Page 17 of A Deal For a Kiss

“Something inside me…” I say, my eyelids growing heavy. “Something inside me does remember.”

“You’ll remember,” he tells me. “We have all the time you need.”

“It scares me,” I tell him. What I’ve remembered is so much bigger than my life in Edinburgh and my life before. It’s so much bigger than all the history I studied. This is unreal. It's like nothing I could have ever prepared for.

“There is nothing here to fear,” he assures me, and I believe him.

I stare into his eyes before reaching my palm up to cup his stubbled jaw. I nearly say it,I know I’ve loved you before, but I don’t. And as if he knows already, he kisses me right there, in that spot again and I moan, “Carlisle,” as if I’ve said his name a thousand times before.

APHRODITE

Olympus

Istand before my altar, with its mirrors from the foot of the bath to the high ceiling. Its edges gilded and the edge of the water littered with rose quartz, vases of flowers, and candles whose flames reflect in the still water.

It’s quiet, apart from the crackling of the fire, as I slip off the silk robe and step into the hot bath, enveloped by steam.

The entire entrance to my sanctuary is carved from aquamarine. It reflects the glimmers of the water so beautifully and the stone wraps itself onto the ceiling. The stones glimmer with otherworldly blues and golds running through them, shining into the water and making it appear as if it goes on forever.

When I close my eyes, the sirens call to me. There is so much love to be given and far too much taken for my liking.

I dip my fingers into the water and let the ripples on the surface settle before I sink my thoughts into it, following thepath from past to present to future and back again until I find what I am looking for. What I need to see.

Who I need to see. Who needs me most for their highest self, I whisper as I stare into the flame that reflects in the mirror before me.

Persephone, my sister, is there in the water.

To my shock and confusion.

I recognize her form and her power as easily as I recognize that there is something wrong. I close my eyes and concentrate. Her doubt and fears of what is to come has plagued her, I know. But what I feel is darker. What is coming sends a chill down my spine.

It is like nothing before.

Something has happened. Something has shifted.

It’s as if a person might feel a creature under the water, lurking below, more powerful than a human and more deadly. Persephone’s thoughts are dark like that, and as I concentrate harder, they begin to take a clearer form. The form is mostly a feeling, and that feeling is?—

Cold.

It’s the cold embrace of death. It’s the cold from which mortals never awaken, and which they run from all their lives, whether they realize they’re running from it or not.

I blink away the vision, but the chill still lingers on my skin. “She is a goddess,” I whisper. Things of this nature should not be.

With the unsettled feeling I think of Ares. I need him now to ease this discomfort and fear of the unknown.

Glancing over my shoulder as if someone is there, I see nothing. Not my lover. The darkness though in the water remains when I think of Persephone.

I’ve never felt such things for a god.

I reach more deeply into it, trying to identify it. It reminds me of Ares, but it is not Ares.

It is another presence, close to Persephone. It is not an echo from the past or a possibility. It is someone near to her now, in the present moment.

My thoughts are disturbed as my sister enters my space, and I lose the connection to my power. Athena’s bare feet pad on the quartz floor as she enters. It’s still there, of course, but it’s not as strong as it was, and I no longer sense the other presence as clearly.

As my sister crosses the floor, I try to keep my thoughts with Persephone for a few moments more.

It is not easy. The sound of Athena pulls me toward my physical form and away from the power in my basin. Athena cannot prevent me from using my power, but distractions make it more difficult.

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