Chapter 37

Chapter 37

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“How did you know?”  Hazel, the vampire, demanded as she slid from around the trunk of a tree.  She wore another flimsy black dress, only this time a black parasol lounged casually against one shoulder, shielding her from the gray daylight.

“You smell like blood,” Eliot all but growled. Miriam didn’t miss how his eyes cut nervously in her direction.

Hazel pouted, glaring at someone behind them.  “You Oaf!  I told he would know.”

“Sorry.”  Miriam turned to find the other half of the strange pair, Sage, standing a few feet behind them, bathed in shadow.  “I was…hungry,” he added, licking a crimson spot from his lips.

Miriam shivered and unconsciously shifted closer to Eliot.

“What are you two doing out?”  he demanded.

“It’s almost nightfall,” Hazel replied, twirling the end of her parasol around and around.

“And we’re bored of that damn house,” Sage pitched in.  “We aren’t feral puppies you can keep on a leash, you know.”

Eliot seemed to disagree.  "Get back to the--"

“Let us come with you.”  Hazel’s black eyes were pleading.  “Pretty, pretty please?”

“No.”

The only warning Miriam had was a flash of white before Eliot grabbed her arm and started to drag her in an opposite direction.

“Why not?”  Sage appeared in front of them this time, crossing his pale arms over the front of a dark sweater.

“We promise not to be naughty,” Hazel added, appearing by his side.  She smiled, revealing a flash of her pearly white fangs.  “Pinky promise.  We will be on our very best behavior.”

“Somewhat,” Sage added in a grumble.

Eliot looked like he might say no again--or worse.  His eyes narrowed dangerously.  Then all at once his grip tightened and Miriam found herself behind dragged back in the direction of the forest.

“Yay!”  Hazel exclaimed.  There was a sharp snap as if she had clapped her hands together.  “How exciting.”

“Oh yes, goody,” Miriam heard Sage remark sarcastically.  “Running around in the woods on an errand for some crazy ass witch.  My idea of fun—”

“Sage!” Hazel giggled even as she scolded him.  “You’re idea of fun is anything with a beating heart and two legs—”

“Shut up.  Watch what you say around the mortal,” Sage stage-whispered.

But Miriam was too busy confused by something else the vampire had said than to worry about the morbid innuendo.

“Witch?”  She asked, glancing up at Eliot’s pale jaw.

He didn’t answer.  His grip only tightened around her wrist until she was half afraid he’d cut the circulation off.  He led her hallway up a snow-covered hill while Sage and Hazel followed behind, muttering together under their breath.

Eventually, even they fell silent, and not long after they entered a wide open grove, centered around a sight that made Miriam’s mouth drop open.

“Wow,” she blurted, gaping as her boots crunched over the ice and snow.

Spread out below, like a circle of silver, was a medium-sized lake, nestled in among the trees. In the fading daylight the small clearing resembled some untouched winter paradise from a fairytale.  The waters of the lake weren’t even frozen yet and lapped patiently against a rocky beach.

“It’s beautiful,” she whispered.  “I...I didn't even know there was a lake around here.”

“Most people don’t,” she heard Eliot murmur, suddenly closer than before.  “Even after hundred years, it will probably still look the same as it does now.”

He sounded wistful about that; as if he knew firsthand.

“Lovely,” Hazel said, twisting the stem of her parasol with a bored expression.  “Sage and I will go and see if the wildlife around here is just as…breathtaking.”

The two disappeared into the shadows in a flash.

Eliot looked as though he might go after them, but Miriam was already pulling away, picking a path down the hill to the water’s edge.  She didn’t seem to have any control over her body.  She just moved, not stopping at all until soft waves of the icy water brushed the tops of her boots.

For a long while she just stared, entranced, as the navy sky played across the surface of the water like one big reflection on a giant mirror.  She didn’t even notice Eliot come to stand beside her until his cool breath brushed the lobe of her ear, raising shivers.

“It has a name," he said quietly.  "Do you want to hear it?”

She nodded, too stunned to speak.

“It’s called, Lake Kai,” he explained.  “Named for a beautiful woman who lived around these parts hundreds of years ago.”  His voice deepened into a playful murmur.  “According to legend, the beautiful Kai spent years waiting for her love, who had gone off to war with a rival tribe.  Heartbroken, she left her village, disappeared into the woods where it is said that she cried the tears that form the very waters of this lake.”

The story was obvious too outrageous to be true.  Still…Miriam couldn’t ignore the feeling that there was something special about this place.

Something sacred.

It was almost in a daze that she bent down to swipe her fingers across the water’s surface.

It was cold.  Bitterly cold—the liquid tingled against the tips of her fingers.  Impulsively, she brought her hand to her mouth and let a drop slid down onto her tongue.

“Taste anything like tears?”  She heard Eliot ask from behind her.

“It tastes…”  She licked her lips, rolling the odd flavor around on her tongue.  “Salty,” she admitted in awe.  Laughing she turned to face him.  “It tastes salty…”

She trailed off when he didn’t return her smile. He was watching her instead, face blank and expressionless, like always.

