I looked at him, ready to throw my arms around his neck, but I restrained myself. “Thank you,” I whispered, hot tears pushing against my eyelids, “I know we have to go back…. I want to go back for the sake of…. Thank you.”
His eyes bore into mine, asking me a silent question that made my heart flutter and my stomach clench in distress. I held my breath and shook my head, dispelling the silly tears and the nagging feeling of disappointment that caught in my throat. This was what I needed. I needed to see Avalon and Jericho and get away from the castle. Get away from Kiran.
“So will you be back to pick me up in a few days?” I asked. I unbuckled my seatbelt and reached for the door handle.
“I am staying with you,” Kiran replied carefully. He unbuckled his seatbelt too and stepped out of the car.
“Why? Won’t you be bored?” I pressed, hoping he would take a hint. I scrambled from the low passenger’s seat of the sports car and followed him to the front door.
“Uh, no,” he laughed, only I didn’t catch the joke.
“How do you know where the safe house is anyway?” I demanded as we reached the door.
Kiran pressed his palm against a gold doorknocker and I watched the protective magic flare under his hand, turn a deep shade of gray and then heard the lock click open. He opened the door for me, letting me pass by him. We stood in an empty entryway. I slipped off my silver gladiator sandals on the red tiled floor and then turned to face Kiran again. The pull of finding my brother and Jericho tugged at my heart, but the need to put the pieces of a puzzle together tugged harder.
“And how did your magic work in the door?” I crossed my arms defiantly, requiring an answer.
Heavy footsteps on the stairs overhead alerted us that they knew we were here. Kiran stepped into me, placing a tender hand against my waist. He leaned his lips to my ear and whispered coarsely, “Shouldn’t you be off to find Jericho by now?”
I shivered from his hot breath against my skin and then closed my eyes to shut him out. I moved around him before opening my eyes and when I did Jericho stood in front of me, watching me with heartbroken eyes and a flushed face. I knew Avalon stood behind him, and others that wanted to greet me, but my heart soared at Jericho’s handsome face in front of mine. His hair had grown out again, not long like when I first met him, more like when Talbott brought him to me in Peru. His dark locks lay across his forehead haphazardly, and his hazel eyes darkened with a restrained danger when they flickered from me to Kiran. A five o’clock shadow roughened his face, obscuring his endearing dimple.
I could feel his frustration, his anxiety at how he came upon Kiran and me. I knew there would be explaining to do later, excuses to be made. But not now, not when the joy of seeing him and of being able to touch him, burst in my heart. I threw my arms around his neck, pressing my body against him and releasing my magic to find his. There was only a moment of hesitation with my magic when I had to redirect it from finding Kiran’s to mingling with Jericho’s, but I prayed nobody but me noticed. Nobody except Kiran, whose magic for the briefest moment leapt into suffocating happiness at the prospect of reuniting willingly with mine.
I buried my face in Jericho’s neck, inhaling him, letting myself become consumed with him and then I closed my eyes against the rest of the world, against everything we were up against and breathed him and only him. His arms went around my waist, holding me to him, protecting me from everything else, reminding me of everything that should be in this world and wasn’t.
I didn’t lift my head to kiss him; I couldn’t, not in front of all these people…. Not when the charade I played with Kiran on a daily basis felt sadistically close to cheating. Not when Kiran stood only a few feet away watching us. I pushed myself impossibly closer to Jericho, and pushed Kiran out of my head all together.
Avalon cleared his throat from behind Jericho, but it was Jericho that let go first. I looked up into those hazel eyes before I left his arms, promising that I loved him, offering my heart to him silently, and giving him reassurance that I remained his. He didn’t return my intensity, he didn’t promise me the same things, but he did look lovingly back, his expression softened and his lips turned upward into a confident smile.
Confident-ish smile.
“Like we don’t talk every day!” I grumbled, letting Avalon pull me into an affectionate hug.
“Yeah, only when we talk it’s all, how do I get out of this basement dungeon, Avalon? And what’s the best way to attack the Citadel?” he mocked me in his best impression of my voice. I had to laugh at the high pitched squealing meant to sound like me.
“Avalon!” I gasped, pushing away from him and punching him in the arm before I gave Kiran a sidelong glance at the reference to attacking the castle.
“Oh, good grief,” Avalon rolled his eyes, but I could feel that he didn’t mean the sarcastic gesture for me.
I moved from Avalon to Silas and then Gabriel, both of whom I could feel wanting to say something deep and prophetic, but I didn’t stay long enough to hear it. There would be time for ominous warnings and vague life lessons later; right now I just wanted to relish in the happiness of being surrounded by people I loved and nothing else.
Rosalind and Lilly’s father Allister, who I had never met before, greeted me. Allister was a very good looking man with a thick red scruff of a beard and wavy vibrant red hair. Pale and freckled, his indigo eyes sparkled and his face danced with expression. I wanted to ask the details of how he escaped prison, but now was not the time. Not in front of Kiran.
