Lightning Kissed (6 page)

“Tell me everything,” I finally managed to
croak out after I was well spent.

“Sit down,
meu amor
.”

He escorted me to a chair by the bed and
then pulled the desk chair beside me. I let myself relax. I would
fix this. Whatever I had to do to protect him, I would.

“I don’t even know what it’s called. I’ve
been looking through the texts, trying to figure it out.”

“What texts?”

“Eivan’s journals. The journals of Sevella.
Their life—his life.”

I gasped. Eivan was Eidolon. He retained
many gifts—gifts that consumed him. An Eidolon had not existed for
centuries. Eidolon meant phantom, ghost, apparition. That’s what
Eivan was. Few had seen him, but the stories were many. There had
only ever been two—one was Demetrius. He was assassinated by the
Resin’s then leader, Sanctum. And then there was Eivan. Eivan
travelled one night and never appeared again. There was speculation
of all kinds in the stories told to us as children. Eivan travelled
too much—he overexerted his gifts—his wife killed him. Even the
descendants of Eivan were forced into hiding at the shunning of the
Lucents.

No one even knew where they were.

Or who they were.

“I think I am…” he began. I jerked forward
and covered his mouth with my palm.

“No. Don’t even say it. It can’t be,” I
sobbed, removing my hand and using it to cover my face. Eidolon
carried such a profound power and responsibility to our people and
the Resin alike.

“Saying the word doesn’t change what I am
capable of.”

“Which is?”

“Duality. I am there. A shadow of myself is
there, in New Zealand. It’s like an obedient clone, walking,
talking, breathing, doing whatever I want it to. It’s actually the
perfect decoy. And it follows every instruction to a T. Collin says
it looks like a more translucent version of me—a ghost, if you
will. And if any member of the Resin should come in contact with
it—it vanishes. That is its orders.”

“How,” I begged for answers.

“In Madrid, I waited for you.”

My heart stopped for a moment with that
admission. I knew he would be waiting there. Yes, Ari had seen some
guy there. But that was only part of the story. She’d also seen
Theo on her trip, but I’d ignored it—like she’d never told me.

It must be easy for couples to break up when
one or both of them don’t really want to be together. It was
nowhere near that with Theo and me. But at least I tried to act
like I didn’t hang on his every word.

Theo had no ability to pretend—at least not
with me.

“There are a lot of Resin there. I was
confronted behind one of the clubs and as my fear grew, I felt a
shedding of sorts, like I was losing my outer shell. I don’t know
exactly how it works. It was stranger than the first time I’d
flashed. It was like nothing I’d ever experienced. I saw the gang
of them, looking back and forth from me to something else and back
again. I followed their stares and found—me.”

“And now you can summon it at will?”

“Yes, after some intensive practicing.”

I recoiled at his response. This made a
total of two things that according to legend and history, he should
not be able to do. Things that made him even more valuable to our
enemies.

“You’re scared of me?” he asked. There were
very few times that Theo sounded vulnerable, and this was one of
them.

“I’m scared
for
you. There’s a
difference.”

He moved his head from side to side,
cracking his neck. A disgusting-sounding habit, I’d learned to live
with long ago. He made no attempt to respond, just leaned forward
and laid his head in my lap.

“I feel better just telling you. I hate not
telling you things.”

I ran my fingernails through his hair and
against his scalp. I knew it calmed him. He was being careless,
just flashing here and there, and practicing unprecedented
gifts.

I needed to formulate a plan. I had to
convince him to let me keep him safe, somehow.

A knock at the door of the adjoining
bathroom startled us both, and I flashed immediately. All we needed
was the added nosiness of parents.

***

I spent most of the next morning on a tiny
island off the coast. It could be faintly seen from the beach, but
no one visited it. It was uninhabitable, and the surrounding rocks
made it impossible for a boat to approach it. But I needed no
boat.

There was one mountain in its center that
contained caves and secret springs only known to me and Theo—that I
knew of. It was my favorite place to go and think, even when I
could be anywhere in the world.

I wanted to beg him to give up his pursuit
of more information. The Guardians of the texts were monitored.
Records of who came in and what they studied were written down and
reported directly to the Synod. They would soon know that Theo had
been there and what he had been studying. It was just a matter of
time.

Unless we could get this Collin guy to keep
his damned mouth shut.

I knew very little of Eivan, but I knew my
grandmother would know it all.

My mother had always told the encouraging
story of Eivan as opposed to the negative one. She’d chosen to
believe that Eivan, as told to her by my grandmother, was a great
man who loved his wife and cared for the Lucents—cared about
protecting our race. But Sevella was human, and in his love for
her, he did not travel. However, as the compulsion built and he
finally did travel, it was too much. He got lost.

I’d always thought that was the romantic
version of the story. Sevella was outcast after Eivan disappeared.
They blamed her for the disappearance of their Eidolon.

She was never seen again.

He was revered for his gifts—but mostly he
was revered for his ability to restore light to the Resin. He could
give them the ability to travel again, but some were so far gone
that they no longer cared to travel, only harbor their hate.

“You couldn’t have picked an island with
some mangoes? I’m starving.”

I turned my head to find the object of my
thoughts there in front of me.

Sometimes, Theo pissed me off beyond
sanity.

“What the hell are you doing here?”

He shrugged, picking up rocks from the beach
and tossing one into the surf. “Did I forget to tell you, I can
seek as well?”

My face told him that clearly he hadn’t
mentioned it. “You’re shitting me.”

“No, my foul-mouthed love, I am not shitting
you.”

