Centaur Legacy (33 page)

Tears had already welled up in her
eyes, her voice no more than a whisper, “So, you don’t want
me?”

I closed my eyes. I couldn’t look back
into hers, and I couldn’t admit the truth. If I told her how I
felt, she would choose me. I couldn’t let her give up her future
for me. For the first time, it hit me: if we were to become
betrothed, regardless of who made it so, both our lives would be in
serious danger. I would willingly accept the risk, but I couldn’t
let her squander her future. “I didn’t say that. I said I’ve made
peace with my decision. You don’t have to feel sorry for me. I’m
going to be fine.”

“Beau, I don’t feel sorry for you. I
don’t have a misguided sense of duty. I don’t have an obscure
obligation that I feel I owe you. Don’t you see? I care about
you.”

“You hardly know me.”

Her hands went to her hips, her brows
furrowed; her voice was strong and unyielding, scolding me. “I know
more than you might think.”

I hated it when people assumed they
knew me. We’d spent very little time together. How could she claim
to know me? I challenged her without meaning to. “Really? What do
you think you know?”

“I know your father tried to pay
another Centaur for his daughter’s choice.” I’d never told anyone
that. The only people who knew were my dad and me. I’d refused an
arranged marriage for the same reason I hated the third tenant.
“Her father accepted the bribe, and when you found out, you called
her father; you told him to keep the money and his daughter. You
knew he needed the money, and you knew his daughter would have
married you out of obligation to her family.”

She paused waiting for me to say she
was wrong. She wasn’t, but it made me uncomfortable that she could
have known about any of it. “I know your friend Daniel didn’t start
out as your friend. The only reason you ever spoke to him was to
keep him safe from your father. You moved out to the west coast to
prove to him that not all Centaurs are unfeeling and pre-programmed
to be jerks. I know the day you pulled me from the burning car, you
were furious that my betrothed died, because you felt he had more
to live for than you did.”

I shouted, “Enough!” I couldn’t listen
to her romanticizing my decisions or my thoughts. “Lacey, I’m not
going to force you to marry me. You’re free. Your life is your
own.” I put my back to her and walked away.

The strength in her voice never
wavered, “You see, Beau, that’s the part that sucks about this gift
I have.” Her words stopped me in my tracks, and without wanting to,
my body involuntarily turned back to hear her, “I can see visions
of things that are going to happen. I can read minds as easily as I
can read the written words in a book, but I can’t see how you feel
about me.”

I mouthed the words because my voice
refused to work, “Lacey, don’t.”

“I’ve made my choice, but if I say it
out loud and you decline, it will break my heart.” She closed the
distance between us as she spoke, “I cared for my lost betrothed.
He was a good Centaur and would have made a fine husband. But he
didn’t have what you have. He wasn’t noble.”

Shaking my head, I felt my shoulders
slump. “I promise you, I’m not noble.”

Her hand softly cupped my face, as her
voice quieted, “More noble than you may think. The pettiness of the
Centaur ways are beneath you. You won’t grovel. You won’t oblige
underhandedness. You’re better than that.”

I didn’t know what to say.
My voice wouldn’t respond, and even if it worked, I wouldn’t have
known what to say. My hands started to tremble. I couldn’t walk
away a second time. I heard my own voice echo in my head:
Do not give up the gift, that which is due
you
. The seven tenants were drilled into us
from the time we could speak. I winced when I realized I was a
breath away from claiming her. If she said another word, I wouldn’t
be able to stop myself. I
would
claim her as mine.

Her nervous smile eased, her lips
opened, and I heard the words I believed I would never hear, “I
choose you, Beau.”

Her words echoed in my mind as if she’d
spoken them in the Grand Canyon. I could feel my chest swell, a
heat radiated from me inside out, and I fell to my knee. Lacey
offered me her hands as I knelt next to her and gave the sacred
betrothal pledge. “Lacey, you are mine. I promise to protect you. I
promise always to put your needs before mine. I promise I’ll never
let you go to bed angry, and you’ll never wake up alone. I promise
to love you the rest of my life, and when this life is over, I’ll
spend my eternity in the pasture with you.”

She smiled, and I felt as though I
needed to shield my eyes from her beauty. Lacey gently tugged on my
hands, letting me know I should stand. When I did, I realized it
had been more than just the two of us in the dimly lit hotel
lounge. Her father, along with my brother Bart, had just witnessed
the whole thing.

Bart is the next oldest eligible
Centaur in our family, and although we’d never openly discussed it,
I got the distinct feeling that he understood my desires to leave
Centaur life behind and start a new life as a human. My decision to
leave allowed me to escape the state of perpetual waiting. Bart was
twenty-six and had another four years worth of potential
rejections.

Bart had always been a Centaur of few
words. We five brothers looked strikingly similar, so when people
described him, it would always be, “You know, the quiet one. . .”
He came to me with his right hand extended. As we clasped hands, he
reached around with his other arm and pulled me into a
bone-crushing embrace. In the previous twelve months, I’d heard
Bart speak fewer than thirty words. I was surprised when his
embrace was accompanied by, “Beau, you can come home. None of us
could stand to be apart from you. Come back to South Carolina with
us. Bring Lacey.”

I wasn’t sure which one had surprised
me more: the choice by Lacey that I couldn’t have seen coming if it
were written on the Sears Tower, or the heartfelt congratulations
from a brother who cared more about my decision to leave the
Centaur way behind than I would ever have guessed.

Lacey’s father was affronted by our
exchange. “What have you done?” His gaze fixed on his daughter, but
his hollow words were directed at me. “You’ve just sentenced her to
death.”

Without thinking, I leaped in front of
Lacey. I could feel the muscles near my eyes flex and my nostrils
flair, “She is mine.”

