The Darkness in Dreams (Enforcer's Legacy, #1)(14)

“Lover? Mate?” Marge smiled. “Yes. A warrior just like Christan and Arsen.”

“He looks older than they do.”

“An accommodation to my vanity. I once told him I was uncomfortable with our age difference and he changed his physical appearance to keep it closer to mine.”

Another secret Lexi hadn’t realized, that Marge was insecure when it came to love. Lexi touched her friend’s hand. “You deserve to be loved, Marge. He seems perfect for you.”

“Now that he doesn’t look thirty,” Marge agreed. “They don’t age unless they want to.”

Lexi looked toward Christan, unable to stop herself, watched the way sunlight disappeared in the midnight depths of his hair. Awareness pounded through her, the kind a woman felt beneath her skin. Hard. Alarming. She’d need to walk far, far around him, this man with dark intensity in his eyes. Far around, indeed.

“So Christan is what—a boss or something?”

“Or something.” Marge relaxed in the bistro chair. “No one has seen Christan in four hundred years.”

“That seems excessive.”

“He was in the Void.” The older woman lifted her shoulders, pushed the hair from her face. “It’s a place between matter and space.”

“But four hundred years?” It was more than excessive. It was extreme, reminding Lexi of what immortal meant when it came to time.

“But it’s curious that he’s back now.”

“Curious isn’t a word I would use.”

“Fascinating, then. Warriors have both telekinetic and telepathic abilities. Maybe you’ve noticed the way they seem to be holding mental conversations? They are. And the telekinetic ability—that’s how Christan put you on the ground and kept you there. He can be annoying at times.”

Annoying was another word Lexi wouldn’t use, but Marge was prattling on, ignoring Lexi’s lack of enthusiasm.

“Immortals can speak any human language they want, but for their magic they use mental images called one words—it’s a complete concept. They project it telepathically, just send it into someone’s mind. Robbie told me it takes a strong power to control the one word Christan used to put himself into the Void. That’s how he kept himself there, too. Only two immortals are strong enough to have forced him back. Probably the one they call Three did it.”

“They go by numbers?”

“The immortals on the Calata do. Some old tradition. Christan is her enforcer.”

“I can imagine what that means,” Lexi said, looking at the man.

“No, actually you can’t. It’s quite appalling in some respects, although I find it tragic. Everyone respects him. They would do anything for him. They’re trying to protect him right now, even though he doesn’t need protection.” Marge picked up a cube of the cheese, held it between her thumb and forefinger. “How do you see Christan, now that you understand what they are?”

“I haven’t formed an opinion,” Lexi said, although a part of her remained confused by the emotions he aroused. She was both aggressive and vulnerable at the same time. When he’d put her on the ground, the force of it felt empty, but there’d been more behind his action than ending an argument over photographs. He’d looked at her, and his eyes were dark and ancient. Bitter. She could still feel it.

“How do I factor into this, Marge?”

“You have memory lines.”

“One,” Lexi corrected. “Barely visible, and without memories, which I assume is the purpose behind it.”

“But you’re smart enough to know what it means.”

Toward the edge of the canyon, bits of dirt swirled in a dust devil that jumped and skittered across the ground. Lexi watched it fade away, then glanced at the faint line beneath her skin.

“What life was this?”

“If I had to guess, it was Gabrielle.”

“She died young.”

Marge nodded. “The lines record every remembered lifetime, not just those with the warriors.”

“They aren’t around for every life?”

“No, they don’t always interact. Sometimes, it’s due to circumstance. Choice in others.”

Lexi scrubbed her boot across the ground, a child, erasing something written in the sand. “How was Robbie able to find you?”

“The magic creates a bond energy in the girls. If a warrior is sensitive enough, he can pick up on it.”

“Describe it.”

“I feel a silver thread. When Robbie is near there’s a tugging sensation in my throat.”

Lexi turned her head to gaze at a distant juniper tree, gnarled and bent. Half of the tree had been severed from the other as if struck by violent lightning, exposing the inner heart, blood red.

“I don’t feel anything like that.”

“But you recognize him. You’ve been aware of him this entire time.”

Lexi looked back at Marge. “When Arsen changed, you said, not him.”

Marge picked at a thread from her khaki slacks. The low sound of male voices carried, filling the silence, and Lexi turned her eyes toward the juniper again. “It’s not Arsen, is it?”

“It was a long time ago,” Marge said. “Warriors are immortal. They wanted what no immortal should have dared conceive, and the Calata gave it to them.”