30. Why Does Pain Have to Hurt so Much?

But she had needed a punch of power. When Abigail attacked, she didn't have the magical object she needed to fight at her strongest. She'd been handicapped because she'd already given it to me.

I needed to find Leticia and I needed to fight Abigail. There was no choice. I wasn't going to run, not anymore. I'd done that for too long. I was hanging on to Clive and this life, no matter what. ‘What,' unfortunately, was apparently a world of pain.

Nope. I wasn't giving myself time to get scared. It had to be done, and sooner rather than later. I'd suffered through the horrible headaches and blindness before I had the wicche glass, and I could do it again. I put the grimoire aside and stepped off the table. I had no idea what would happen, but lying down on the flagstones and moss seemed preferable to falling from four feet up. Why add to the trauma?

Okay, fuck it. Let's go. Slowing my breathing, I envisioned my magic like a thread, coiled in my chest. Wrapping the thread around the wicche glass, I began to pull the magical payment from the small glass orb. Fire spread slowly down my limbs. Teeth gritted, I forced myself not to scream.

Martha had said I could direct the payment. It didn't have to be blindness. Opening my eyes, I stared at the purpling sky above and directed the payment elsewhere. I didn't want to be trapped in the dark again, not like before… When I heard the high keening sound I was making, I knew this wouldn't work. I had to open wide the floodgates. I couldn't do this a little at a time. The pain would be too much and I'd stop, whether I meant to or not. Like a Band-Aid then, all at once.

And just like that, the scars covering my body were painted in fire, my head crushed in a vice. All thought gone, only horrific, unending pain. Back bowing off the ground, I screamed and screamed and screamed as my blood boiled and my skin crackled. A slow, ceaseless, hellish torture.

Sam!

And then I was huddled in a dark place, alone and cold. I needed to go away, to sleep.

"Sam! Where is it? Where are you hurt?"

Poor Clive. He sounded frantic. The black cocooning me muffled his voice, which was good. I didn't want him to hurt, but I couldn't go back there.

"What have you done to her?"

"I did nothing, vampire."

That was nice. Maybe Clive and Galadriel could become friends. He needed a friend. I was fading into the cool depths of nothingness.

"Look at this."

"Her heart is slowing. I don't care about the damn book. Sam, can you hear me?"

"Read."

I was going to miss him. So much. My mate. My love. Oh, that was good. The screaming had finally stopped.

"I swear by all that's holy, if you die, I will bring you back!"

No. I didn't want to be one of those damn pissy vamps. I didn't even like black.

"I mean it, Sam! You come back right now. I have reason to know just how long an eternity is. I refuse to live it without you."

I wanted to touch him, to feel him, but that would mean letting in the pain, too. I didn't think I could do that. There should be only so much one person is forced to endure.

Go on, dear. It's time to go back. I'm sorry you had to live my pain, too.Martha's words came on a cool breeze, smelling of wisteria and moss. Go on. Feel his hand on your face, his forehead against yours. Don't break both your hearts. Follow him back. He's waiting.

It hurts.

I know, child. That's how you know you're alive. You still have work to do and a hand to hold. Don't give up now.

I waded back through the pain, every nerve ending alight with torment, but I felt Clive's hand on my face, a phantom ache.

"She's coming back."

"How do you know?"

"The screaming is getting louder."

"I don't hear—"

Eyes popping open, I gasped, and then curled up and shook. Clive was trying to take away my pain, but it was barely lapping at the shores.

Two cool hands rested on me at shoulder and hip. "Don't expect me to do this again. I hate Faerie."

The flames were snuffed out as pain drained from my body.

That's my Gad. Tell her I love her. Always have. Always will.

With a shudder, the last of it dissipated. I opened streaming eyes to see a pale, shaking Galadriel. She got unsteadily to her feet, headed for the bar door and the mirror beyond. Clive helped me sit up, his hands gentle as he pulled me into his arms.

"Galadriel?"

She paused at the door, not looking back.

"Thank you."

I heard a gust of breath and she stepped into the darkened Wicche Glass.

"Also, Martha says she loves you. Always has. Always will."

The only response was the sound of a sob before I felt her pass from this realm into the heart of Faerie.

Clive held me close and rocked. I put my nose against his throat and breathed, his scent settling me. After a while, I realized I was picking up on stray thoughts, not ones he was sharing with me, ones he was struggling with.

Leaning back, I stared him in the eye and said, "I mean it. I saw firsthand what the mixing of vampire and werewolf blood does. I don't want to be a vampire."

His fingertips traced the lines of my face. "I know," he finally said. "I don't think I'd be able to stop myself, though."

Standing, I held out a hand and helped him to his feet. "You're plenty strong enough. You have more self-control than twenty vamps. You know I don't want it, so you won't do it."

"I'm afraid you have more faith in me than I do in myself." Clive looked confused when I picked up the grimoire and climbed back up on the table.

"Galadriel cleared the pain. I want to try to find Leticia again."

