Page 49 of As Darkness Fall
And I haven’t even thought about how to deal with the fact that I’m Soulbound to a god.
A lot of wine and a lot of therapy.
But first. Figuring out how to get my parents back.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Ilooked back and forth between my companions.
“So, we’re all thinking the same thing,” I asked. “Right?”
Neither of them agreed with me.
“I’m not the only crazy one here. I know that. You’re both thinking it, too,” I said. “I know you are.”
“Thinking what?” Vir asked, leaning back, his knees poking into the seat in front of him rather hard.
“Can you not do that?” Aaron grumbled, shifting in the chair.
“No, I’m cramped,” Vir muttered.
“Children. You’re just a bunch of children,” I moaned. “My parents are doomed.”
Both of them shut up. Good. If I needed to guilt them into remembering that lives were at stake here, then so be it. I would do it. There wasn’t much I was ruling out just now. I’d do anything to get my parents back. We had so much to talk about. There were so many questions I had to ask of them. Answers that I desperately craved.
“What is it you’re thinking, Dani?” Vir asked, subdued as he sat up in the chair to pull his knees out from Aaron’s back.
“It’s simple, really,” I said. “We have to rob Hades.”
“What?” Aaron exploded. “No. Absolutely not. No way. Nuh uh. Not happening.”
“It really is a terrible idea,” Vir added in slow, measured words. “Horrible. Hades is, well, grouchy doesn’t even begin to cover it.”
“So very true,” Aaron grumbled.
“But I don’t see how we have any other choice,” Vir added.
Aaron exploded. “What? You can’t be serious!”
“You were the one who gave him the Idol, you fool,” Vir pointed out tiredly. “Ofcourse,we have to get it back from him. We can’t let something as valuable as that stay in his possession. That is simply unacceptable.”
I sat back and listened as they argued. It was clear that they respected one another, though there was also a level of dislike present there as well. I wonder what had happened to create the relationship between them that I was witnessing.
Is that because of me? Is this just a testosterone thing?
Although I certainly wasn’t ready to confront the situation, there was an undeniable chemistry between Aaron and me. I’d felt it that very first night when he’d sat down next to me at the bar after my fight. Every day and night since, it had been there. I kept myself from giving in because the time had never been right, but that wasn’t the same as it not existing. Because it most certainly did.
Then, there was Vir. He was a god, which alone would have brought with it a whole new set of issues when it came to sexual tension. Unfortunately for me, I wasn’t just attracted to him. I was Soulbound to him. A very real linking of our two selves. I still wasn’t ready to unpack that baggage, mostly because I had yet to figure out how the hell an immortal being could be Soulbound to anyone. Let alone me. Maybe later, after we had rescued my parents, I could pause and try to deal with that.
But I wasn’t counting on it. I was pretty good at avoiding confronting my problems.
As I refocused on the two of them, a particular memory returned to me. I was back in the minor temple of Terrano in Shuldar, tied to a sacrificial altar, with Vir next to me, also bound.
Aaron had shown up then, without warning, to rescue us. And as I remembered it now, the two of them had acted like they knew one another then.
Except Vir has spent the past millennia in the Direen, the realm of the Shifter Gods. So, they couldn’t know one another, not unless—
I stared at Aaron. Was it possible he was over a thousand years old? He certainly didn’t look like it, but then again, he was a vampire. What did that mean? How did they age?Didthey age? There was so much I didn’t know about vampires. I paused, realizing I didn’t knowanythingabout vampires besides their existence.
