“The time was sealed,” Gwinn repeated.
“None of it made sense and once I was aware I never remembered saying it. I didn’t remember anything.”
“Evanthe tell you about the faith?” Gwinn knew Reveca wouldn’t have. King was right before her, so was Dagen and now her and Adair—and Reveca still gave no notion she believed, really believed, in Escorts or dark Gods.
“She told me about a prophecy. The fall of dark Gods. In all truth she wasn’t concerned with the name I said or whatever births or passes would occur—she cared about the last line. ‘The time was sealed.’” He looked down at her. “According to Evanthe, time could not be sealed. She said it flowed forward and backward, it never stilled.”
“It can be,” Gwinn said, feeling a shiver race down her spine.
“What?”
Gwinn shook her head to clear it. “The spirit in the house is relentless, she—it—has something to say but will speak to anyone but me about it. Cash told me to read these books. I only got through the first bit before Adair woke.” She looked back at him. “It talked about fated time, but it also spoke of Voyagers.”
“And what are they?”
“Bad ass,” Gwinn said matter-of-factly.
Shade breathed a grin.
“I’m serious. I’ll have to read more but it sounded like time travel, but more so appointed time travel. Seal time.”
“Why though? Why alter what is to be?” Shade asked with a glance to the water, the water that never stilled. It moved as the entire world did, as all energy did.
“Well, apparently, evil or talented souls can travel through time, stop events that would wave through time. They can cheat, fix the game.”
“Really?” he said in a tone clearly stating it all sounded like fairytales to him but he was willing to humor her.
“It had a lot to do with fated time and people. I think a Voyager could seal time, make it to where it was going to happen, no matter what the dark forces said—the birth or pass would occur, meaning those births or whatever would live out their fate, appointed time, and the evil could not stop it, take the easy way out, you know?”
Shade furrowed his brow. “You trying to make a hero outta me?”
A shy smile, then, “You don’t need help there.” She looked back to the water. “I don’t know. I can imagine though, what if you were a Voyager? What if you made it right somewhere in time and because you did those souls will rise when they are meant to—Xavier will fall.”
“And after I was stabbed, through the back, mind you, I gathered my swamp house and appeared on a bank bleeding out, waiting for a witch to row by and hale all powerful immortal witches to save my ass.”
Gwinn shrugged one shoulder. “I’ve heard of stranger things.” She tilted her head, looking at the home. “It doesn’t really look like a swamp house. It was on the water somewhere though,” she said, evaluating the impressively high stilts the house was on.
She moved off the bike. Shade followed at a distance, enjoying watching her and the only thing that had always been his, his only connection to a forgotten past, side by side.
He only nodded to the area he had appeared. Gwinn went to the exact place and looked down as if she were there, guarding his body until the witches came for him.
“There are no accidents, Shade. Even pain leads us onward.”
Maybe so, he thought as he took her hand and led her inside.
Chapter Two
Shade wasn’t sure why she was so tense as they moved up the dock. He assumed she wasn’t ready to be this secluded with him. No matter how bold she said she was.
When he opened the door, she gripped him as if she feared he’d vanish then she let out a breath as they stepped in the main room.
When Shade knew he wouldn’t be back for a while, due to the rainy season, or stuff with the Club, he always sealed this place up tight. It was always hot, dusty, and sticky by the time he returned.
Not now though.
It almost looked as if Reveca utilized therapeutic cleaning on his lair. The windows were open, the fans were on low, the air was moving and felt just right. There wasn’t a sign of dust across the entire place. There were hundreds of candles burning low against the stone walls.
“Stone. I told you,” Gwinn said, taking in the room. “Not built for the swamp, built to last.”
Shade appraised her stare, wondering how she knew the stone was original. He’d added rooms over the years, expanded what was there, for no real reason beyond just wanting to put his energy somewhere. Not all the walls were stone, just the main one that divided the home and the outer ones. The others were wood, some parts were log, others were planks, all materials he found locally.
