A/N: Shorter than normal...and had an abnormally long wait...sorry.

Kendall went from remembering nothing to remembering everything in a matter of seconds. The memories of his past, of who he was, of who James was, of who they were slamming into his brain so hard that it caused him to black out as he watched it all play out. He saw himself meeting James for the first time, underneath their oak tree. He remembered exactly how he felt the moment their eyes first met and the immediate connection that appeared in the form of a silver thread linking their hearts. He remembered how happy they'd been together, how they would have given up everything for each other. He also remembered that they practically had given up everything in a vain attempt to be together.

They'd been so desperate to be together that they had defied the elders, who said their love was an abomination, that it wasn't allowed. But they'd thrown it all to the wind anyway, breaking every law their kind had, willing to make any sacrifice necessary if it meant they would be by the other's side in the end.

Kendall gasped, sitting up suddenly and almost knocking his head against James' in the process as all of his memories came back to him, assaulting his senses.

"You," He breathed heavily. "It's you. It's always been you."

James allowed all of his guards to fade in the way that he only did when the blonde was around and for the first time in twenty years a genuine smile broke his hardened features as he wrapped his arms around the other male, burying his head in Kendall's shoulder. "Fuck, I've missed you Blondie," He admitted in a mumble, voice rough with emotion.

"But w aren't supposed to be together," Kendall protested weakly, even as he clutched the brunet tighter and silently vowed to never forget about him again.

"Yes we are," James whispered into his hair.

"I don't understand how fate can be so cruel. We're meant to be together. I can feel it in my soul," Kendall relented.

James sighed, and played with Kendall's hair, wishing for the millionth time that things were different, that they weren't so complicated. "And yet nothing's ever been more wrong. But that hasn't ever diminished my love for you."

"Nor mine for you," Kendall replied softly, still gripping James with everything he had and never wanting to let go again.

When James and Kendall had first met, at the first clash of hazel and green eyes, their connection had been intense, immediate, fated…and forbidden.

They may have been forever marked as soul mates, but that didn't change the fact that James' coven descended from demons and Kendall's descended from angels. They were never meant to be, yet they were they were always meant to be. They were never supposed to align themselves, but the silver thread that connected them said otherwise.

For while James and Kendall's love may have been written in the stars, their covens were mortal enemies; two groups of witches that wanted nothing more than to destroy the other. And their future was waiting yet again in the hands of the elders, who saw them as nothing more than a fluke, a cruel twist of fate meant to test their coven's individual loyalties. But the only loyalty James cared about was his loyalty to Kendall and the only loyalty Kendall cared about was his to James.

From the moment they met they were warned by the elders not to be together, warned of the consequences if they disobeyed. But they couldn't stay away from each other, so for two years they met in secret.

The members of their individual covens from their generation supported them; lying for them and joining together to become one large coven, the most powerful coven to ever exist, and that ended up being their downfall. With all the power swirling around their combined covens it was impossible to keep it secret and hidden from their elders.

And the elders were furious to find that James and Kendall, with the help of their covens, had gone behind their backs, disobeying their orders, ignoring the laws and customs of their kind and allowing dark and light witches to align together for the first time in history.

So they placed a curse on the aligned coven and on James and Kendall specifically. Every twenty years, at midnight on Kendall's eighteenth birthday he would perish, bursting into flames, only to be reborn two years later and meet James shortly before his next eighteenth year. The rest of the coven was cursed in a similar manner to Kendall; their memories of who they really were surfacing on their thirteenth birthdays, when they would see out James and spend seven years as a coven before they also burst into flames, the only difference being that they perished at midnight on their twentieth years and were immediately reborn.

But James suffered the worst curse of all, forced to live eternal life, watching his friends come and go, spending years alone only to be rewarded with a few precious months with the boy he loved before he was made to watch him die, time and time again. Then watch his friends die. And then spend another thirteen years alone when the curse started it's vicious cycle all over again, one that never ended and slowly tore away at the small amount of humanity James had remaining.