Except for something faint, just there in the back of those amber eyes.

It was a look that made her throat go dry.  Weightless, her hand fell down to her side and she could only stand still, frozen in place, as he moved closer.

Those pale fingers were cool and gentle, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

“Of course it tastes salty,” he said, red eyes boring into hers.  “Just because something is a legend, doesn’t mean it isn’t true.”

He was the living proof.

Still, she didn't know what to say.  Anyway, at the moment, things like logic and facts didn’t matter.

It didn’t matter that years of general science had taught her that a single person’s tears couldn’t possibly be enough to fill and entire lake.

That he and the things he spoke about didn't exist.

It didn’t matter that she was out in the middle of the woods with a virtual stranger who liked to complain that it would have been so easy to kill her.

None of that mattered.

The only things that did, were the two of them standing at the mouth of a freezing lake, bathed in the glow of a weak moon struggling to push through the clouds overhead.

Nothing else.

She thought he might kiss her.  He moved closer as if he might, but then at the last minute he turned away.

“Hmm,” he said softly, pulling her gaze down at the rocks beneath their feet.  “I don’t ever remember seeing these here before.”

He stooped to fish something from the gravel.

“Here.”

She blinked to find a smooth, round stone on the palm of her hand.  It was a deep shade of greenish-blue, almost like turquoise, that gleamed beautifully beneath the light of the stars with a perfectly oval hole formed near the top.

“It’s lovely,” she murmured, turning the stone over in her hands, even as a part of her flinched at the familiar color of blue.  It was almost like…

“Here’s another,” Eliot said softly, slipping a second stone into her hand beside the first.  The newer stone was smaller, but no less brilliant than the first.

“They’re beautiful,” she said, fighting back unease as she realized what color the stones reminded her of.  She forced herself to smile anyway.  “Do you think the Lady Kai would mind if I keep one?”

Eliot gave her a strange look.  Then, before she could blink, he took one of the stones from her and turned around. She stared as he bent down to undo the laces of one of his boots.

“What are you—”

“Wait,” was all he said.  The next moment, he turned around holding a black shoelace by both ends.  Near the middle hung the stone; a makeshift necklace.

Miriam laughed, even as something warm began to spread through the pit of her stomach.

“May I?”  Eliot asked, as polite as can be.

Brushing her hair to the side, she turned around and tilted her head.

“S-sure.”

She couldn’t keep from shivering as those cool fingers brushed her skin as he looped the shoelace around her neck and tied it securely.  The stone felt heavy against her chest, but in a good way.

Like some ancient piece of hand-me-down jewelry passed through generations.

“Thank you."  She reached up to brush her fingers against the cold stone.  “Every day I’ll look at it and be reminded of a woman shedding thousands of tears into a beautiful lake.”

Eliot laughed, but his fingers were still there against her throat, brushing softly against her skin in icy whispers.

“Think of it more as an amulet,” he said, breath brushing her collar bone.  “A talisman of good fortune.”

“Good luck,” Miriam agreed with a nod.  “I could use some of that.”

Her word seemed to strike him deeper than she meant them too.  He pulled away, and when she turned around his face was drawn tight like she’d punched him.

Once again, she wondered just what she could have said to upset him.  But, rather than focus on it, she curled her hand impulsively around the second stone and bent down to tug at the laces of her boots.

The second stone didn’t have a hole like the first, and she had to loop it into the string with a firm knot.

“Here,” she blurted, holding it out to him.  “Some good luck of your own.”

It wasn’t until she saw him staring that she realized that her pink shoelace might not have been the best accessory to go with his dark green sweater.

“We can switch?”  she offered, reaching up to undo hers.  “I don’t mind—”

“No.”  Deliberately, he closed his fingers around the delicate stone and looped the shoelace around his own neck before she could untie her own.

The sight should have been funny—a guy wearing a pink shoelace around his neck. But, somehow, against that pale skin, the bright color was just as threatening as black.

"Thank you..."  He reached down, cupping his own stone between two fingers.  “My own good luck.”

Their eyes met again--and this time everything else seemed to fade away.

The winter breeze whipping through the branches died, and away went the soft sound of water lapping at the shore.

Everything faded into silence but the two of them—and the dark figure that crashed noisily through the trees behind them.

“All finished,” Hazel called loudly, skipping down the hillside with Sage in tow.  “Though, I must say that this wild game is simply marvelous.”

She smacked her pink lips.  “I feel so…organic—”

Her tone made Miriam swallow, pulling her attention away from Eliot—but he was moving away too, frowning.

“I smell something,” Sage announced in his deep grumble.

Hazel bounced on her feet excited.  “Ooh!  What?”

“Shut up,” Eliot snarled.  Together, he and Sage cocked their heads to the side.  Almost as if trying to hear something from far away.  “Listen...”

"To what?"  Hazel demanded on a sigh.

It was only a split second later that the sound came again, this time loud enough for even Miriam to hear it.

A sound that echoed.

A sound that made tingles of fear dart down her spine.

The mournful howl of a wolf.