Twenty-Eight
Saben Frost woke up with a horrible taste in her mouth, her head felt as if it were about to split, and stranger still was the pulsating sensation in her chest as if her heart had come back to life. She had never felt more human than at that instant.
She drank in the sight of him, his legs and arms were crossed, his blue eyes intense and staring directly at her.
By God he was beautiful, the very sight of him made obliterated all thoughts of Mezereon. The stranger was the embodiment of Thoth, Sin Máni, a youthful Tecciztecatl and she was for an instant convinced of her devotion to him. Who was Apollo, who was Ra when the cold silver blue radiance of the Moon had come for her?
And as the haze cleared a little more she had a sense of de-ja-vu but it was so hard to remember things clearly. "You awake?" His voice was pleasant, deep almost comforting, easing the ache in her head.
"What's going on?" She asked, her voice husky and not altogether awake.
"Saben."
She shivered at the sound of her name. She sat up slowly, her limbs aching though she was not broken or bleeding.
"You'll be sick for a while unless you flush the bad blood from your system." He said.
How had he known she had drank rancid blood? She stared at him, studying his face, cold and pale features, deceptively youthful but beautiful. It was his eyes. How had she forgotten his eyes, electric blue and filled with the mysteries of the heavens?
"You remember me?"
She nodded but did not trust herself to speak.
"I suppose I should congratulate you for getting in alive."
"What did it cost you?"
He tilted his head. "Money comes and goes."
"No." She said sharply. "To be here now." Pointing to the ground in front of her.
His eyebrows raised and a small smile came and went. "Never mind."
"Cebren." His name erupted from her lips and his eyes narrowed. He didn't like to be called Cebren. He stood and approached her carefully, his body was all rippling grace and predatory, she was frightened of him, sure that any of his good humour had long since evaporated You do not want to test the boundaries of the Night.
"That's my name, do you remember the rest?"
"Daniel." She stared past him and at the door as if she could see through the wood and back toward the cage that held the children captive.
"Yes, your son."
She closed her eyes and tears rolled down her cheeks. "My son."
"You've come here to get him out."
She nodded and opened her eyes to find him right before her face, his lips close enough to kiss. "He's in the basement." She whispered.
"They usually are." He replied coldly.
A rush of anger revived her body and she grit her teeth to stop herself from screaming. Yes, she remembered him. Abberline. Cebren. Soulmate.
Yes. His voice hissed through her mind as everything clicked and the past came rushing back to her in one glorious burst and she whimpered as she fell forward, Abberline caught her, holding her whilst the last shudders ran through her. He was relieved she remembered, relieved by her touch to know she was solid.
"This is the part where you come up with a plan to save us all." She whispered in his ear, sharp teeth sliding to touch her lip, her lips brushing the cool skin of his throat.
He shuddered but didn't speak because she knew he had no plan just as his title and all his Power could not guarantee his own safety in this place.
"Why are you here?" She asked. "You heard Mezereon, he's not going to sell me and you know I'm not going to leave without Daniel."
"He doesn't even know you."
"He's still my flesh and blood."
They sat for a while in silence with their arms around one another they fell into the silver edged world reserved for the two of them alone. A place where they could be at peace, if only for a moment.
Reality inevitably invaded and the revelation of what Mezereon had done to her, how she had supplicated herself, how she had worshipped him, how she had the taste of him on the inside of her mouth made her sicker than the diseased blood she had ingested.
"I want Mezereon dead." She said.
It's not that easy. His voice rolled gently through her mind, the quality of it managing to sooth her aches and pain. That is something you can not do alone, Saben.
"Maybe." She said, lip trembling.
You won't do it. You're not a killer. It was part of what drew him to her, her gentleness, her stubbornness, her desperate sadness.
"I am what you all made me."
There'll be a terrible price to pay.
"I'll bear it."
You'll never see your son again. But he wanted say 'you'll never see me again' but he didn't say it aloud but she heard it and knew this consequence too. She knew now as she had many times before, to live without Abberline was a terrible thing indeed.
But he could live on without her, resolute not to think about her, resolute not to care if she lived or died. I have lived many lifetimes before Saben Mariley Frost, I can survive many years to come.
She could feel him wince as his words drifted through her, but it was okay because even though they were bound she had known as she always had , that they could never truly be together. It was what had sent her running from him as a child, it was what had let him let her go at that instant crouched in the cedar wood, her cheeks smudged with dirt.
Love wasn't enough. What was love anyway? Blind, destructive, unrealistic thing, created by gods and men who had the luxury of a short life.
"Say it." She said.
"What?"
"Say it."
"I have to go." He said.
The image of Daniel's dirt smeared face filled her mind and the unabashed contempt that had shone in his eyes and Abberline saw this too. He gripped her a little bit tighter as the pain rocked through her.
I'll bear it. She repeated like a mantra and shut her eyes tight as the door closed between them perhaps for the last time.