The floor was stone at one time. He’d covered it with hardwood.
Thanks to Evanthe, the home was well furnished. Most of the pieces accented the swamp life, eccentrically made from rare logs.
There was no T.V, no radio, nothing electrical really. Candles gave light if he wanted it. In all truth with his immortal vision and the natural light of the night he could see just fine without them. Pumps purified the water he needed.
There was a kitchen, of sorts. Originally the home didn’t have one. Evanthe added one long ago when she was furnishing the place for him. There were cut outs for a stove and a fridge. The fridge was all he had though, and its power was a generator he only used to keep his beer cold. It was running now, so he was sure Reveca had stocked him and Gwinn up.
There was a vast living space on the first level, broken up only by a library. Further in there were two smaller bedrooms.
The second floor was the master bedroom. The level, at least the deck, reached out over the bottom, made the home look all the stranger, even top heavy at first glance.
Before he could give Gwinn the nickel tour, she walked to the stone wall and put her hand on it. “The heat, see it holds the heat, naturally.”
Shade lifted his brow. He supposed it did. “Must be why it’s so damn hot when it’s closed up.”
Gwinn’s gaze was searching in every direction. Her dream had never allowed her in the house, but it all seemed like…home.
“The element doesn’t make much sense for a swamp,” she agreed with a lifted brow. “Wonder where the house was before.”
A grin burst across his lips. He was humored by her theory, but that was about all. GranDee, the first one, was an amazing woman but Shade was sure she spent too much time talking to her spirits. She had to have overlooked the home before; it was easy to get lost in the swamp, more so then than now.
“Nothing was in here?” Gwinn asked. “When they found you?”
“There was stuff, all waterlogged.”
“Save any of it?” Gwinn asked hopefully.
“I didn’t, I don’t know if they did—I doubt it. Those first few years…they were a haze.”
Gwinn didn’t doubt it. Witches may be cleaning fools but they also knew essence was powerful. The first thing she would have done if she were GranDee would have been a revealing spell, seen what this home had seen in its past. Even a glimpse would reveal so much.
“Was it the transition or the suspicion you were under?”
“Both,” he admitted, walking to the fridge and pulling out two ice-cold beers. He opened them both and handed her one.
“I stayed here for a good while, almost six months. Reveca came and went. GranDee came every dawn and stayed for a few hours. Evanthe…she didn’t really leave.”
Gwinn was starting to grow jealous of Bastion’s mother, Thrash’s lover.
“A natural mother. I can vouch for that,” Shade said, not even sensing a hint of disdain. “She tested me daily. I figured out later she was testing history against my knowledge, striving to understand where I emerged from.”
“What kind of test?”
Shade slid out of his kut as he answered, a sight that quickened Gwinn’s heart. She knew he meant to stay here, alone with her, no chance of distraction, for a while. “La
nguage. I could ride a horse—I was a damn good horseman, but I called them ‘flights,’ little things like that. I was battle trained, scars that the transition took away said as much, so did the sword to sword fights with Reveca.” He lifted his brow. “Never go sword to sword with her—ever.”
Gwinn giggled as she took a long drink. She was tempted to swallow all of it to calm her nerves.
Shade was by no means crowding her or suggestive, but still, she felt the air popping with the vibration of them. He leaned against the table as if he had all the time in the world and went on. “They’d try to get me to do magic, well, GranDee would. Reveca wouldn’t have it. I think I failed their tests,” he said with a lifted brow. ‘Ain’t no kinda witch in this boy,’ is what GranDee would say.”
Gwinn giggled more, almost not swallowing her next swig.
“I adapted fast,” he said, glancing around the room. “Almost too quickly from the way Reveca looked at me. My odd words vanished. I was told once it’s called a horse, this is a saddle, and then repeated the way I had said it before. The odd accent they said I had faded. Writing, reading—the English language, it took me days. French, Spanish, and so on, days.”
