Imperial (Insight #8)(72)
I sighed. “Silas, I’m going to do something. It may hurt. No, it will hurt. For several reasons. But I think it is for the best.”
“Why so?” he asked, furrowing his brow.
I glanced to his chest. “Have you ever seen the marks on your soul?”
“I have been struck many times, Queen.”
“Right.” He really had no idea this was going to be excruciating. “Listen, in a past very long ago you were right before my eyes, and I did not see you as mine. I’m so deeply sorry for that.”
“It’s the past.”
“It is, but the scars of my blindness, the results of it, are on your soul.”
He glanced down, but his armor of a Witness was shielding anything he could have seen.
“I’m going to open your mind. When I do, you will see your past, not only the one I know of, but your beginning. That beginning could have been eons before you fell into my line for the first time.”
He was really confused now.
“As your mind opens, I want you to seize the wrath you want to feel. Xavier will pay, and I have already killed the girl by the name of Cadence.”
“I don’t understand what you are worried about. I already carry a wrath for Xavier.”
“That you do,” I sighed. “The wrath in my line is the strongest at the top of it. My First is woven very close to me, meaning that within that soul there is rage, stubbornness, jealousy, a skilled and lethal warrior, and hopefully now a soul that can feel love without fear.”
“Sounds like a man I would fight with.”
“Not a man.” He moved his head from side to side to tell me that I was losing him. “My Fated soul, tread carefully with these memories, for they were never forgotten by those that share them with you. The emotions are raw, and it will take time to mend the wounds.”
“Are you sure you are not about to smite me?” he asked, trying to lighten the mood.
“Silas, do you accept me as your queen? Do you openly accept your heritage of an Escort, a heritage that can now love?”
“I accept it, as well as my fate as a Witness.”
That was all I needed. Now he was claimed, connected to all of us.
I reached my hands for his forehead; beneath them, a glow beamed. He breathed in as he felt the hum of my touch. As I slid them down his beautiful face, my energy was fully awakening him, opening his soul so that he could see all of his past.
He began to tremble violently. I pulled him to my arms and held him with all my power. Right now, everything was exploding inside of him; he was reliving it all, feeling it all. His body fully flexed as waves of wrath rolled off him.
I held him until the trembling stopped, until I heard him gasp and draw in a deep breath. He slowly pulled away from me. His eyes were wide as they stared at his chest.
“You always knew. Feel no guilt. You always knew.”
Silas moved his head from side to side as his hand clenched his chest. “He killed her,” he breathed.
“She has been with me in the care of the Reaper.”
“Reaper?”
“We have guarded The Fall together. And tonight, at the procession of death, I will ask the Reaper to grant us a permanent stay, to restore our lives.”
“I’m going.”
I held my hand out. “No, she knows nothing of this.”
“She thinks I’m guilty.”
“Deep down, I doubt it. She knows you are alive.”
“How?”
“Because we stepped out of the Veil and she is still breathing.”
That confused him more.
“You coupled with her. You are joined by the Creator.”
“Three hundred and thirty-three times,” he said as his gaze captured that memory.
“Yeah, that was excessive. But anyway, now as an Escort you are linked to her; if one falls, so shall the other. You need to pay your debts to Charlie, explain that you do love her, that she loves you, but you are not now or have not ever been in love with each other. Tell her why you have had no other choice but to use guilt with her. Tell her so that when I manage to restore Mazing, when you go to her, she will see that.”
“I look nothing like before.”
“That might make it easier, son. The past is painful…maybe you should just convince her to fall in love with you again. As Silas. Let Colton rest.”
“I don’t think I can stay away that long.”
“Right now, you need to speak to Charlie. You need to look the soul that loves her in the eye and tell him that you are sorry, that you are cut from the same cloth.”
“He is yours, too?”
“No, but I love his king, and we are one.”
Silas looked down in shame.
“Fight with them, Silas. Put the past behind you. Rise as a Fated soul that sees both sides. You are not broken; you are tested, tried and true, and you will be rewarded.”
“She is okay? You swear she is?”
“She is.”
“When can I come home? When can I see our home?”
Oh, those words gave me so much peace. “When I return from the Veil.”
He nodded once as he stood. “I’ll do as you ask.” He then bowed gracefully.
I was standing in front of him at that instant. “You have to want to mend these bridges; otherwise, your words matter not.”