Hidden (House of Night #10)(42)

Everything changed then. There was a brightness that caused me to blink and when my sight cleared Travis was gone. In his place was a really hot, young, black guy. He had long hair that was pulled back in a low ponytail and shoulders so broad he looked like a linebacker. He was kissing Lenobia as if it were his last kiss in the world. And she was kissing him back-only it was a different Lenobia. She looked young, like she was only sixteen or so. She wrapped her arms around him like she'd never let go. All around them the air wavered and shimmered, like I was watching them over the top of a bubbling pot. Only instead of steam rising, I swear there were robin's egg blue spirits of happiness flitting around them. The happiness swelled within me and started bubbling, as if the pot was my head and the water my emotions. The ground fell away beneath my feet. I was floating in joy and love and blue bubbles.

Then my head got real dizzy and my stomach totally rebelled.

"Zoey! Stop! That's enough. Put! It! Down!"

I realized Stark was yelling at me and pulling at the Seer Stone. I felt the earth under my feet again. The blue bubbles evaporated and the joy went away, leaving me sick and drained and super shaky. I dropped the Seer Stone in time to bend over and puke beside the tree.

"You're okay. You're okay. I got you, Z. Everything's fine." Stark was holding my hair back while I continued to retch and heave up my guts.

"Stark? Zoey?" Lenobia was coming toward us, sounding breathless and worried. I could hear Travis close behind her asking what was wrong. I couldn't answer, though. I was too busy barfing.

"Zoey! Oh, Goddess, no!" Lenobia's concern skyrocketed when she realized I was puking.

"She's not rejecting the Change. She's okay," Stark reassured her while I took yet another tissue he offered me and wiped my mouth. Finally done puking I leaned against the tree, embarrassed and grossed out. I seriously hate to puke.

"Then what is it? Why are you sick?"

With Stark on one side and Lenobia on the other, they guided me to a wrought iron bench that wasn't far away from the big tree (but far enough away so that we wouldn't smell my puke-eesh).

"Should I get someone?" Travis asked.

"No," I said quickly. "I'm fine. I'm better now that I'm sitting." I glanced at Stark questioningly. He nodded. "Whatever you saw, tell her. We trust her."

I looked from him to Lenobia. "And you trust Travis?"

She didn't hesitate. "With my life."

The big cowboy smiled and stepped closer to her. Their shoulders touched.

"Okay, what happened is my Seer Stone started heating up. When Travis got out of the car it got really hot. Stark was here, so we decided I should look through it at, well, you guys and see if that would help me start to understand what it shows me. So I looked through it at you two."

"Seer Stone?" Travis asked. He didn't sound freaked out at all. He just sounded curious.

"It's an old magick amulet given to Zoey by an ancient vampyre queen," Lenobia explained. "What did you see?"

"Well, nothing but you two until you kissed." I smiled sheepishly. "Sorry for watching you while you were kissing."

Travis smiled and put a bandaged arm around Lenobia's shoulders. "If I have my way about it, little missy, you'll be seein' a whole lot me of me kissin' this pretty girl."

I waited for Lenobia to strike him dead with her death-ray vision. Instead she looked adoringly up at him, pressed her hand to his chest over his heart, and rested her head, carefully, against his shoulder. Then she repeated, "What did you see when we were kissing?"

"Travis turned into a big black guy and you turned into a younger version of yourself. And all around you there were these wispy, bubbly, happy things that were blue. I'm pretty sure they were sprites of some sort." My eyes widened. "Actually, now that I think about it, the bubbles reminded me of the ocean. Huh. Weird. Anyway, I got all caught up in it, like it lifted me from the earth and put me in a happy blue ocean bubble. Sorry. I know that sounds crazy." I held my breath, waiting for Lenobia to laugh and Travis to scoff.

They didn't do either. Instead, Lenobia began to cry. I mean, seriously. She did the big, shoulder-shaking, snot bawl that I tend to be prone to. Travis just held her closer to him. He looked down at her as if she was a miracle personified. "I've known you before. That's why you feel like home to me."

Lenobia nodded. Then, through her tears, she told me, "Travis is my only human mate, my only love, returned to me after two hundred and twenty-four years. I vowed never to love another after him, and I have not. We met and fell in love on the ocean in a ship that carried us from France to New Orleans."

"So the Seer Stone showed me the truth?"

"Yes, Zoey. It absolutely did," Lenobia said before she turned her face into Travis's chest and wept while he held her, releasing two centuries of waiting and loss and pain.

I stood and took Stark's hand again, pulling him away so that the two of them could be alone. As we walked into the stables he said, "This does not mean Aurox is Heath come back to you. You know that, right?"

Stevie Rae saved me by rushing up and gushing, "Ohmygoodness! Where have you been? I can't wait to tell you 'bout Lenobia and Travis."

"Been there. Done that," Stark said. "Where are Aphrodite and Darius?"