Tempted

After Aphrodite’s gloomy, but probably accurate, prediction I didn’t think I’d be able to sleep, but exhaustion caught up with me. I closed my eyes and then, for a little while there was blissful nothingness. Sadly, bliss didn’t ever seem to last very long in my life.

In my dream the island was so blue and beautiful it dazzled me. I was standing on… I looked around… the roof of a castle! One of those real old-looking castles, made of big blocks of rough stone. The roof was massively cool. Framing it were those stone-sticking-up-things that looked like a giant’s teeth. There were plants everywhere on the roof. I even noticed lemon and orange trees, branches all heavy and full of sweet-smelling fruit. In the center of everything was a fountain in the shape of a beautiful naked woman whose hands were lifted over her head, and from those cupped hands flowed crystal water. Something about the stone woman looked familiar, but my gaze kept getting pulled from the gorgeous rooft op garden to the even more awesome view that stretched around the castle.

Holding my breath, I moved to the edge of the roof and looked down and down and down and out at the brilliant blue of the sea. The water was beyond beautiful. It was the color of dreams and laughter and perfect summer skies. The island itself was made of jagged mountains, covered in unusual-looking pine trees that reminded me of giant umbrellas. The castle was at the very top of the highest of the island’s mountains, and as I peered down in the distance I could see graceful villas and a pretty little town.

Everything was bathed in the blue of the sea, which gave the place a sense of magick. I inhaled the breeze, smelling salt and oranges. The day was sunny—the sky utterly clear of clouds, but in my dream the brightness of it didn’t bother my eyes at all. I loved it! It was a little cool, and more than a little windy, but I didn’t care. I liked the crispness of the breeze against my skin. At that moment the island was the color of aquamarines, but I could imagine how it would look as dusk approached and the sun no longer ruled the sky. The blue would deepen, darken, and change to sapphire.

My dreaming self smiled. Sapphire… The island would turn the exact color of my tattoos. I tilted back my head and threw my arms wide, embracing the loveliness of this place I’d created out of my sleeping imagination.

“So it seems I cannot escape you, even when I flee your presence,” Kalona said.

He was behind me. His voice crawled across the skin of my back, up over my shoulders, and wrapped around my body. Slowly, I let my arms drop to my sides. I did not turn around.

“You’re the one who sneaks around in people’s dreams, not me.” I was glad my voice sounded calm and über-under-control.

“So you are still unwilling to admit you are drawn to me?” His voice was deep and seductive.

“Look, I didn’t try to find you. All I meant when I closed my eyes was to sleep.” I spoke almost automatically, avoiding his question and willing myself not to remember the last memory I’d had of his voice and his arms around me.

“You are obviously sleeping alone. Were you with someone else, it would be much more difficult for you to be touched by me.”

I suppressed the confused longing his voice made me feel and filed away that little bit of info—sleeping with someone did make it more difficult for him to reach me, just as Stark had told me the night before. “That’s none of your business,” I said.

“You are correct. All of those sons of man who swarm around you, eager to bask in your presence, are completely beneath my concern.”

I didn’t bother to call him on his twisting of what I’d said. I was too busy trying to stay calm and will myself to wake up.

“You chase me away from you, yet you find me in your dreams. What does that say about you, A-ya?”

“That is not my name! Not in this lifetime!”

“‘Not in this lifetime’ you say. That means you have accepted the truth. You know your soul is the reincarnation of the maiden fashioned by the Ani Yunwiya to love me. Perhaps that is why you keep coming to me in your dreams, because even though your waking mind resists, your soul, your spirit, your very essence yearns to be with me.”

He used the ancient word for the Cherokee people—my grand-ma’s people and mine. I knew the legend. A beautiful, winged immortal had come to live with the Cherokee, but instead of being a benevolent earthbound god, he was cruel. He abused the women and used the men. Finally, the Wise Women of the tribes, known as Ghigua Women, came together and created a maiden from the earth. They gave A-ya life, as well as special gifts. Her purpose was to use Kalona’s lust to lure him underground so that he could be trapped within the earth. Their plan worked. Kalona couldn’t resist A-ya and he was trapped within the earth—or at least he had been until Neferet had freed him.

And now that I’d shared a memory with A-ya, I knew only too well the truth of that legend.

Truth, my mind reminded me. Use the strength of the truth to fight him.

“Yes,” I admitted. “I know I am the reincarnation of A-ya.” I drew a deep, centering breath, turned around, and faced Kalona. “But I am today’s reincarnation of her, which means I make my own choices, and I will not choose to be with you.”

“And yet you continue to come to me in your dreams.”

I wanted to deny that I’d come to him—to say something smart and High Priestess—like, but all I could do was stare at him. He was so beautiful! As usual, he was underdressed. I guess the better description would be undressed. He had on jeans, and that was it. His skin was bronze and perfect. It covered his muscles with a smoothness that made me want to touch him. Kalona’s amber eyes were luminous. They met my gaze with a warmth and kindness that made my breath catch. He appeared about eighteen, but when he smiled he seemed even younger, more boyish, more accessible. Everything about him screamed super hot guy I should be going crazy over!

But that was a lie. Kalona was actually super-scary and super-dangerous, and I could never forget that—no matter what he appeared to be—no matter what the memories planted deep within my soul yearned for him to be.

“Ah, so you finally deign to look at me.”

“Well, you wouldn’t go away and leave me alone, so I figured I’d be polite,” I said with forced nonchalance.

Kalona threw back his head and laughed. The sound was infectious and warm and very seductive. It made me ache to move closer to him and join him in the freedom of his laughter. I wanted it so much that I’d almost taken a step toward him when his wings chose that moment to stir. They quivered and then spread partially open so that the sunlight glistened against their black depths, illuminating the indigo and purple that usually hid within their darkness.

The sight of them was like running into an invisible wall. I remembered again what he was—a dangerous fallen immortal who would like to steal my free will and, eventually, my soul.

“I don’t see why you’re laughing,” I said quickly. “I’m telling you the truth. I’m looking at you because I’m polite, even though I really wish you’d fly away and let me dream in peace.”

“Oh, my A-ya.” His expression sobered. “I can never leave you in peace. You and I are bound. We will be each other’s salvation, or each other’s doom.” He took a step closer to me and I mirrored his movement by taking a step backward. “Which shall it be? Salvation or doom?”

“I can only speak for myself.” I made my voice stay calm, and was even able to add a touch of sarcasm to it, though I could feel the cool stone of the balcony balustrade pressing like the walls of a prison cell against my back. “But both sound pretty bad. Salvation? Jeesh, you’re reminding me of the People of Faith, and since they’d consider you a fallen angel, that doesn’t make you much of an expert on salvation. Doom? Well, seriously, you’re still reminding me of the People of Faith. Since when did you become so boringly religious?”

In two steps he closed the space between us. His arms became bars, caging me between the stone balustrade and him. His wings shivered, opening around him so that he eclipsed the sun with his own dark brilliance. I could feel the terrible, wonderful chill that always emanated from him. It should have repelled me, but it didn’t. That awful coldness drew me at a soul-deep level. I wanted to press myself against him and be carried away by the sweet pain he could bring.