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This time I recalled his words with new ears, saw the memory through new eyes. Too late I saw how pained and ruined I had made him. Too late did I at last understand and regret my hardened shell of a soul. Seid’s curse was a bittersweet gift in disguise after all. It went along with his nature, because he was fashioned from the sea and storms. And it was my choice to remain bitter against him all this time.

His many attempts to distract me over the age that followed might have been about more than revenge, after all.

Their voices were so soft at first, I barely heard them. Yet I turned my head slightly to the crack in the open doorway and saw a sliver of their shapes. Cain had his shoulders hunched and his head bowed. The mad state of his hair betrayed how often he had dragged his fingers through it in the last hour. I smiled affectionately at how youthful this habit had rendered the appearance of my strong soldier.

Lissa had her fingers splayed together and was threading them together, twisting th
em in tight angles as she spoke. “I shouldn’t have thrown your relationship with her around like that. I didn’t have any right to say what I said and I’m sorry. I—I
like
Orona, even if she can be a little weird sometimes. But she cares about you a lot. And I’d like to think…” She paused and lifted her emerald eyes to dart over his masked features. She sighed heavily and laughed, “This is ridiculous. I can’t believe how awkward this is. It
shouldn’t
be, you know?”

“Shouldn’t it?” Cain lifted his head and bared his teeth at her.

Lissa flinched but tried desperately not to show it.

And the golden thread I had crossed an ocean to
find the source of was pulsing brighter, thicker now. No longer fragile as a spider’s web. I could sense the underlying strength that had forged their bond, a thing of reliance and desperation that had evolved into deep, passionate love.

The knowledge would have broken me not so long ago. But in the short time that
had passed, I had come undone and felt so freshly mended, I could only wait and listen.

“Yeah,” she said and swore under her breath. “I’m not good at this, Cain. I don’t know what you want me to say…”

He lifted his clenched jaw and I sensed the confrontation coming. His voice rose as he replied, “If this is you giving me your apology, how about you start by telling me why you told Rona about our baby.”

Lissa’s hands absently rested over her flat abdomen and her eyes welled with unshed tears. “What are you talking about? I never told her
anything.”

Cain’s temper flared and he threw up his hands with a cu
rse. “Look, don’t try throwing this back on me! I wasn’t the one taking her out and getting her drunk or dressing her up like a hooker! You always do that, never stopping to take the blame, Lissa. And that’s why you’re in the mess you’re in!” He took two steps towards her, his chest heaving.

Lissa choked on her words
. “What are you saying?” She cried out when Cain snatched her bruised wrist and tugged up the sleeve to reveal the discolored skin.

“
This
is what I’m talking about. You should have never got mixed up with this guy! I tried protecting you when you didn’t want it and now I don’t think I would even if you wanted me to.”

Lissa wrapped her hand around his. “Cain, you’re hurting me
,” she whispered.

He gasped and stumbled back a step, shaking his head to clear the dark aura over his head.
His gaze softened.

My heart fell as I saw how their connection only grew instead of breaking completely.

“I should have told you about the baby,” she said. 

The harsh slant of his mouth eased. He looked so innocent to me then, vulnerable and young. Even his voice seemed lighter as he answered her. “I know.”

Lissa’s eyes widened and I sensed this was the closest he had ever come to accepting her apology. “You sounded good back there,” she tentatively said. “I didn’t know you could play like that.”

Cain shifted on his feet and dragged his fingers through his black hair. “Glad to hear I fooled you guys into
thinking I’m a musical genius.”

I glanced down at my fingers and the colored lights still dancing just beneath the surface of my skin. The curse
had taken hold of me before I could hear his playing. But now I was beginning to wonder if it had happened for a reason, something that transcended beyond my happiness.

Their laughter was reluctant and meshed
together like strings against the beat of drums. It complemented and separated them from one another.

At one time, this laughter had been a common thing. I remembered how Seid made me laugh when we played in the water together. He was not always terrible and frightening. Sometimes he was tender and mischievous.

And you forgot all of this in your hate.

Clenching my fingers into a tight fist, I wanted to growl at the voice in my head. She was always saying things I
would rather not hear. But perhaps now it was time to remember, time to face the truth. I peered through the door crack once more.

Now that their laughter had faded, I could hear fresh notes singing from the stage, through the hall and below. Lissa and Cain now stood together with their backs to the opposite wall, neither touching.

Besides the cord connecting them that seems to be growing even brighter, thanks to you.

“Cain, I always knew you were made of something more, you know? Like you were gonna do great things one day. Maybe that was what scared me. I never thought I could live up to you. You’re just so
good
, like all the time!” She laughed, exasperated, waving her hands wildly.

Cain kept his head bowed low and shove
d his hands in his pockets. “Derek gave you those bruises, didn’t he?”

Lissa shrank back into herself
. The Lissa I had come to know would have denied everything and pushed him aside.

The volume of his curse made
even me flinch. “I’m gonna kill him!”

“Don’t!” she begged and grasped his shirt in her hands.

Cain grunted something under his breath and turned to face her. He pulled her closer and bent down until their eyes were level. “Are you happy with the guy you left me for? He’s a real stand-up guy, huh?”

Lissa’s voice shook
. “I was wrong! Okay? Happy I’m finally admitting I was wrong? I don’t want that life anymore, Cain. All the fine things I thought I had to have… they’re not important.” She sucked in an uneven breath and dropped her hands from his chest to her sides. “I know I don’t got any right to say this, but I’ve realized something lately.”

