Part 19 (1/2)
Brovik sat up, pale hair falling into his eyes. ”Ethan, she's overcome by the bonding.”
Ethan towered over us his expression closed and dark. ”I should never have brought her to you.”
Brovik collapsed back against the mattress laughing, while Ethan pulled on his clothes, and strode from the room. Minutes later, one of the cars screeched out of the tunnel to the ferry slip.
Brovik shrugged as if he were used to it. ”He'll get over it- in two or three decades perhaps.”
”But... ”
”No questions.” He slid into me again. ”Conversation isn't required.”
Brovik wasn't like any man I'd ever encountered. I had a weakness for danger, and he was pure devastation. Ethan could only aspire to his heights.
He insisted I share with him alone, and when I did, a terrifying vision a.s.saulted my psyche. Mist gathered then parted, and in a dawn-red haze, a woman appeared, dressed in flowing gossamer silk, black hair floating about her, as if she was under water. Brovik was there now, bearded, hair long and flowing, dressed in clothes of a long gone age. She slowly raised a knife high above her head, striking a tremor of deep, dark, primal fear. Then, just as suddenly as the vision appeared, it exploded into a ma.s.s of colored dots and was blown away.
Brovik lay on his back panting as I snuggled up to him.
”Who was she? The dark woman?”
He rose up, clutching me by the shoulders. ”You saw a woman? What else did you see?”
I evaded his question. ”Just a woman.”
”Does Ethan know you can see in the blood?”
”Can't everyone- every Immortyl Immortyl that is?” that is?”
”It's a rare gift. I've known only one other who possessed it.”
”Ethan says they're hallucinations.”
His eyes veiled. ”Have you discussed this with any other Immortyl Immortyl?”
”No, it seems rather, well, personal.”
”Keep this secret. It is best others don't know.”
”Why?”
”It could bring you harm.”
I remembered the terror gripping Brovik because of this woman, and sensed wheels turning in his ancient brain. He abruptly rose, pulling on his clothing as I retrieved my own from the floor. His room was a surprisingly spare and tidy place. The furnis.h.i.+ngs were spa.r.s.e, the large low bed covered in plain white quilts and sheets, a small chest for clothes, two chairs and a small radio. A telescope and some instruments of navigation sat on a small plain table. Books were arranged on a low shelf, mostly about birds, animals and the sea. No poets for Brovik. No starry-eyed dreamers to borrow from. Brovik was was poetry. poetry.
He stood by the window, holding his hand out to me. ”Come, let me show you something.” I joined him and he put his arm around my shoulders, gesturing out to the beautiful night. The tower was gla.s.s on all sides so that the sky was visible for three hundred and sixty degrees. The strange light of the aurora played over his features. His eyes looked far beyond and into the past.
His head tilted slightly back, the straight fair hair falling back from his brow as he spoke, ”Our Ethan has reached a crucial time in his existence. After a hundred years all ties to the mortal past have died away. The survivors gone, the times change; nothing looks or sounds or feels the same. He mourns the children he left behind, the infant sons he hardly knew. They grew into men, grew old, and are now dead and gone. He clings to what has slipped beyond his grasp.” He turned to face me. ”It's all dust you see, and gone, poof, into thin air.” He gestured again to the snow-covered pines, the fiord fiord and sea beyond. ”This is eternity, Mia. It will continue when even we are dust. Ethan cannot love this earth as we do. He's doomed to seek the unattainable. He blames me for his sorrows, although when I encountered him he was desperate to leave his world behind. I tried to persuade him not to buy the house, too many ghosts there, but you know how stubborn he is.” and sea beyond. ”This is eternity, Mia. It will continue when even we are dust. Ethan cannot love this earth as we do. He's doomed to seek the unattainable. He blames me for his sorrows, although when I encountered him he was desperate to leave his world behind. I tried to persuade him not to buy the house, too many ghosts there, but you know how stubborn he is.”
”I live with a shadow.” I lifted his hand to my lips. ”Let me stay here.”
”Kurt would enjoy company his own age.”
”What was that comment about following someone to a funeral pyre?”