It had been three hundred years since James and Kendall had met for the very first time under the oak tree. Two hundred and ninety-eight years since they'd been cursed. A total of fifteen times that James had watched Kendall die, and despite being one of the most powerful witches to ever exist, be completely powerless to stop the death of his love and the curse that plagued them. James was three hundred and sixteen years old. And he felt every single second of that age. He was tired. Tired of being alone. Tired of falling in love with Kendall all over again only to have him brutally ripped away every time. Tired of being powerless to stop it. He tired deep down in his bones and unsure of how much longer he could continue this life and still keep his sanity intact.

He had no more idea of how to stop the curse now then he had in 1735, when he'd been reunited with a seventeen year old Kendall for the first time, nineteen years after they received the curse. After a few times of dealing with the pain of having Kendall for just a few months only to watch him die, James had decided to try a new tactic. Instead of just moving from city to city so as not to arouse suspicion as to why he didn't age, James moved all the way to another country. He figured it would be easier to deal with the loss of his blond if he didn't have to relive it every twenty years, continuing to experience it each time as if it was the first time. But Kendall took a trip abroad with his parents that cycle, and met James on a midnight stroll.

And James knew it would be impossible, he had no way out of it. No matter where he went, how hard he tried to hide, Kendall would unknowingly find him. The curse was smarter than James had originally given it credit for. So he stopped fighting it that way, stopped trying to hide and instead began searching Kendall out, so that each cycle they would have the most amount of time together as possible, and more time to try and figure out how to break the damned curse.

He moved back to Pennsylvania and bought the land his family had owned in the seventeen hundreds where the oak tree still stood, proud and tall and chock full of bittersweet memories. He built a massive house on the land, where he spent as much time as possible, until he had to move away for a few years before people began to notice he didn't age. But he always came back again and would spend as long as he could there each time. And the cycles when Kendall showed up and he wasn't living at his house, they always took a trip to it, the house and the tree in the front yard held all of their memories, held their past for them, patiently waiting for them to come back and add new ones where it would keep them locked tight for James to dwell in on the many lonely nights he lived.

Kendall had been there the summer James had built the house, lounging under the tree and calling out unhelpful directions, being more of a distraction than anything else, occasionally picking up a paint brush and helping out until the two got distracted by each other. That summer had been one of James' favorites, for the sheer amount of time they'd had together, and how carefree they'd been that summer, working all day and spending all night under the stars or skinny dipping in the river. Relishing being together.

There was one room that James had built, on the second floor of the house, towards the front. It opened up onto a private porch that looked out at the oak tree, just like the master bedroom which was next door to it, and was filled with large windows, allowing massive amounts of sunlight to stream in during the summer days. James had built it with Kendall in mind, knowing how much his blond loved the sunshine and fresh air, and as expected, Kendall had immediately fallen in love with it, claiming it as his and refusing to let James have a say in how it was decorated. But James didn't mind, he loved watching how happy Kendall was as he painted his room in rich blues, and put a reading nook in the corner, teasing James that he may just spend all his time in their and James would have to sleep by himself in his cold and drab bedroom next door. He'd never followed through on it of course though, and James and Kendall had split their nights between the bedrooms, although it seemed Kendall would pout and get his way more often than James, so most times when Kendall was around the blue room temporarily became the master bedroom.

James and Kendall spent the night in each other's arms, holding tight and relishing in their reunion, sometimes talking, other times just enjoying each other's company. Kendall had a lot of questions about his past lives, because his memories were still fuzzy, and not everything had returned. They sometimes came back in spurts, all getting jumbled in his mind for the first few days so that he was left with a bunch of puzzle pieces he had to try and fit together to see the picture of his life. It helped having James there, though, since he could fit the pieces together for Kendall while he was still in the early stages and things were still hazy and confusing.

"Okay, I have a question," Kendall said after a few minutes of silence. "Why do you call me 'Blondie'?"

"Well, you see your hair-ow!" James laughed when Kendall playfully punched him in the arm. "Okay, geeze. You've gotten stronger since last cycle," He complained rubbing his bicep. "I've always called you that. It was actually what I first called you when we first met before we knew each other's names. And I've always just stuck with it because you have a different name each cycle, but you always look the same. You've always been my Blondie and you always will be. So suck it up."

"Fine, I'll deal with the nickname I guess," Kendall teased back. "What was my name originally?"

"Lucas."

Kendall pondered that a minute, eventually making a face. "I don't feel like a Lucas," He muttered.