Her father pleaded, “Beau, don’t do
this to her. They’ll be looking for you. You won’t escape
them.”

I understood his painful words. He was
right. By choosing to remain a Centaur and accepting Lacey’s
choice, we would now be targets of those seeking the Lost Herd. The
blaze that had radiated in my body turned to embers. I turned to
face her to try to find a speck of regret looking back at
me.

I only saw her unshakable strength,
“Beau, I knew the risks. I chose you. You are mine.” My upbringing
taught me to keep a distance. Touching, even while betrothed, was
frowned upon – but I couldn’t stop myself. I gathered Lacey in my
arms and cradled her head against my chest. I willed the world to
spin without us, to let me stand here in her embrace.

Her father interrupted us, “If you care
for her at all, you’ll let her go. You’ll break your pledge and
never set eyes on her again. Do it now, before anyone finds out.”
Lacey looked up into my eyes: my heart was hers. It would always be
hers.

If I broke my pledge here, now, she had
a chance of a life with another. As a Centaur, I could only make
that pledge once. There were no do-overs for Centaurs. Centaurides
could accept a betrothal pledge and change their minds after, but
the Centaur would never be able to force the pledge a second time.
The bond was once in a lifetime.

I had asked Drake about it when we were
searching for Cami. He told me he had accepted Bianca’s proposal,
but he never gave her the pledge. Centaurs were never psychic, but
he knew his best friend Gage wanted to give her his
pledge.

I considered her father’s words. If I
broke my pledge, I would still be tied to her for eternity and
could protect her on earth. It was the only responsible thing to
do. I had to let her father take her home, give her a chance at
life. I opened my mouth, but the words refused to escaped
me.

Lacey, no doubt reading my thoughts,
pushed back away from my embrace, “Don’t you dare!” Her words
startled me, and whatever words I was trying to form vanished in
front of us all. She continued, “Beau Strayer, you are my Centaur.
If you break it, I will never forgive you. You are
mine.”

She stood straight, fists balled at her
side, and in a ferocious voice I never wanted to hear from her
mouth again, she shouted “Daddy, I’ve made my choice. Be happy for
me. For as long as I live, Beau is my Centaur. I don’t want to
waste time. Call Uncle Norman, find a priest, we’re getting married
today before either of you,” she pointed her finger menacingly at
both her father and me, “tries to stop it.”

Her father was the first to recover,
“Lacey, there’s no rush. Even with Ted you planned a long. .
.”

Lacey cut him off, “Dad, today. Stop
arguing. Set it up or I will.” She turned her attention on me, her
voice much softer, and the furrowed brow holding the glare for her
father abated, as well. “Beau, you left your family because you
couldn’t take the rejection. You don’t want to be human any more
than the river wants to run still. I’m not afraid of marrying you
or joining your family. The only thing that frightens me is you
getting a hair-brained idea to try to save me by breaking your
pledge and disappearing. I want this. I want you. I want it
today.”

(Drake – Cameron’s house,
SD)

I thought we would have weeks together
before we needed to make any more permanent plans. After just days
together, we’d received a call that the Centaur Council would meet
in Centauride, South Africa at the end of the month. It was a
special session, and we already knew the topic.

I was still awkward as half a man. I’d
never been vain, at least I tried never to be, but I would catch my
reflection in the glass of a window or the large mirror hanging in
the living room – I couldn’t get used to my new form. Cami had
moved most of the furniture into the bedrooms; the small living
room felt much bigger when the only piece left was a well-worn
recliner. At night she lay with me on the floor of the living room,
and throughout the day, I did my best not to destroy the
place.

How long could we continue like this? I
asked myself this question hundreds, maybe thousands of times. I
tried to comfort myself knowing I was in this form by my own
choice. But that fact gave me no comfort. I doubted it ever
would.

“Stop it, Drake.”

Cami was standing in the door frame
between the kitchen and living room staring at me. I forced a smile
back at her after looking around the emptied room. “I’m not doing
anything.”

“Yes, you were. I can hear your
thoughts, remember?”

I nodded. “Cami, I’m your Centaur.
Nothing will change that. I think it’s time we look at this from a
practical perspective.”

“I’ve made my choice,
Drake.”

“There’s no future with me, Cami. We
aren’t even the same species anymore. You have an obligation to our
race. You are the last Chiron Centauride.”

“So?”

“So, you have to. . . you need someone.
. . you can’t. . .” I couldn’t finish the thought. Daniel’s face
flashed in my head. I may not be able to get the words out, but I
knew he loved her. He’d loved her for longer than I’d known her,
and I understood why her mother believed the two would end up
together. They were compatible; they were comfortable friends,
trusted allies, and shared a mutual respect. Under the right
circumstances, it could be more.

She remained in the doorway. She knew
what I was thinking; I didn’t need to spell it out. My thoughts
wounded her, but if she were to have any kind of life at all, we
needed to stop thinking about just surviving and come up with a
plan for her: a life she could live with.

“Drake, I can’t keep being the strong
one. You can’t keep doubting us. . .” Cami was still talking, and
her words were heartfelt, but a strange feeling came over me.
Voices, no. . . thoughts, swirling all around me – danger was near.
I could feel the danger encircling us, not the threat of what could
happen weeks or months from now, but a tangible threat just outside
the house. Centaurs were here. They were stationed at each exit,
all with weapons: guns, knives, one carried a mace.

She was still talking when I cut her
off, “Cami! Get in the basement, now!” I was across the room and
lifting the trap door before the words were fully out of my mouth.
“Get in, don’t come out.” I tried to count the warriors outside in
my head, at least ten, a perimeter around the property, another
thirty. Damn it! How had they gotten so close?

“Drake, I don’t under. . .”

“Down, now! I’ll be back for you. I
promise. Not a word and don’t come out. Do you understand? Don’t
come back up!”