He smiled, drawing his hand away. ”I was trying to get his goat as you say. An Old Norse burial rite- when one of our important people died, his slaves were gathered together. It was asked of them, 'Who will go with him?' Usually a slave girl agreed to go. She was sacrificed and buried with him.”
Why was I shocked? ”She volunteered? Why?”
”Who can say, perhaps she loved her master so much that she could not bear to be parted from him?”
”Maybe they drugged her?”
He chuckled, picking up a small, carved wooden box from which he removed a golden ring. ”Come. See what I have for you.”
He dropped a ring engraved with a pattern of interlocking circles into my open palm. ”It's a symbol of my people, meaning unity,” he said, slipping it onto my finger. It fit perfectly. ”All members of my house have them.”
I thought of the sewer rats on the beach, and the markings on them, suddenly the ring's weight felt oppressive. He shut the box and stood, unreadable, mysterious, and serene, reaching out to take my head between his hands. Terrified, I looked up into his eyes. My breath came harder. How many times had I been told to beware him? Yet, I found myself falling under his spell.
His fingers brushed over my face. ”Don't be frightened, Bird of Prey Bird of Prey. Tell me how this game evolved?”
”Ethan got the idea from the Ibsen play he saw me in. It became his life's work.”
”We needn't be rivals, Mia.”
He ma.s.saged my temples with his fingertips. My eyes closed for a half-second, then opened full on his calm blue gaze. I stared at him, open-mouthed, forgetting all the careful training of my senses, completely captivated. The sight, sound, taste, and smell of him, drew me. Wasn't this what Ethan cautioned against? His lips parted, tongue lightly moistening them. His breath warmed my skin. I longed for that mouth all over my body.
His fingers traced the line of my brow bone, down over my nose. ”Understand, I'm the moon and you're the tide, without my favor you cease to be, but if you do as you're told, go smoothly, and don't make waves, my love and favor are yours. There's work for you. After the council forbid us to pursue science, Gaius swore he'd work together with me for this cause, but I suspect greed recently got the better of him. Through Kurt's contacts with the little rats, we've learned that Gaius has abducted many of their number, and many s.h.i.+pments of an unknown nature have been made to the Palazzo. It could be nothing, Gaius is a great collector of art as well as flesh, but if he's my compet.i.tor I must know. He's recently made another offer for you. Dirk is coming into his portion, and Gaius wishes to bestow on him the gift he most covets. Your power to see in the blood is an a.s.set to this house. Go with Ethan, as if he intended to negotiate a settlement with them, and then contrive to be alone with Dirk. Use your gift to uncover information. In the end, Ethan will refuse Gaius's offer... ”
”Dirk will hurt me. Nothing gets him off like my pain.”
”Don't fear.” I fell under the spell of maddening stroking of my temples, struggling to retain my will. ”Nothing will harm you. You have my promise. I know your deepest desire.” He slashed his wrist, pressing it to my lips. His consciousness poured out, filling me along with his blood. I reached out to catch the rays s.h.i.+ning from his face. ”See what I will give you... ”
Kurt, as I first saw him, in the moonlight on the terrace, the G.o.d of love, surrounded in cascades of roses. His hand stretched out and I went to him. He was too real to be mere fantasy. I smelled his blood and heard his heartbeat. I was no longer in the tower room but somewhere on a beach with him, waves rus.h.i.+ng as a brilliant, blood-red sun rose before us.
Brovik's voice insinuated itself around my brain. ”My boy is beautiful. Feel him inside you.” Kurt's smooth fingers and mouth caressed my skin. His hands cupped my b.r.e.a.s.t.s. I bore his light weight, his teeth and tongue on my throat as he moved inside me. ”Imagine a world, where the two of you would be free.”
I shook and shuddered with pleasure. ”Yes-s-s!”
”Do as I say and it will be so. Mia!”
I blinked my eyes. Kurt was gone. I met Brovik's steady gaze, fully aware of what had just transpired, but not quite sure if it was just my imagination.
He nodded to me. ”It's nearly morning. Ethan will be back soon.”
”I'm afraid... ”
”I'll protect you. Go, do as I say.”