Page 342 of Flirting with Darkness

“Kharon?” Rae says, rising to her knees as I make my way to Moirai’s onyx stone. I need answers.

“Rae, listen, I promise, I’ll explain everything to you, but I need you to be honest with me.”

“Of course,” she answers, searching my face.

Patting my face, I’m surprised to no longer find sagging skin or sunken eyes, but Rae stares on at me as though nothing has changed. “How do I look to you? I mean do I look like some old, decrepit man? Like I did at the cotillion?”

“The cotillion? Are you really stopping the moment to ask me how you look? I mean—”

“Please, Rae, I promise this isn’t about vanity. Seriously, what do you see?” I need to know I’m not losing my mind.

Standing up, Rae closes the distance between us. Tracing her petite fingers along my chest and abs, she hums, fluttering her eyes up at me through her perfectly thick lashes. “I see you, Kharon. I’ve always seen you.” Slowly, Rae’s hands reach my face, cupping my chin.

Just her touch alone calms my angst, soothing the trepidation brewing within me.

Her words shoot straight to my manhood and it’s taking everything in me not to throw her back in the pile of silks and satins behind her. Just her touch alone invigorates me in ways only hours ago, I thought myself incapable.

Before I have a chance to reply, Moirai’s bright light shines through the stone and her veiled form appears. “Greetings, brother!” Moirai calls to me, startling Rae as she jumps back into my arms. Pulling her into my hold, Rae grunts and looks up at me in shock when she senses my stiffened member now pressed at her backside. “I hope I’m not interrupting you,” Moirai continues, slightly distracting me from my abandoned thoughts.

“Greetings, sister,” I start, rubbing Rae’s shoulder’s, hopeful to ease the concern I sense building within her as Moirai speaks. “I’d like you to meet someone,” I announce with a puffed chest as I finally introduce my sister to the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known.

“No introductions are necessary.” Moirai’s bright tone shines through the onyx stone and I can only imagine my lovely sister’s smile stretching from ear to ear. “With the way your eyes are dancing brother, I know this must be the Rae Vereen you’ve spoken so fondly of.”

Rae looks over her shoulder up at me as a bashful smile crosses her face. Kissing the top of Rae’s head, I wrap my arms around her as she nuzzles herself deeper into my embrace. It feels so good just holding her.

A small chuckle escapes me, and I’m surprised at the lighter turn the night has taken. “You are quite right, Moirai—as always.”

“Yes, but that is not what you want to know. Is it, brother? You want to know why the cursed stench of death brought on by the Changelings is leaving your body?”

Rae steps aside, looking back and forth at me and Moirai, concern filling the void between her brows. “Kharon, what is your sister talking about? What does she mean by death?”

The worry I see in Rae’s eyes pierces my heart. I want for nothing but to bring her back to the impassioned precipice she clung to only moments ago, but I can’t go further without understanding what is happening to me.

“Moirai, please, no riddles,” I begin, all too familiar with the furtive speech of both the Fates and Changelings alike. I know my sister can’t help it. Fates like her don’t typically give straightforward answers. And Changelings, confounded by this earthbound plane, their language is more in line with a parable or limerick than the fluid sentence structure of men.

“Well, Rae Vereen,” Moirai answers, keeping her attention on Rae, ignoring me. “Once the obol was stolen from Kharon and your cousin Melchior set free, the curse that the Changelings put on my brother was unleashed—quickening his age, inevitably speeding him to death’s door.”

Horrorstruck, Rae turns back to me, clutching my arm. “No!” she cries. “Please don’t let them do anything to him. I know he was only trying to save you—not hurt Melchior! I can explain it. I’ll make them understand. Please!”

“Ah, what a pure heart she has, dear brother,” Moirai sighs. “And it is the love and purity of her heart that is yet freeing you from their wretched curse.”

Squeezing my arm, Rae’s tearful eyes stare up at me and my heart leaps at the sight of the care I see laced in the small smile curved at the corner of her perfectly apricot-hued lips.

“That is also why she alone can see you for who you are—not for what they made you to be,” Moirai adds, and all the puzzle pieces slowly take shape in my mind.

Once Melchior was free my body shriveled into an unsightly, decaying old man. The curse of the Changelings upon the Sons of Erebus were clear, without true love we would fade from existence. If I were still in the Netherworld, such a fate would place me in servitude as a ferryman of Sheol—a collector of souls. But here on an earthbound plane, I would simply fade away and die.

“Rae, when I asked earlier how I looked to you—you said you saw me. Yet, earlier at the cotillion the lot of them were horrorstruck by the mere sight of me. But not you. You saw me—the real me. And if what my sister says is true, that can only mean one thing.”

Wiping the trail of tears flowing to her chin, Rae looks up at me, still with hopeful eyes. “What, Kharon? What does it mean?”

Taking her face in my hand, I smile. I can’t believe I didn’t understand it before now, but looking at her, the truth is plain to see. “It means you are, in fact, my true love. Only a love as true as yours can see me for not what some curse would make me out to be, but for who I am—for who you deserve me to be.”

“And who is that, Kharon? Who do I deserve you to be?” Rae asks, leaning into my palm.

“I am yours Rae Vereen. All yours. That is, if you’ll have me,” I reply, pressing my forehead to hers.

“Why do you think I’m here, Kharon. I’ve been waiting for what feels like my whole life to have you—but I know one thing, I’ll never let you go.”

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