"You're sure?"

"This is where my power's strongest." I closed my eyes and breathed slowly. When I felt Clive sit and rest his head on my knee, I smiled, running my fingers through his hair.

Wow. Okay. That worked. The ghosts were clearer, not a nebulous hazy fog, but individual smoky forms. The green blips felt like beacons now. I hadn't been able to sense her before, so I ignored all the glowing blips and instead searched for a faint vamp signature.

"Found her."

He squeezed my calf. "Of course you did."

"She's…" I laughed. "She's next door to Stheno and her sisters."

"And they haven't noticed a vampire in their neighborhood?"

"In their defense, they drink and fight a lot. Shh, I'm going to try to read her."

Wrapping myself around her vampy mind, I found a weak spot and wriggled in. When the pain hit, I gasped and then Clive soothed it. I was getting better at this, but it still felt like walking through a minefield.

After visiting memories of her feeding on that poor werewolf, I was braced for horror and instead found Clive. He was much younger, maybe an early teen. Leticia's heart was racing. She was sitting on a horse and terrified. Her mother had berated her for being afraid, sending her to the village on an errand, forcing her to ride her father's ill-tempered bay. The horse had tried to bite her on multiple occasions. She'd hated it.

She'd lost control, yelling as the horse had barreled down the path, headlong toward a craggy outcropping of rocks. She knew he was going to throw her, knew it in her bones. And then a handsome young man stepped out of the trees, dropped his scythe, and ran to intercept them.

He stepped directly in front of the charging horse, put out a hand, and shouted, "Ho!" The horse faltered at his command, slowing, dancing one way and then the other. A young Clive strode forward and took the reins, murmuring softly to the agitated horse.

Once the horse finally settled and blew out a breath, Clive leaned in and rested his cheek against the horse's. He nodded to an awed Leticia, staring wide-eyed at him.

"All right then, miss?"

"I hate this horse," she squeaked.

"Aye, and I venture he knows it." He patted the horse's neck. "He's a mite big for you. Do your parents know you've taken this beast?"

"I was sent to the village." Still terrified of the horse she was riding, Leticia only had eyes for Clive.

"Well, that's lucky then. I was headed there myself. I'll walk with you both."

Leticia glanced back at the edge of the woods where his abandoned scythe glinted in the sun and gratefully pretended she believed him.

The memory went dark and I moved forward, slipping into another.

Clive was older now, a young man. He was driving a plow pulled by oxen. His tunic hung from his waist, sweat glistening on straining muscles. Not that I wasn't enjoying the view, but why was I here? Glancing around, I found Leticia huddled behind a stand of trees at the edge of the field Clive was plowing.

She, too, was older, perhaps middle teens. Her face showed marks of a recent beating, a reddened cheek, blackened eyes.

A girl, younger than Clive, walked to him carrying some kind of pouch. She treaded carefully over the furrows in the soil. When he saw her, he called to the oxen and stopped, pulling up his tunic and wiping the sweat from his brow.

"Please let me help you. With Papa gone, it's too much for one." She held out the pouch to him and he turned it, drinking greedily before pouring some over his head.

Handing it back, he said, "Nay, Elswyth. If we have a good season, perhaps we can take on a hand."

"At least take a break from this sun. Dinner is ready."

Clive looked up, marking the sun in the sky. "At the end of this row, I'll eat and let them rest. I need to finish the field before dark if we've any hope of getting the crops on time."

"Aye." Elswyth looked sad as she turned to go.

"Hey, did you collect berries for me? I've been dreaming of them with honey."

Spinning, she smiled. "You'll just have to wait and see, won't you. The pottage is high fragrant. It'll fill your stomach right enough. As to the berries…" She turned back toward the small, squat cabin, a spring in her step.

Grinning, Clive called up the oxen and began the heavy work again. Leticia sighed, watching him.

And the memory went black. Trying to follow synaptic pulses, I jumped into another memory along the same neural pathway.

"Dead!" Leticia's mother Aldith screeched. "They're dead!"

Leticia cowered in the corner, happy the brutal men, who so casually beat her, were gone.

"It was that liar who accused your father and brothers of meddling with his whore of a sister. I know it was him. The farm's been abandoned. He's probably the one that done it. Blaming your poor father for his own wicked ways."

"He's…" Kind. She wanted to say kind, but quelled at the look in her mother's eyes.

"He's what?" Eyes narrowed, her mother waited.

"Gone. Almost a year now." Leticia's fingers worried the edges of her apron.

"And how would you know that?" Aldith looked at her daughter differently, as though just realizing she might actually know something.

"I used to see him in town from time to time. After his sister died and his mother took ill."

"How would you know anything about him? Their farm is miles away." Calculation had slowed her words.

"Gossip. Royse had her eye on him." Leticia shrugged, hoping her mother would go back to ignoring her.

"Whore," she spat before pacing the room. "I know t'were him. He'll wish he kept his lying mouth shut when I'm done with him."