Reign of Shadows - Deborah Chester [87]
Like her, he was clad only in darkness. Her skin flushed hot as though she’d ben dipped in boiling water, yet the very top of her head felt icy cold. She found herself gripping the sides of her bench with all her strength, and she could not stop trembling. Her breathing deepened, and her back arched of its own volition.
Suddenly she was off the bench, standing tall. Her fear remained, yet it shielded an eagerness she had never known before. Something inside her seemed to recognize this half- seen stranger. He walked like a warrior, graceful and strong. She had never seen anyone as tall. His neck was like a column, straight and strong. She strained to see the molding of his head and face.
To see him more clearly ... to gaze into his eyes ... to feel the touch of his fingertips on her skin ...
She stepped forward, walking to meet him halfway. Her heart lifted and yearned. She knew him, had known him throughout the sands of time. He was for her, as she was for him. Gladness burst through her, and she wanted to sing as she ran. Why had it taken so long to find him again?
In the blink of a moment, the distance between them ended. They stood face to face, breathless and cloaked in the strange shadows.
“Elandra,” he whispered, his voice striking like a bronze bell within her soul.
The light was spreading, lifting around them. In moments she would see his face and know his name again, this man whom she had loved for all of time.
She lifted her arms to his neck and pressed herself close against warm skin and hard muscles.
“Elandra,” he said again. “I have found thee, my only love.”
His lips brushed against her trembling ones, even as she caught her breath for the kiss that would return her memory.
But from the corner of her eye she glimpsed a quick flash of yellow light, bright and foreign to the soft green light at their feet.
Distracted, Elandra turned her head to look, and her lover vanished like smoke.
“No!” she cried aloud. She looked in all directions, but he was gone.
Filled with a sense of loss, Elandra took a few aimless steps. “Come back!” she called. “Please come back to me!”
She did not know his name, and her frustration grew. If she could call out his name, he would come back to her.
“Please,” she whispered again.
He did not reappear, and she knew she could search forever through the shadows and not find him.
Angry, she turned toward the yellow light and stormed toward it. “Why?” she called. “Why couldn’t you wait?”
The light tried to recede and wavered. That’s when Elandra saw it was only a shield for a woman, motionless and watchful.
Slightly plump and middle-aged, she was garbed in a long black robe that covered her entirely from neck to wrist to feet.
“Who are you?” Elandra demanded. “Why did you interrupt? What are you doing here?”
The woman’s eyes widened in astonishment that changed to alarm. Without a word, she gathered up her long skirts and abruptly ran.
But her flight only fanned Elandra’s anger more. She ran after the watcher, pursuing her in a wild, zigzagging flight up and down hills and over boulder-strewn ground. The woman ran awkwardly and not very well. Soon, she slowed and began to glance over her shoulder more and more often. Elandra gritted her teeth and increased her stride.
You are an old gazelle, she thought, drawing on an old childhood game when she had been taught by the huntsman how to pursue quarry with her mind as well as her body. I am the panther, swift and bold. I can catch you.
With every stride, she gained on the older woman.
By the time they reached the stone pillars, Elandra was close enough to grab the back of the watcher’s robe. She yanked hard, bringing the woman to a halt just short of the gateway.
The woman twisted in her hold, eyes filled with fear. “No,” she said breathlessly. “You cannot exit with me. You cannot—”
“Tell me his name, watcher,” Elandra said.
The woman’s fearfulness grew. “Impossible!” she breathed. “You cannot see me. You are not