The Knight Of The Rose (8 page)

elbow against the ground, and the world spun around me.

“Ara?”

Ignoring the spin, I looked up as, like the sun rising over the ocean, David’s eyes filled with

that amazing shade of green, but brighter—Dorothy’s Emerald Cit y illustrated in the gaze of a

vampire. They sparkled so vibrantly—almost transparently green. I was sur e the incandescent gl ow

behind them was his soul.

God, you’re so beautiful.

The vertigo consumed me then, and forced my eyes to close.

“Ara? Are you all right?”

“Kiss me?” I breathed.

Without opening my eyes, my lips moulded around David’s when they touched. A blend of

sweet, warm butter and salty, metal-tasti ng liquid mixed under our kiss. David’s tongue smoothed

over mine, forcing it away from the sharp edges of his fangs.

We held the kiss for a long, deep br eath, then, a cool rush of air flooded my lungs when

David pulled gently away and moved his lips over the side of my face and down my neck. “I want to

know every inch of your body by only the memory of my lips,” he whispered.

The sound of distant thunder rattled the sky above me, and fat droplets of summer rain started

to fall around us again, collecting on the leaves and seeping through the hollows in the canopy. It fell

over my skin; warm, like a glass of water that had been left in the sun all day, then mixed with t he

heat of David’s kiss as he drank the rain from the curve of my waist.

I rolled my spine, letting him cup his hands under my hips while his lips searched the rim of

my underwear, just below my belly button. “David?”

“Yes, my love?”

“I want to feel you against me .” Hooking my fingers just under his elbows, I tugge d him

toward me; his bare chest and arms slipped across my body. I l et out a little gasp as he rested his

weight on top of me for the first time.

With his lips caressing the skin beneath my ear, and his hands s moothing the balmy rain

down my thigh, his hips collided gently with mine as if the unwelcome intrusion of our remaining

clothes were no longer there.

The pattering rain on the trees above us became heavier then, and beads of water blinded me,

while his fingers fell into the crease of my leg under my knee, pulling it up over his hips.

“It’s raining.” David broke our kiss and looked up.

“I know—we’re saturated. I feel like we tel eported into a warm shower by mis take.” I

grinned and wrapped my legs tighter around him—nudging my hip- joins against him. “My undies

are wet.”

David laughed. “Don’t make me think about that.”

But I want you to think about that.
I smiled up at him; his hair, like a painted cloth over his

brow, looked darker when wet—almost black. Beads of rain dripped off the ends, over his nose and

lashes. The rain was cool, but I felt warm—tucked against him like I was under the roof of a small

cubby house.

With an aching gaze of desire chasing away the iciness of restraint, he spread his fingers out

over my spine and pulled my pelvis into his.

I gasped; I’ve never felt something press against me there before; I want to di scard the

meagre remains of the separation between our near-naked bodies and let David inside of me…

He stopped suddenly and looked down into my eyes; “It’s time to go—”

“What?” I blurted, dropping my arms to my sides.

David nodded to the now dark sky. Though it was hard to make out the time of day through

the obscurity of the canopy, I could tell from the shadows that it was late, and the rain was going to

get heavier at any minute.

“Please? Not yet. I—I want you to make love to me, David. ” I reached up and stroked t he

gristly stubble along his jaw.

A roll of thunder stole the words from David’s lips; he placed his hand over mine, still on his

face, and his eyes softened at the corners. He shook his head. “No, Ara, my sweet, beautiful girl. I

can’t do that to you. It would be wrong of me.”

“Wrong of you? Why, I don’t understand?” With the cold conclusiveness of reason, the small

split in my wrist started to sting.

“I can’t marry you, Ar a. I can’t take your innocence and then leave you—it would be very

dishonourable of me.”

“But I want you to take it, David. I want to give it to you.”

He breathed out through his nose, closi ng his lips into a thin smile. “No, my love. One day

you will fall in love with someone, and you’ll want to be pure—untainted—for him. If I take you

now, you can never go back. I would hate for you to regret any of our interactions one day.”