“What?” Anger had fled from Cain’s barred jaw, changed the lines of his face into an expression of worry, of fear. Over their heads the cord linking them continued to weave together.

“Maybe the thing I was missing was in front of me the whole time,” she whispered while keeping her eyes downcast.

His lips parted and his blue eyes widened
, as if in pain.

We both watched as Lissa’s strength crumbled, the rocks she had covered her soul with breaking down to mortar.
Her shoulders shook and then her hands went around his waist. She pressed herself to him, and sobs escaped her mouth.

Cain stiffened and glanced furtively in every direction
, as though unsure what to do, then slowly wrapped his arms around her shoulders. He pressed his nose in the top of her head and sighed.

A strange thing happened to my broken heart afterward. I saw Lissa as myself, fragile and desperate as I was two thousand years ago. And I did not want Lissa to make the same self-sacrificing choices I did then.

-colleen

Chapter 22

Swan Song

Never had I given much thought to my own actions. Once, I cared deeply for the fate of the lovers I had been led to test. But over time and the slow draining of love from this world, the mission became nothing more than my duty, my task. Rather than pour my heart into helping the lovers survive their plight, I brooded.

L
ove made me think of Seid and my gifts became but a reminder of that curse. If I had not lost sight of my mission, if I had cared a little more for others, instead of feeling sorry for myself, could I have mended the leak?

Before Lissa could enter the dressing rooms, I donned my cloak and watched her breeze pas
t me. For the following minutes I watched her sit before her mirror and wipe away the smudges her tears had pulled beneath her eyes. I watched as she smiled at her reflection and then covered her mouth when she laughed. She sounded disbelieving, joyous and then just as quickly terrified.

Slowly, she shook her head
in disbelief and whispered, “What are you doing, chica?”

Could she have seen me when I moved to stand behind her, shimmering and glowing like the skies after a summer storm, she would have seen my struggle. I wanted to tear off my cloak and demand
she forget Cain and live with the consequences of her choices. I wanted to shout at her for leading Cain on and running to Derek, to Jude, to any man who would trade affection for gratification.

She carefully applied skin
-colored paste again to the bruise on her left cheek, the one her tears had recently exposed. I watched the joy fade from her eyes, to be replaced with acceptance.

Do you love him?
I wanted to ask her.

A flurry of grating voices behind us announced the dancers’ arrival. They spoke of the important guests coming in but a few hours. I turned to stare at the clock. Was it time already? How long had I been lost to the curse, trapped in my own mind? Again, why had Cain not come looking for me?

“Oh! Look who it is. Why am I not surprised?” A woman who seemed all legs spoke over the others.

Lissa hastily finished touching up her skin paste and offered them her usual catty grin. Ignoring the ginger, s
he turned to the others. “Ladies, you guys done dancing for the boss yet?”

Each of them offered different answers, each more ridiculous than the last. I fled their hen
-clucking chatter. In the brief times I had observed them, I believed that nothing they ever said in front of each other was worth anything. Even Lissa seemed weary of them, now that I watched her with renewed eyes.

To find Cain, I simply followed the golden threads connecting him to Lissa, even at this distance. I was too afraid to look for the bond he and I shared.

It will snap and fade soon enough,
I reminded myself.

Much had changed in the club during the short time I had hidden myself away. Cain’s thread led towards the apartment I had visited the other day. I had no wish to intrude on his visit with his uncle. So I clung to the back in my cloak and waited.

Before Cain, time had been on
e seamless, endless dream without meaning. Change inevitably came and went with the seasons. Sometimes, if I blinked the right way, I missed more than a lifetime.

I watched as the cleaners made the floor and tables shine. Musicians warmed up their instruments, though I had listened to them playing long before this. Chloe, the cloak girl, took her post with another big
-chested and muscled man. He had taken over Cain’s job to protect the door this night. Drinks were poured near me and guests filtered into their seats.

With my cloak in place
, I was once more invisible and grateful for it. The curse had grown in strength since I accepted it, so the oppressive webbing of their emotions did not overwhelm me as it had before. Still, I watched the threads weave and tangle together in various shades, each glowing from the inside out. It was beautiful in a terrifying way. It made me tremble with feeling. The temptation to erect that tidal wave between my own emotions and them grew with the number of bodies in the room.

I blinked, hoping to break the connection for a few blessed moments. I needed to breathe, to remind myself why I was there. I needed to remember…

“—this girl you keep talking about, boy? I about kicked Lissa out the other day for not bringing her on in to meet me.” An elderly man spoke from the stairs above my head.

Cain answered, sheepishly, “Sorry
, Uncle Gregg. I lost track of her earlier, but she’d love to meet you.”

“Don’t t
ell an old man what he wants to hear, Cain. Level with me. Is she a looker?” After a brief silence, his uncle chuckled.

Cain sighed. “You have no idea…”

“She’s got legs a mile long, Pop!” Jude piped up and I realized his was the third set of footsteps approaching my hiding place. “And wait till you hear that accent… Ouch! Easy, brother, I wasn’t tryin’ to mack on your girl.”

Uncle Gregg only laughed harder and Cain grunted something under his breath.

So he did miss me, after all.

But s
urprising as the idea was, I pushed it aside and reminded myself of the hard truth. I knew what I had to do now.