“You sat out here and learned languages?”
“No, they were trying to match my words. They reached far back in time. The words just stayed. I saw it, I knew it.”
Shade dared to blush when he saw her eyes light up. It was a trait they both shared—knowledge. Neither could get enough of it. In all truth, though, for a long while, as he battled his own curses, learning wasn’t a priority—getting from one moment to the next was.
He glanced over her, his Ol’ Lady, standing in his lair, and thanked every God he knew of that the next part of his story played out the way it had.
“I was all alone one day, it was hot as hell. I was debating on the water. Wondering if there were secrets in it, if something of mine was just below the surface…and what else was below the surface. Then at all at once I felt a cold blade against my neck.”
Gwinn gasped as if it were happening now. “I was armed but only with a small blade. I raised my hands as a distraction. I was sure I could overpower any mortal who had the mind to rob me.” He smirked, took a deep drink. “When I turned, and aimed to take the weapon, I discovered, once I could not remove the weapon from his death grip, I was not fighting a mortal.”
Shade lifted his chin and grinned as if he were reciting an old family Christmas tale, all the while Gwinn’s heart was racing.
“Talon grinned, then it was on. He threw his weapon down. I threw my knife down. I knew then at least the man I was fighting had honor.
“We tore this swamp up. Trees fell, gators slid away, snakes hissed, moss fell, our clothes were ripped we were covered in mud. The fight went on for hours—literally. Blood remained over our wounds that closed not long after they were made—it was an all out war. The first fight I’d ever been in on this side of life and it was the first time I felt—vindicated, right. Fighting. It was my language.
“All at once the fight led us back to where we started and I found his sword. He slipped in the mud giving me my opening. I had the blade to his throat.” He laughed. “Then I heard a course of deep laughs and looked up to see the others: Talley, Steele, Rush, Judge, Thames, Thrash, Echo—all of them laughing. They distracted me, because the next thing I knew I was in the mud, and Talon had his blade to my throat.”
Gwinn gasped, but Shade kept his grin.
“‘What are you doing locked away in the swamp with my woman, Son,’ he’d said. I carefully said, ‘I vow GranDee and I are strictly platonic. Honor intact.’ Talon roared with laughter, so did the others.
“He asked, ‘And your other caregivers?’” Shade held the suspense by taking a long drink. “My response was simple: ‘Fierce as hell. Tread carefully. The blonde is vicious.’
“Talon stood, pulled me up and asked ‘Are you ready to go home?’ Relief overcame me. I asked if he knew who I was. He said, ‘Yes, you’re a Son.’ Then ‘Honor your brothers, your family. Always.’ Reveca stepped out of the swamp ‘bout then, and gave me a slight grin.
“Later, after more vows and rituals Reveca had set in place, and a long, less public conversation with Talon I was inked. I was a Pentacle Son, home.” He lifted a brow. “The baby until Cash popped up.”
“And your past was left to question? Nothing more?”
He shrugged. “Judge and me were hip to hip for a while. He schooled me on the Sons but also tried to see into my mind. Thames gave it a go. I think they thought with time it would come up, a dream or something would make sense.”
“And nothing did?”
Shade stood up, walked slowly to her, looked down carefully searching her gaze. “Six generations later something happened.”
“What?” she whispered, feeling her heart pick up.
“You.” Shade’s expression hardened, only because he remembered what he was doing the moment Reveca arrived with Gwinn’s dying body and the news of the second GranDee’s death.
“Time stopped,” he said. “There was a rush to get Talon and all, but time stopped. I felt you,” his hand reached for her chest, to where he could hear her pounding heart, “a vibration of life, a pull. You were there, nude, immersed in the water, an angel.” He swallowed nervously. “I had this urge to tell them all to get away. To tell Reveca to leave you and pull you to me and hold you, breathe for the first time since I came here.” His fingertip ushered a lock of her hair behind her ear.
