Dreams aren't supposed to bleed into daylight.
His eyes are locked on mine as he speaks, voice low, almost trembling.
"I saw them take you. I've been seeing it for months."
I freeze. I never told anyone about my nightmare—not even Shel—and yet he knows.
"Let me explain. I had this dream a few months ago, that you were in an accident, I saw something happen to you. I saw them take you, and I believed it was just that, a dream. My subconscious fear of losing you."
Wait. What? Who's them?
"A few weeks ago, I had a horrible nightmare, and that was the first and only time I ever had a nightmare like that. Knowing then I had to find you because every day since this incredible dread has crept into my emotions I keep seeing you die."
Taken back by his statement, I gape at him. I told no one about my nightmare, not my parents or siblings. Not even Shel. He witnessed my reaction and explains more.
"I should have been here sooner," he says, voice scraped raw, like it's clawed its way out of his chest. "But my father had other plans for me."
The words drip with venom, but the shadows in his eyes tell me more.
"Chains. Fire. Silence. He says torture is the purest language—that even the strongest break if you cut deep enough. I was locked in his dungeon when it came—the nightmare."
The memory clawed at him. His voice drops.
"Stone walls wet with blood and salt. The stink of iron and rot. Rats gnawed at scraps in the corners, waiting for whatever fell from the table. My wrists split open against the cuffs every time I pulled, but I pulled anyway, because the dream…" He breaks off, shaking his head.
"I saw you. Taken. And I screamed, not from the pain he dealt me, but from the terror that I couldn't reach you."
The air between us turns cold and heavy, like his nightmare has slipped into the room.
His eyes, pale and unrelenting, pin me in place.
"That thing in the shadows that carried you away…" His words are almost a growl
"It was a Ker."
He sees my reaction, and I'm sure he notices my confusion and anger.
"Keres aren't like anything else you've ever faced," he says, his voice low, like the name itself might summon them. "They're ties to your mother and aunts. Born from the same darkness, but unbound. They don't follow rules. They don't answer to gods. They feed on blood, on terror, on endings."
His eyes flicker, a shadow of something he's seen before.
"I think they're after you because of who you are–because of your mother–and because someone has paid them to come. They won't just take your soul, Angelia. They'll take all of you, drag you to whatever pit their employer chooses, and leave you there until there's nothing left."
He pauses, the air between us tightening.
"You've already been in their claws before. Plagues. Wars. Disasters. Each time, they came for you. Each time, you slipped their chains. And each time one of them died for it–punished by their master for failing to hold you."
My stomach lurches. The woods are beginning to feel too small, the air too thin.
"This is insane," I whisper. "It sounds…demented. Like something from a dream."
His gaze hardens. "Then wake up."
"You feel it, don't you?" His voice low, urgent. "That gnawing ache at the edge of your thoughts, the weight in your chest when nothing seems wrong but everything feels wrong. That's me. That's us. Bound by blood, bound by something older than memory. Even when your mind was foreced to forget me, the bond remained. I sense when you're in danger. And you–" His eyes pierce mine, unrelenting. "You feel it when I bleed."
My stomach twists. What the hell is going on? I know I've had those gut 'feelings' out of nowhere. Could it be because I'm feeling him in pain or in danger?
He steps closer, shadows curling around him like second skin. "It wasn't supposed to be this way. We were never meant to be more than protector and charge. Your father–Hermes–chose me to guard you because I was the one soldier he believed would never be tethered to a single women. And for hundreds years, he was right. I wanted them all. I swore I'd never crave only one."
His voice breaks, a sharp crack against the weight of his control. "Until you. Until everything about you—your fire, your stubbornness, the way you defy the very threads of fate—made me forget every other face. You ruined me, and I never wanted to be saved."
He exhales like a confession has been ripping him apart for centuries. "Even after all the years, all the silence, all the gods themselves tearing us apart, it feels like yesterday. For me, it's always yesterday."
I blow out a sighing breath, "Well this is all new to me, not yesterday or the day before, but today."
