I return it with an intensity and fervor matching his. Aware of the slim veil of energy hovering between us, keeping him safe from what, thanks to Roman, has become my lethal DNA, which, also thanks to Roman, won’t be a threat for much longer. Hardly able to believe that the days of what we’ve come to refer to as our almost kiss are so close to being over.
Soon, very soon, we’l be able to live just like everyone else. Able to touch each other openly, freely, without any worries. Like we do in the pavilion—only better, because it’l be real.
Soon we’l embrace as ourselves—our present-tense selves—instead of in our various past-life guises.
I pul away ever so slightly, close my eyes and turn my face to the sky, stealing a moment to send a silent thanks to Roman, wherever he is, for giving us this wonderful gift.
Then just when I’m about to kiss Damen again, his face fal s and he moves out of my reach, answering the question in my inquiring gaze with a curt nod toward Lotus, who kneels at a distance.
She sits at the edge of a pond just a few feet away, her wispy silver strands flowing freely about her, murmuring softly with her hands clasped tightly to her chest. Gazing upon an abundance of lotus blossoms that rise through the murky dark waters to bloom above the surface. Their soft white and pink petals lifting upward, surrounded by shiny green scal op-edged leaves, one popping up right after the other until you can barely see the water for the flowers.
She remains like that for some time. Content to meditate on the wondrous view before her, until she turns to face us, wearing an expression that, while not exactly what I’d cal troubled, hardly matches the flood of triumph Damen and I are currently in the midst of.
Damen’s eyes narrow, his jaw clenches, bracing for whatever bad news he’s sure that she brings.
The two of us cautiously moving toward her, meeting halfway, both of us equal y startled when she rises from the muddy banks, looks at us, and says, “Congratulations.”
We wait. Wait for something to fol ow. But, for a while anyway, that seems to be al .
“You may return to the earth plane if you wish.” She glances back and forth between us.
Damen squeezes my hand, in need of no further prodding. He’s more than ready to leave right now, doesn’t see the point in wasting another second hanging around. But I stand firm. Dig my heels in. Sensing it’s not over yet, there’s something more Lotus is waiting to share.
“You have done wel . Al is in bloom.” She gestures toward the flowers that are stil blossoming, and to the landscape beyond. “You have even freed the lost ones.” She presses her palms together, forming a steeple she holds close to her heart, her simple gold band glinting at us. “And so you are free to leave. Free to return to your immortal lives. Yet, I wonder…”
We look at her, me curious, Damen on guard, fingers curling at his sides.
“I wonder if you wil want to return to your lives after al you have learned. I wonder if you wil choose a life of physical immortality after having learned the truth of the soul.”
Damen rol s his eyes, grunts, and again, tries to haul me away. But I stay right where I am, looking at Lotus when I say, “Are you implying we actual y have a choice?”
She lifts one gnarled old hand, brushes a stray wisp of hair away from her face. “Oh yes,” she says, her gaze moving over me. “There is a choice. A way out.”
I press my lips into a frown, trying to determine just what that might mean. Deciding I don’t like the conclusion I come to, don’t like it at al , when I say, “If you’re referring to death as a way out…” I shake my head, blink a few times, hardly believing she would even dare broach such a thing. “Wel , you can forget it. No way is that happening. I mean, in case you don’t remember, that pretty much results in a one-way ticket to the Shadowland for people like us. And since we did a pretty good job of cleaning up the Shadowland just now, we’d hate to see it resort right back to its old ways. Not to mention how there’s
no guarantee anyone would even show up to release us like we just released Roman, Drina, Haven, and everyone else.” I pause long enough to huff, blow my hair out of my eyes, but not long enough for her to interject. “Also, you should probably know that we have the antidote now—or at least the recipe to make it. Which means we’ve just been handed a whole new reason for living—a real y good reason for living. We have each other forever. We can live the life we’ve always dreamed of. And final y, wel , the whole dying thing is pretty much moot anyway, since I can’t actual y die anymore.
Back when Haven kil ed me, I rose above my weak chakra. I overcame my weakness, made the right decision, and because of it, I came back to join the living. I’m unkillable now.” I lift my shoulders, knowing it may sound weird, but then, weird is al relative here. “I’m a true immortal. Here for the duration. I’m not going anywhere, and I real y prefer that Damen doesn’t go anywhere either.”
“And you?” She turns to Damen, total y unfazed by everything I just said. “Do you agree with this? Do you feel as she does?”
He frowns, glares, teeth gnashing together as he grumbles an unequivocal “Of course I do!” Then he squeezes my hand, eager to leave.
But even though I’m eager to leave too, for the moment, my curiosity’s piqued and I want to see where this leads. Wondering if I might already know when I say, “This way out that you refer to, is this for us or for you?” My eyes narrowing as I recal her earlier words, when she begged me to release her, but from what, she never made clear.
Is she stuck?
A prisoner of the Shadowland but without the glass cage?
The answer coming in the form of her usual riddle when she says, “It is for you, for me, for al of us. Once I learned the truth, I was already too old and frail to make the journey. But now you are here. Returned just for this. I can see it in your eyes, in the light that surrounds you. You are the one. The only one. The fate of many lies in your hands.”
“So … basical y you’re saying that my journey isn’t even close to being finished? That there’s stil a heckuva lot more you expect me to do?” My gaze narrows as I try to determine just how I feel about that, mostly veering toward being very much against it.
She nods, her clumpy old eyes never once leaving mine. “You are so close. It is best to keep going from where you now stand. Where destiny is concerned, each step leads to the next.”
“Oh, sure,” Damen says, the sound of his voice startling me in that it’s even gruffer than I would’ve expected. But to Lotus’s credit, she doesn’t react, doesn’t wince, doesn’t flinch, just continues to stand there, observing him with her usual calm. “Sure, we’l get right on that.” He shakes his head. “Sorry, Lotus, but you’re gonna have to give us a little more to go on. Ever and I have been through the wringer and we came out on top, got the one thing we wanted—the one thing we needed to make our lives complete, and now you think you can just show up, toss another cryptic riddle our way, and steer us out of our much-deserved victory celebration and back into more trouble—trouble that you alone have created?” He glares. “Think again.”
“Seriously,” I add, encouraged by his argument. “Why should we even consider doing this? Why can’t you find someone else, one of the other immortals, maybe? Haven’t we been through enough already?”