15. Lorraine

Chapter Fifteen

Lorraine

I hadn’t seen Ash in a while. It was worrying—where was he? Lately, things had been much better between us, and I liked spending time with him. He’d been here all the time, sometimes even spending the night with me in my bed. Had something happened? I missed him, and I wished I had a way of reaching out to him. As much as I was bound to him and it felt like I knew him better than I knew myself, I couldn’t always reach him. Sometimes I could feel him through our bond, as if he was reaching for me, checking in on me. I couldn’t do the same in return. Was it because I was just human without magic of my own? Or was there another reason? “Knock, knock,” Philippa said into the open door when I sat on the couch, reading a book. “Hi,” I said, looking up. I frowned when I realized Philippa wasn’t alone. “Oh.”

“This is my friend… Anita,” Philippa said. She had auburn hair that flamed in the sun and hazel eyes that rested on my face, studying me. She had a regal air about her, which was hard to pull off when she wore a hunting dress like what I used to wear and leather sandals that wrapped up her legs to her knees. Anita rolled her eyes. “You can tell her who I am, Philotes.”

“You’re a goddess,” I said. She narrowed her eyes at me. “How do you know that?”

“You don’t look like any human I know. Your attitude… You also called her Philotes.”

“You’re smart,” she said. “I’m Artemis.”

“The hunting goddess?” I asked. She nodded. “Among other things.”

When I glanced past her, I noticed deer grazing in the meadow. Wasn’t that how she always presented herself? Cat had told me something about that. I tried to dig back into my memories of what Cat had always talked about, but I’d never really cared for Greek mythology. If I’d known what I knew now, I would have paid a lot more attention. “Can we come in?” Artemis asked. “Sure,” I said.

They stepped into the cabin, and Artemis looked around as if she was scrutinizing the place. “It looks different in here since I visited last.”

“Ash changed it for me,” I said. “It was a little… outdated.”

“Hmm,” she said. “Does he come to see you a lot?”

I frowned. “Yeah, often enough. He hasn’t been by in a while, but he usually comes to check in.”

Artemis nodded and walked into the kitchen, running her hands over the coffee machine, the counters, the new stove that wasn’t anything like the wood-burning thing I’d had here until recently. “Is there something I can help you with?” I asked. Artemis seemed pretty invasive. “Do you love him?” she asked. I blinked at her. “What?”

“What she means,” Philippa said quickly, “is that she’s always looked out for Ash, and he got his heart broken pretty badly before, so she just wants to get to know you.”

“And find out if I’ll break his heart, too,” I said, looking at Artemis again. “Humans can be very fickle,” Artemis said. “They fall in and out of love like it’s a game.”

“It’s hard to find the person you’re going to spend the rest of your life with when you have limited time to work with,” I pointed out. Artemis tilted her head, watching me. “You’re a firecracker, aren’t you?”

I shook my head, irritated. Noticing this, Philippa put her hand on Artemis’s arm as if she was trying to stop her from saying anything else. “We’re getting off on the wrong foot,” Philippa said. “Why don’t we have some of your delicious coffee, and we can sit down and talk, get to know each other a little bit?”

I hesitated. I wasn’t sure I wanted that. Why had Philippa brought Artemis to me, and why was she so hostile? “Will you make us some coffee, please?” Philippa asked. “Artemis has never tried it.” She turned to the goddess. “You’ll think you’ve died and gone to Valhalla when you taste it,” Philippa said. Artemis raised her eyebrows. “Goddesses can’t die.”

Philippa looked at me with pleading eyes. Was I supposed to make this better? She was the one who’d brought the hostile goddess along; it wasn’t my problem. Still, I nodded. I couldn’t exactly kick them out—they were goddesses, and this wasn’t exactly my cabin. I was just a guest here. I walked to the kitchen, careful to step around Artemis, and programmed the machine to make three cups of coffee. I prepared the cups while Artemis looked around the cabin. “He hadn’t done anything about this place in a long time,” she said. “I’m surprised he changed it all up.”

“I was struggling after the life I knew back home,” I offered. “The biggest thing was running water.” I smiled when I thought back to the way Ash had fucked me in the shower. He’d started to love the running water, too. He’d come back for some of that more often. “Running water,” Artemis said. I nodded and prepared the second cup. “He must really think something of you to go to the trouble.”

“Was it a lot of trouble?” I asked. “I don’t know how magic works.”

“Magic belongs to the user, and it’s allotted according to what we’re assigned at birth. I’m the goddess of hunting, chastity, and the moon. My powers are aligned with that. I can’t be deceitful, for instance, or create storms, or salvage friendships.” She glanced at Philippa. “It’s not what I was made to do.”

“Ash protects the forest,” I said. “Hmm,” Artemis answered. It meant he’d had to go looking for someone with magic to do this for me, and it hadn’t necessarily been easy. I’d loved that he’d done this for me.