I waved my hands in the air, exasperated
with him. “Any other gifts you have that you want to share?”

“Yes. Now that you mention it, I used to be
able to make my girl moan my name.”

I rolled my eyes at him. Not that it wasn’t
true. It was so true. Theo’s mouth and the things he could do with
his tongue should’ve been outlawed. Plus, there was this thing he
did, digging his fingers into the backs of my thighs—ah, posters of
his face should be plastered on telephone poles, ‘Beware Theo: One
kiss and you’re done for.’

“I meant Lucent gifts.”

He shrugged. A playful smile tugged at the
corner of his mouth. “Oh, no, not yet. But Eivan did have twelve
children. I supposed he had plenty of unpublished gifts. Maybe I
should re-read Sevella’s personal journals.”

He was trying very hard to be funny, but I
found no humor in his situation. Done with his incessant jokes, I
eyed the ocean before me. I loved the ocean. There was something
about the constant weightlessness that reminded me of flashing. It
was like bobbing up and down in that perpetual state of adrenaline
and calm.

“Do you want me to go so you can swim
alone,” he asked facing the waves. He knew me too well.

“No. I want to know what we’re going to do
about this.”

His expression grew hard. “
We
will do
nothing. I will do more research and eventually I will need to tell
the Synod.”

Research meant finding the other keepers of
the histories—and maybe even speaking to some of the Prophets. Long
ago, before the Lucents had a Synod, there were Prophets. Their
words were gold and their wisdom infallible. But finally, some
Lucents began to think they had too much power and insisted on
having a council.

My grandmother had been one of them—still
was.

“Let’s go see Grammy first and then we
decide.”

Still as a statue he stood, and then
bellowed out a hefty breath. “Since when is there a we, Colby?”

I deserved that sting and all its
aftershocks. Nightly, daily, and sometimes hourly I had to remind
myself of why there wasn’t a we. And yet, here I was, calling us we
again.

It felt like freedom.

“There has always been and will always be a
we as long as we live, Theo.”

I almost hoped he hadn’t heard my answer. If
he had, he provided no outward response. The waves became louder
and louder as they crashed closer to us both.

“It’s too dangerous,” he began our banter.
It was useless on his part. I’d never lost an argument. He was too
soft. Always had been.

“I love danger.”

He turned to face me. “There are Resin on my
tail—always.”

“Mine too. They like to look at my ass as I
flash away.”

“You are so stubborn. You’re not going with
me!” He growled through a clenched jaw.

I shrugged with my left shoulder, and my
left eyebrow followed suit. “That’s fine. I’ll just follow you. You
forget—I’m a seeker as well.”

His jaw worked overtime and the vein on his
neck rolled blood through it in anger. That vein always popped out
when he was angry. It was the only way I knew. He’d never raised
his voice at me or even shown in tone or words any bit of
aggravation.

Which was aggravating in itself.

Show me some anger, man.

The opposite was true of his expressions of
love. There had been times I had been brought to tears by his raw
honesty about how he felt about me. I’d never really been able to
return the same sentiment. It was hard for me to make that
emotional connection with anyone. I kept myself at a healthy
distance—healthy for me and everyone else. That mistake of getting
so close to my father wouldn’t be repeated again. He was taken from
me in an instant, and I couldn’t endure that pain again, ever.

At the same time I couldn’t let anything
happen to Theo. It wasn’t an option.

He turned around to face the mountain and
lifted his head to view the top. It wasn’t much of a mountain, but
then again, he wasn’t admiring the view. He was clearly thinking of
what to say next. He did that too much. Or maybe I didn’t do it
enough. Words and thoughts just blurted from my mouth at any time
and place.

“All this time you’ve pushed me away, and
now that I’m in trouble and actually want you to stay away from me,
you want to come with me. Must you always be so damned stubborn?
Can’t you see?”

His voice broke with his last question, and
at once I knew I’d taken it all too far. I got up from my seated
position. Theo’s hands were in his pockets, his head bowed in
exasperation. I looped my arms around his waist and splayed my
hands against his abdomen. His abs trembled underneath my palms,
but he didn’t move to embrace me.

I’d definitely taken things too far in the
sarcasm department.

I laid my cheek against the spot between his
shoulder blades. “Can’t
you
see?”

Finally, his hands enveloped mine and
tangled our fingers together.

“They’ll never let us travel together
unaccompanied. We are neither bonded nor sealed. It wouldn’t be
right even if I were to concede. And I’m not saying I’m going to
let you.”

I squeezed him tighter. Even his back
smelled phenomenal.

What he spoke was truth. Our parents would
be wary of us being together again at our ages if we were not
bonded, the Lucent version of engaged, or sealed, the Lucent
version of marriage. Theo was a stickler for the rules. He claimed
the rules kept us out of trouble. I claimed they kept us caged.

“If they give us permission, it will be
fine. We can ask them together, tonight.”

“Even if they do,
Querida
—you know me
better than that. Please, stay away. I swear to the stars if
something happened to you—I would chase you into the Paraíso. It
would be the end of us both.”

Anger broke me free from his hold.

He was winning.

For the first time in our lives, he was winning and I
couldn’t even take it.

“Name your terms.” I folded my arms over my
chest.

“No, not this time. There are no terms.”

And with that exasperating statement, he flashed
away.

THE PROPHETS ARE NO
LONGER ACKNOWLEDGED AS MESSENGERS OF THE ALMIGHTY.

I had a cool temperament most of the time,
but Colby needed to learn a lesson. There just weren’t negotiating
terms for some situations.