“David. This is the new world. It doesn’t work like that now.”

“That may be so, but it st ill works that way for me.” His wide, sincere eyes looked right into

mine, his voice intense wi th conviction. “In my soci ety, virginity is something very sacred. It is a

rare virtue to be praised and cherished, not something girls should give away without refl ection or

care.”

“But—”

“Ara, please? It’s what I want for you.” His hars h tone forced me into silence. “Sometimes

you can think too much with your heart and not enough with your head. I have to be the adult here. I

have to protect you from yourself—from your human nature.”

“But, David—I can take care of myself. I’m a big—”

“It’s my job to protect you,” he scolded, then smiled at my shocked expressi on. “Even if it

means I’m falling apart.”

I don’t agree
, I huffed internally.

“And—” he added, sitting up and dropping his elbows over his knees.

I sat up beside him and touched the tips of my fingers along the tight skin on his shoulder.

“And what?”

“And…I need to tell you something …” As our eyes met, a flash of sadness turned his pale

green, “—something which, I’m afraid to say, is not good news.”

“Okay.” My voice trembled a little.

“I told you I would warn you when it was time for me to leave?”

“Yes.” My stomach sunk; I bit my bottom lip.

“Well…the… I—” his voice st eadied with a chest-li fting breath; he looked to the side, his

gaze fixing on my lips, then rising up to my eyes. “The time has come.”

My mouth fell open. No!

“I’ve been called to return to duty.”

“What? When?”

“Two weeks.”

“Two weeks? But—that’s not enough time. Ho

w can I —how can you expect me to.” I

stopped and shook my head. “No. No, you can’t do this. You—”

“That’s not the worst part, Ara.” He took another deep br eath, shuffling his posit ion

nervously. “In that two weeks, I am expected to operate the Set from the New York offices. I will

only be able to see you at night.”

“Night? Two weeks? And that’s it? For forever?”

“Unless you change your mind and become a vampire,” he said in a low, dry tone.

“David. I can’t make a decision like that in two weeks. How can you possibly expect me to—

”

“Because you have to, Ara!” He looked at me long enough to see the hurt infect my face.

“The time is now. Like it or not. You have to choose. When the full moon rises in a fortnight, I will

be boarding a train and leaving for Le Château de la Mort—with or without you beside me.”

“You can’t do this to me. Mike’ s here f or the next two weeks. How am I going to choose

between life and immortality while he’s dist racting me?” I sl ipped my bra straps back onto my

shoulders and pushed my stringy wet hair from my eyes. “Can’t you reason with them? Can’t you do

something?”

“Ara. You don’t understand the ways of the Set. I’ve been ordered to return by the head of

the World Council—the
king,
for God’s sake. One does not refuse an order from the king.”

“But—”

“Look.” He dropped his head with a dejected breath. “Two weeks to get my affairs in order

was a generous courtesy. He needn’t have offered that at all—”

“Why? Are you in trouble?”

“In ways.” The grip where he held his wrists together over his knee s tightened. “The man I

entrusted to run things in my absence has proven less than reliable. I must return and pull things into

line.”

“But you have a life here. What about school and—”

“Ara, the Set do not care! It’s a part of being on the Council. I knew this when I j oined; I

accepted that with all of its glory and all of its responsibility. I
must
leave. That is all there is to it.”

“But, what will I do without you—how will I get through the days?”

“Something tells me you’ll be fine.” He smiled conceitedly.

“Now what’s that supposed to mean?”

David stared at the ground. “I have a confession to make.”

“Okay…”

He turned his head to the side—away from me. “I was listening last night. When you spoke

to Emily and Alana—about Mike.”

Oh no. I covered my brow.

“That’s what happened? Wasn’t it?” He looked back at me and nodded once . “The reason

you were crying the night you asked your mum to pick you up? The night she—”

“Yes,” I whispered.