Now, it meant even more. When the third cup of coffee finished, I offered the cups to my guests, and we sat down on the couches. Artemis carefully sipped hers. “Oh, gods,” she said. “I told you,” Philippa said with a grin and winked at me as if this coffee would change everything. Would it? It was just coffee, but Artemis really did look like she’d died and gone to heaven. “I don’t want to hurt him,” I said softly. “I know you’re worried about that.”

“How do you know?”

“Because you’re hostile about it, and that only happens when you care enough about someone that you think might get hurt.”

Artemis studied me without answering for a moment before she nodded. “He’s been hurt before. Badly. He made a lot of sacrifices for the woman he was in love with, only to learn that she didn’t feel the same about him. She used him—I’m not sure for what—and then she left, and he had to pick up the pieces of a broken heart and a shattered existence.”

My heart ached for Ash that he’d been through so much hell with someone he’d trusted. “I know what that can be like,” I said, looking into my cup instead of sipping the coffee. “I thought I could trust the man I loved, too. Instead, he sold me. I had to revisit everything I thought was true, too. Love isn’t selective in who gets to experience it, but neither is pain.”

Artemis sipped her coffee. “You’re not afraid to love again after what you’ve been through?”

I shook my head. “I can’t help it, can I? I mean, sure, I’m afraid, but we don’t choose who we fall in love with. Sometimes, it’s the perfect guy. Sometimes, it’s someone who sells you to pay off his gambling debt after he stole all your money for years.”

Artemis looked horrified and glanced at Philippa, who only nodded. “Hmm,” she finally said. “I think I might have misjudged you.”

“Yeah?” I asked with a giggle. “I guess I get that a lot around here. You know, being human and all has me at a disadvantage.”

Artemis looked surprised before she burst out laughing. “You’re joking. That was a joke.”

“It was,” I said and laughed. “You don’t have a lot to do with humans, do you?”

Artemis shook her head. “No, not in centuries. It seemed safer to stay away from them, and when Ash got hurt as badly as he did, it just solidified my decision to keep my distance. All my friends are here or on Mount Olympus, and since the times have changed and humans don’t really turn to us for help and guidance anymore, it doesn’t matter.”

“What did you come here to find out?” I asked. “If I’ll hurt Ash?”

Artemis nodded. “I wanted to know if what you feel for him is real enough that you’ll sacrifice anything, whatever it takes, to be with him.”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. Artemis frowned. It wasn’t the answer she was looking for. “I wasn’t brought here by consent, and I’m not staying here by choice, either. I was kidnapped, and I escaped, and then I became bound to Ash, which means I have no choice until All Hallows’ Eve.”

“The bond,” Artemis breathed. Did she know what it meant? Maybe she knew better than I did. “The thing is,” I said, “I know what I feel for him, but I won’t know what I want until I have the chance to decide for myself.”

“That doesn’t sound right,” Artemis said. “Isn’t free will something you’re accustomed to?” I asked. Artemis frowned. “Of course it is.”

“Well, then you’ll know that unless you get to choose for yourself, you fight whatever is forcing you to do something.”

“Hmm,” she said. She seemed to say that a lot.

“Ash is a great guy,” I said. “But I have a life. I have a sister to look after, to get back to. On the other hand, I have hell on my heels, and I don’t want to involve Ash in that forever, even though I’m scared of what may happen if I don’t have him to protect me anymore. My life isn’t the best kind of life to offer, and if Ash has a life filled with magic and beauty and no pain or death, then it wouldn’t be right to ask him to leave all of that behind, any more than it’s fair of him to ask me never to see my sister again. I’m not the only one who will have to make sacrifices.”

“You’re right about that,” Artemis said. “I guess all I’m trying to say is that I care enough about him that I don’t want to be the reason he’s unhappy. Even if that means that he should lose me rather than have me in his life.”

Artemis finished her coffee and stood, as if the meeting was suddenly over. “You’ve told me everything I needed to know.”

“Really?” I asked. “I didn’t say anything at all.”

Philippa stood, too, but Artemis shook her head. “You can stay. I have something to think about.” She walked to the door without saying goodbye, and a moment later, she disappeared. “That was weird,” I said. “Yeah.” Philippa looked as confused as I felt. “She’s not usually like this. I don’t know what’s gotten into her. I’m sorry I jumped her on you like that, but she was insistent to meet you.”

“Well, I guess it was nice to meet her. Sort of. I have no idea what all of that was, aside from her trying to figure out if I was good for Ash. Do you think she thought I am?” I felt like I’d had to please Ash’s parents or something, and I was suddenly nervous about the outcome. “I have no idea what she thought,” Philippa admitted. “I’m not sure of anything right now.” She giggled. “But I do know I want to go for a swim in the stream. Join me?”

I smiled and nodded. “I think cooling off in the stream after all this is a great idea.”

We left the cottage and walked to the water. I couldn’t help but wonder what all that had been about and why I still hadn’t seen Ash. Was it something I needed to worry about? I hoped not. I just wanted to see him again.