He laughs, "There was this one time, I remember, we were discussing how tired you were of hiding our union because all kinds of visitors came around to ask Hermes for your hand. It was one of our biggest fights, your new summer garden destroyed by your outburst. There were flower pots thrown, at me I might add, all over the stone paths. All because I refused to tell anyone and wanted to keep you all to myself." He looks at me.
"It was also one of the most enthralling, passionate make ups we ever had. We made love to the sound of nature's songs, under the stars in the middle of the garden against this tree we planted together. This tree served as a symbol of our unifying bond. I remember walking by that tree every day on patrol with a smile on my face and remembering I needed you. I would search you out right after my patrol every night."
My skin begins to get hot from, most likely, blushing.
"Your touch on my skin is more addicting than any drug." His hand caresses my arm as it moves down toward my hands.
Will smirks, "There was also this other memorable time when you received an invitation to dinner from my father, and he was flirting with you in front of my mother and other siblings. Ares kept asking you about your interests, including your thoughts on starting a family and similar topics. You slammed your fist into that table and stood up while glaring at him, like you could melt him with just your eyes. You could if you wanted. You reigned in your power with so much control I wanted you there on the table that night."
The look on Will's face spoke volumes at how he feels about this woman he speaks of. He loves her. Would die for her.
"You're so sweet. You apologized to my mother for his behavior. Then addressed Ares, "I wouldn't be your partner even if you were the last man on Erda. I find you egotistical, flighty, and a Neanderthal who coerces women, ensnaring them in your manipulating games. You are not good enough for me, just like my father told you."
"I was so proud of you at that moment—"
"Wait. Ares wanted to marry me?"
"At least I know you're listening; caught that, huh?" Yes, my father marched to Olympus and told Zeus to order Hermes to give you up to him. However, my grandfather firmly told him in a loud, booming voice that he needed to manage his own sibling issues and would not command Hermes to give him his only daughter for marriage.
Hermes is my father? I stare down at my hands. Why don't I recognize anything Will is saying?
With blurred eyesight, I'm thrown into another vision.
"Hermes, this union between your daughter and I will join our families to strengthen us. You must let me make her my bride." Ares paces the large room, looking every so often in my direction.
"I already told you Ares, my daughter will never be with you. She has a mind of her own and I encourage it very much. You have a partner that is everything you want in a woman, she is complacent and obeys everything you ask of her. Daughter of mine?" A booming male voice interrupts me as I am reading a book.
I am sitting in a throne chair fashioned in all gold with a white cushion and a marvelous white and gray fur thrown over the arm laying across the seat. "Yes, father?"
"Are you interested in marrying Ares?"
I laugh, a full-blown laugh, and then I stop short. "No. Father, I will never be with the likes of a man like that; he is not good enough for me. You are aware of what standards I want in a partner and how I am currently seeing someone."
"You allow her to court men without supervision? Hermes that is—"
"Don't test me brother. She is my daughter and I want her to choose her own companion, not forced into a relationship with someone she will never love or share interests with. You need more lessons with our dear sister, brother, why don't you go see Aphrodite. She may help you understand how in these times, woman control their own lives."
My eyesight takes in my surroundings, and I see Will still talking in front of me, confused that he is not commenting on my visions.
"At first my mother couldn't stop raving about you to her lady friends. She would say 'Enya, you guard her everyday it is shocking that you do not get closer to that girl better, she would be perfect for you. Yours and her wit would keep you both busy for millennia."
He smirks at the memory; I do as well, thinking to myself. He steps closer and touches my hair and bends to get closer, like he needs my scent to live. I raise an eyebrow; he meets my eyes again.
"If she only realized that after that dinner debacle we were in my chambers. As soon as my door bolted, I twisted around, hungry, and wanting you. I pushed you up against the door and kissed your neck, trailing my lips down to your shoulder. Your fingers gripping my biceps and tugging my hair. We kissed harder and faster with every second that ticked by."
I can see where this is going and I seriously wish I could remember it.