“When Cash pushed me out of the room, later when I watched you in your fitful sleep, I was furious at you. I was more furious at you in that moment than when I thought you and King had something going on.”
Gwinn’s eyes shifted to green, a revealing color, what was seen when her emotions were not under control.
Shade went on. “I was mad you waited til’ then. The way I think, what I know—it was fastened to today.” His thumb grazed her cheekbone. “I stared at you as you slept and I knew if I was the man I was when I awoke in this life, when I was straddling two spectrums—I’d get you. I’d understand this pull you have, this awareness you give me.” He sighed as grief glinted in his gaze. “But after generations of being a Son, of balancing my enhancements, of getting from one point to the next…I didn’t get you. I still don’t.”
Gwinn reached for his hand, cupping it gently in hers. “You do though.”
His eyes, now lavender, rapidly searched hers, and kept doing so as he lowered his head. It wasn’t until his lips were upon hers he closed them, and as he did he groaned.
Her kiss would bring any man to his knees, the sheer vibration of her rocked him, stirred him.
She was the one who deepened the kiss. Apparently she was absolute on proving her opening argument—she was bold. He hoped she kept to it. He never knew how strong he was until he was forced to exercise restraint around her.
Her hands slid up his chest and his cascaded down her back. “Tell me you’re sure,” he said against her lips. He could taste her desire, her excitement. Fear was there, mild as ever but it was present.
She deepened her kiss then slid her lips across his jaw. Stopping just beside his ear she whispered, “Break me, Shade…make me yours.”
He was sure his chest caved in, a drowning man had just found some kind of air, the weight of the world was lifted from him—he had found heaven.
His hand fell lower, grasping her thighs then spreading them as he lifted her around him.
Immortal speed took him as far as the short staircase, then he had to pause, kiss her deeper and push his body against her. When he felt her nails slide down his neck he moved again, this time he made it all the way up the stairs, landing them in the open loft.
The stone walls were alit with candles in red and white glasses. In center of the room, under a wide-bladed fan was a bed before a doorway leading to the deck. The white sheets moved ever so subtly with the air in the room, and the flames danced.
Shade set her d
own. He broke their kiss. Carefully, holding her stare, he pulled the lace top from her, his fingertips brushing her smooth, dark skin as he did so.
Chills raced across her flesh but she made no move to cover herself.
He reached behind her, unclasping her bra with one swift move, a clear sign he was well experienced in this act.
His heavy, able hands skirted across her chest, his eyes flickered with desire as the peaks of her nipples rose to meet the palm of his hands.
His deft hands dropped to her belt, carefully unfastening. “I rather miss your sundresses,” he dared to quip.
Gwinn only barely smiled. She wanted to undress him, to touch him, but she was too caught in the moment, almost as if she were a bystander deep inside, watching this man worship her body.
He’d unclasped her belt, the button, and now the zipper. “Though the new challenge is appealing,” he said gruffly as his hand slid over her mound, gliding across her folds.
They had been here before; this was about as far as Shade would go. The boy would kiss her until she was dizzy, rush his hands all over, but that was all.
Every time he touched her he caused a volcano of energy to erupt inside her—so powerful her legs would shake, her toes would curl, and her breath would stop. He always kissed and touched her until she felt a burn soar through her, then he’d stop—leaving her wanting more.
In the very beginning, when she finally broke his barrier down and made a move on him, her body was quick to rush to the unexplainable feeling, so much so she was sure it amused him, either that or her innocence and lack of experience all together did.
It was a mind game, a hard one, but she had been learning to hold herself back. She knew if she did, his touch would go on and on. Exaltation would fill the air. The vibration of them would numb the soul into sweet oblivion.
Of course, the last time her marathon of holding back the rush was over a week ago, before he left for his post guarding Chalice. Not feeling his touch for so long made these confident sways of his hand, which seemed to know her body better than her, all the more erotic.