I took Jericho’s hand after I greeted everyone and he led me upstairs to a kitchen and eating area. Angelica stood from an oak, roughly made table as soon as I entered the room and rushed to me. She wrapped her frail arms around my shoulders and held me close to her. I nearly wept at our reunion. I hadn’t seen her in so long, I hadn’t looked into her brilliant violet eyes and let her make me feel small and childlike in way too long. When she finally let me go, tears dampened her cheeks and she didn’t release my hand, but patted it motherly, and led me to the table where a small boy of maybe eight, sat eating a cabbage roll stuffed with ground meat.
I sat down next to him and smiled kindly. His big gray eyes grew large and the cabbage roll stopped halfway to his mouth. Jericho joined me at the table while Angelica fixed a plate of food and set it down in front of me before I could object.
“What’s your name?” I asked the boy who still stared, mouth hanging half open.
“Eden, this is Tristan,” Jericho explained, introducing me to the little boy who nodded in reply, cabbage roll suspended in midair. “Tristan joined us a month ago, he’s been adopted by all of us,” Jericho explained and I understood that the child was an orphan. My heart broke for him and his unexplained circumstances. I would have to ask Jericho later.
“And is everyone nice to you?” I asked Tristan, hoping to draw him into conversation. He nodded enthusiastically, a smile spreading across his face. “Even Avalon?” I gasped pretending disbelief when Avalon walked into the kitchen and sat down at the table with us.
Tristan laughed out loud at that and Avalon stuck his tongue out at the little boy playfully. Kiran followed Avalon to the table and Angelica quickly brought over a plate of food for him too. He smiled up at her and thanked her and she patted him affectionately on the head.
Their exchange bothered me, Kiran’s whole presence bothered me, and it was more than how everyone treated him like he was their friend; it was his familiarity with the house, with everyone, with…. The Resistance. But nothing compared to the fear that swept over me when Tristan saw Kiran for the first time. His overly large gray eyes lit up and a true smile spread across his small face. He stood up from his food immediately and went to greet Kiran.
Kiran exchanged a secret handshake with the young boy before messing up his floppy dark brown hair and sending him back to his seat encouraging him to finish the meal Angelica made for him. Tristan obeyed, but had a very hard time keeping his hero-worshipping eyes off Kiran.
Once Kiran sat down the table fell into awkward silence, while those of us with plates of food ate quietly. I felt the tension radiating off Jericho next to me, so I ate faster hoping to be able to remove us from the kitchen as soon as I finished.
After a few more moments of silence, Tristan leaned into me and whispered bravely in a gentle Romanian accent, “Do you like football?”
I turned to him, beaming with the opportunity to answer his question, but before I could reply Kiran jumped in for me, “I think she calls it soccer, Tristan.”
Tristan looked at me in disbelief, but inwardly Kiran’s clarification cleared up a lot of questions for me. “I’ve only played it once,” I admitted, remembering with reluctance the Indian village and the eager, beautiful children that convinced me to play with them in the middle of the street.
“And she was wretched!” Kiran crowed from across the table, laughing at the shared memory. I blushed with his familiarity of my past and slipped my hand into Jericho’s. “I’ll play with you after dinner, if you’re looking for a worthy opponent, but only if I get Avalon on my team. I want it to be a fair fight,” Kiran scolded, alluding to the boy’s extraordinary skill. I wanted to smile at Kiran’s ability to make children feel special and worthy of all his attention, but I couldn’t get over my irritation with him.
“That doesn’t seem fair,” I crowed, “Avalon is a notorious cheater!” I excluded Kiran on purpose and spoke teasingly with Tristan. “I would love to be on your team if you’d let me!” Tristan nodded his head excitedly and I felt for a moment that I won that exchange.
“Oh, sorry to disappoint, Eden, but you’re busy this evening. Isn’t that right, Jericho?” Kiran questioned Jericho pointedly. Jericho didn’t respond, but his hand clenched mine in frustration. “Don’t worry, my boy, we’ll make do without her.”
“Another time?” I turned to Tristan, hopeful. He smiled at me, a forgiving, accepting smile and I felt warmed by his generous optimism.
“Are you finished?” Jericho asked politely.
“Yes, I am,” I answered, fidgeting nervously under the table. It had been a while since we were alone.
“Do you want to get out of here?” he asked quietly.
Before I answered, I glanced at Kiran with expectant eyebrows asking permission to be excused, from force of habit. Kiran looked back confused and I dropped my head into my hands embarrassed. The whole table caught the exchange, especially Jericho. He jerked, his back going rigid and his jaw set stubbornly. I felt his frustration stronger than ever and all I wanted to do was crawl under a rock and hide there until Jericho forgot I asked my ex-boyfriend’s permission to leave the room with my current boyfriend.
“I need to get out of the castle more often,” I mumbled, trying to make light of the situation.
“So she has to ask your permission just to leave a room?” Jericho spat at Kiran, standing from the table.
“Obviously, her situation at the Citadel is complicated,” Kiran explained patiently.