"It means light," James explained. "James isn't my first name, it's my middle name. My first name is Adrien. It means dark."

Kendall nodded thoughtfully, noticing that the first signs of dawn were beginning to stream through the windows. "If I don't get home, my aunt is going to worry," he sighed, even though he made no move to get up.

James nodded. "C'mon, I'll give you a ride home," He offered, reluctantly pulling away and standing up.

He reached out a hand, pulling Kendall to his feet, and then kept their hands clasped as the pair slowly made their way downstairs and outside where James' motorcycle was parked on the curb.

Kendall looked at the bike apprehensively and then turned to James, raising an eyebrow.

James laughed. "You've ridden on bikes with me before. Trust me. You love it."

"Not if I'm dead," Kendall muttered back.

"You can't die until your eighteenth year," James corrected quietly, his eyes clouding over and mood visibly shifting.

"What is it?"

"I just don't like thinking about you dying, Blondie."

"Don't you see it all the time?"

James clenched his jaw and squeezed his eye shut, turning slightly from the blond. "Yes. But it never gets easier. You have no idea what it's like for me to watch you die time and time again and know I can't do a damn thing to stop it. You get peaceful oblivion all the years were apart, you don't know I exist so you don't know to miss me. But all I do is miss you and grieve for you. I don't always get a lot of time with you. One cycle we only got thirty-seven hours. I was afraid you weren't coming back to me that time. It tears me apart inside, Blondie. Always missing you, always waiting for you. And then I have a few precious moments with you only to have you violently ripped from again. I can't do it again Kendall. I won't do it again. This curse ends now. We break it now. Because I don't know if my soul can stay intact for another cycle. I just want to finally be with you without having a bomb ticking in the background, reminding us that our time is limited."

Kendall nodded, and leaned forward, brushing his lips against James'. "Then let's figure out how to break this curse once and for all. Because I want that too."

Kendall tossed and turned in his bed, plagued by dreams that were really his memories slowly coming back to him. He was glad it was a Saturday and he didn't need to get up for school, but at the same time he was anxious for it to reach a respectable time of the morning for a teenage boy to get up on the weekend so that he could go back to James' house. Now that he remembered who he was being apart from James felt wrong, like he was missing a limb or a vital organ.

His phone beeped with an incoming text and his hand shot out, quickly grabbing it and bringing it to his face. He gave a goofy smile when he saw it was from James, asking him how much longer until he was heading over. He typed out a reply that his aunt would know something was up if he got out of bed before noon and promised to come over as soon as he got up. He glared at the clock on his phone that was taunting him with three hours to go until noon before putting it back on his nightstand and shifting in bed, attempting to sleep once again, wishing for the umpteenth time that he was still curled up next to James.

He felt a sense of love descend over him and smiled, knowing James had been tapped into his mood and was attempting to comfort him from across town. Kendall's hand snaked out from his covers fumbling for his phone once more as he sent out one last text to James before finally falling asleep to the gentle vibes of James' love.

James grinned as he read the text from Kendall that simply said I love you, glad that his powers were working when his mind went blissfully blank, signaling that Kendall had fallen asleep.

He decided to take advantage of the time without Kendall being tuned into his feelings and dialed Camille's number, tapping a foot impatiently as he waited for her to pick up.

"It's nine in the morning James," She complained around a yawn in lieu of a greeting when she answered.

"We need to figure out how to break this curse," He greeted back.

"He got his memories back this early?" Camille asked, feeling the shift of energy in James and hearing the urgency in his voice, immediately knowing exactly what it meant.

"I might've helped him along a little bit. He was very persuasive."

"I thought you didn't want him to know until you had a plan? You're the one who commanded us to stay away from him so his memories wouldn't return any earlier than absolutely necessary," She pointed out.

"I missed him," James whispered.

Camille sighed, sitting up in her bed. She was still angry with James, but she also understood how hard it was on him, how lonely he got, how sad his life really was, even if he wouldn't admit him. At least she and Logan got seven years every cycle. "I know," she replied quietly in a soothing voice. "Give me a few minutes to start up my broom and I'll be right over," she joked.

James gave a wry grin at that and nodded before remembering she couldn't see him. "K. Thanks."

"Anytime," Camille responded before clicking off and dragging herself out of bed.