“I’m so sorry, Ara.” David’s arms flew around me, pinning my cheek to his stomach. “He

was a fool to turn you down.” He pulled back from me a little and held my face in his hands; “I guess

that explains your over-analysing when
I
wouldn’t kiss you. I’m sorry. If I had known—”

“It’s not your fault, David. You did the right thing. Better to feel undesirable for a few days

than to be dead, right?” I laughed a short release of tension.

“Do you love him?”

“Who, Mike?”

“Yes, Mike.”

“I—” My eyes drifted past David’s hips, to nothing in particular.

“S’il vous plait, mon amour, tell me the truth. It will hurt me more if you lie.”

“I...” New tears came for a new kind of pain; betrayal, unrequited love, the loss of a friend. I

haven’t cried for Mike yet, and I’ve needed to so badly. I closed my eyes, and a tight cramp twisted

my heart.

If Mike had loved me that night, I wouldn’t be here. But he didn’t, and now I have David—

only to lose him too. I’ll never be happy, of that I’m sure.

Finally, I looked up at David and wi ped the rain-mixed-tears from my cheeks. “I love you

more than I love him.”

David stiffened and drew back a li ttle more. “But he’s better for yo u. You can live with

him—die with him.”

“But he doesn’t love me, David.”

“You lied to me,” he said coldly.

“I know.” My eyes closed involuntarily, stinging from the tears. “I’m sorry. I know I told you

once that I don’t love him; it’s just that—I’m re ally confused.” I looked at him—he looked away.

“When Mike rejected me, I locked all the feelings I have for him deep inside. I felt so damn stupid.

So, I denied it to everyone, and, I guess I lied to myself as well.” I touched my hand to my chest and

the words came out as a breathless whisper, “I should have known my own heart better.”

With his jaw set stiff, David glared down at me. Everything around me felt cold; my arms,

my face, the air, and my heart. As a dista nt roll of thunder echoed off the mountains to the east, I

shivered inside; a storm is coming.

“Perhaps, with thi s information coming to light, we no longer need our last two weeks

together.”

“David. No.” I rose to my knees, shaking my head fiercely. “Please? It doesn’t have to be this

way. We—we can work it out—”

“There’s nothing to work out. You love Mike, and you don’t want immortality.”

“I never said that. Please, we can make our own future. I belie ve in magic st ill. I believe

there’s hope for us—for our life—together.”

He placed a finger over my lips and brought his face down to align our eyes. “No, Ara, my

love. It is all too clear to me now. I have to be the strong one—for both of us—” he dropped his

finger, “—and you have to be the one that goes on. You
must
go on—have babies, beautiful babies,

and be happy—live that dream. You’ve been wai ting for me to tell you I’ll stay—that all of this is

some nightmare. But, my love—” He smiled, looking at my eyes, my lips, then my eyes again. “It’s

not.”

“But, David, I—”

He shook his head and wi ped my cheek. “Shh, don’t cr y. I love you, and you will always

belong to me; I will always be with you, but I can’t keep lying to myself, believing that you’ll change

your mind.”

“But, maybe I will.”

He shook his head again. “Even then, it would only be to save me from eternal solitude. And

for that reason, I just can’t take you r dreams away, and I can’t take your life. It is your greatest gift,

and my greatest sacrifice.”

“David,” my voice quivered.

“Look—” He pointed to a blue and black butter fly, flitting around a single beam of s unshine

falling through trees as the rain slowed to a soft patter. “You see, you’re much like the butterfly.” He

leaned closer to me. “She starts her life in the shadows, close to the ground. She lives and exists only

as others see her; a caterpillar, nothing more—then, one day, she bloomed into a beautiful, brightly-

winged creature—so free, so pure. Something she could never have been , had someone taken her

away.

“Her life is short in comparison to most, but in each moment she lives, she will fly, and she

will spread her beauty and her life through the tree tops, so t hat when her existence comes to an end

as the sun goes down on her fi nal day, her spiri t will go on, and there will always be a beauti ful