Chris stood back from the edge of the Golden Gate bridge. He had to admit that he was a glutton for punishment. Of all the places he could have went he just seemed to keep getting called back to the bridge which wasn't right since it was here that he'd found them.
Victoria. He could barely think of her without a sudden rage taking over his mind and his body. She was supposed to be his girl. She was supposed to be in love with him. In no way was she supposed to have gone and left him battling his family over whether or not that she could be trusted. In no way, was he supposed to find her on top of his bridge cuddling up to his brother the one she hated and the one Chris had been afraid would have killed her himself if Wyatt had had a chance.
Victoria. Why? None of this made any sense.
Yesterday, if someone would have told him that his brother was going to seduce his girlfriend and his family was going to consider killing her he would have told them they were mad. Of course, yesterday he had first started really noticing that she was lying to him about being sick.
He should have seen the signs. There was no way she could have been fine five seconds after he had barely been able to heal her from a dead faint. This morning she had been fine. They'd woken up together. Everything had been perfect and fine considering how their lives were always overrun with new innocents and no real peace of minds. But then again she had gone crazy. She hadn't even recognized him to put her shield down against him and him being the dumb loyal type had tried to break through it when she'd been hyperventilating. He'd ended up unconscious for the most part of that and then the second part he had been defending her to his parents. He'd ran blindly to her defense again when he'd realized Wyatt had taken her away from the manor.
All of it was for nothing though. She'd been fine. She'd been more than fine. She'd been cuddling up to Wyatt. And the looks. He had never seen his brother look like that at any one, and Victoria… he couldn't remember ever seeing her look at him that way. The memory made him sick as he looked over the very bridge where it had all happened.
He was even worse when he thought of what he had done to Victoria. He hadn't even thought. After everything in the last few days between her and him, the secrecy, the sickness, and Wyatt, had torn him apart more than he had been willing to admit. When she'd come after him he hadn't even been able to restrain himself, and his first thought of getting her as far from him as possible had sent her body back hard against the bridges railing. He could still heal her bones cracking.
He was sick to think of the pain he had caused her.
No matter what he had done he hadn't meant to hurt her. When he'd seen Victoria in the kitchen, she hadn't called for him for help when Death had arrived. She had called for Wyatt. It had been his fault that she was dead. He had killed her and now… Now, he had to live with that. How could he live knowing he'd killed the only person he'd ever really loved? The only girl he'd ever been free to talk magic with.
He didn't blame her for trying to ask Wyatt for help. Wyatt hadn't been the one that had thrown her against a bridge. Wyatt was the twice blessed son by all means, too. If anyone could stand against death it would have been Wyatt not Chris. Not the son of an Elder and not a mistake.
Chris looked out over the ocean below. It was getting darker and the gray waves were starting to churn. Everything around him was getting worse. The weather was changing and he couldn't control it because he was too emotional now to care. The wind was rapping around him and freezing his soul and he could feel the clouds barreling in around him as he stood as still as a stone as the rage built up inside of him.
Chris punched the bridge. All of his rage that he had been building up spilled out of him as pain replaced it. Blood dampened his hand. Pain ran up his left arm and whirled around his hand. Tears burned up in his green eyes, but Chris tried his hardest not to cry. He was a murderer. He didn't deserve to cry.
"Why?" he screamed at the thrashing wind.
"Chris," a soft, questioning voice came from behind him.
He turned quickly. He'd almost lost his balance as he did so.
Nothing in the world prepared him for Victoria to be standing there behind him. She was dead. He had seen Death take her with him. There was no way she was alive. Death didn't just give up on his victims. There was no way. He had to be hallucinating.
She grabbed him and pulled him back from fallin off the edge of the bridge. For one single moment, they were inches apart. The tension between them grew as they stared into eachothers eyes silently.
He almost forgot about his brother holding her on the bridge as she stood there before him. Her lond reddish-brown hair flying around her in the wind, and her dark eyes staring almost through him. There was almost a weird glow to her skin in the fading light making her look etheral. He almost forgot then and there. All he had wanted to do for that instant in time was to walk right up to her and pull her into his arms just to make sure she was still there alive with him and not some figment of his imagination. But he couldn't move and the image of her in his brother's arms nagged him. Instead of kissing her like he wanted to do, Chris moved backward and folded his arms across his chest. By doing so, he created feet between them and then he readjusted his shirt collar that was off center because of her grabbing his shirt and arm to save him from falling off the bridge.
She was alive and standing before him. Which only meant that she was here to apologize to him for being with his brother. Something a lot of girls had done before her and the longer she stayed quiet the angrier he got at her.
"Why are you here? I thought you chose Wyatt already. Shouldn't you be with my twice blessed brother?" he spat out.
She shook her head. Folding her arms around herself not defensively but to keep out the cold, harsh winding tearing at them. "Of all people in the world, you were the only one I wanted to see again."
"Well, excuse me for not thinking that considering the last time I saw you, you were having a cuddling session with my brother. Which correct me if I'm wrong, but up until that moment, that I know of that is, you could barely stand being in the same room with my brother. So wouldn't you say it's a little funny that you two were alone up here in the farthest place from say humanity and that you would be in each others arms?"
She grimaced, and kicked the sole of her shoe over the bridge, "You know what, I deserve that. I get it, Chris. You're pissed. But you don't know everything so before you decide to pull that holier than thou attitude with me you've got to remember you don't know everything about this."
"And who's fault is that?" he cried throwing his arms out. "No matter what I do and no matter what I did you wouldn't open up to me. So, I don't know everything! It's not like I didn't try."
He walked a few feet away from her on the bridge. His back partially to her as he searched the ocean below, "Why couldn't you tell me?"
"Because," Victoria cried, she wanted to tell him everything, but she didn't have the time to. She knew that more than he did, but he would never understand what was about to happen. She sighed and tried to stop herself from going into it. She couldn't stop though. Words popped out of her mouth with no chance to stop them, and they kept coming despite how she tried to keep her mouth shut. "Because you looked at me like I was perfect. Like I was the one that you wanted in your life, the one who you thought that could fight demons with you, or whatever the hell you think your life is about. But it wasn't me. I don't want to forever be on the edge killing demons and risking my life. I want to just be left alone by the Elders and the demons and anything else magical, but for some reason I can't even do that right.
"I didn't ask for powers. I didn't ask to be cursed. All I wanted was to be happy and alive and to have a chance. I didn't want you to know who I really was because I was afraid alright." she cried hitting him on the chest as she did so. Not knowing why she was saying all of this. She didn't know why the truth was coming out. She had had something else to say to him, but she couldn't lie to him or not tell him exactly what she was thinking. "God, why am I saying all of this?"
"I cast a truth spell," Chris replied. Then, he kicked himself for it because he didn't want anyone to know what he had done so that he could learn the truth and also so he'd have an upperhand in it all. Damn, the spell had repercussions. Now, he'd have to avoid questions.
"You? You cast a truth spell? Nice going, Chris. You think you could have picked a worse time for a truth spell of all things! Damn it," she cried kicking at some old bridge debris.
"What do you mean?" he asked, trying to get answers out of her for once in his life.
She turned back to him. She looked him right in the eye, laughed, and threw her head back to take in a deep breath. No matter what the truth was going to come out and she hated him for that. "Everything's going to change soon, Chris." As she spoke her eyes changed into a dark blue almost the color of black. "I just wish I could be there to see it."
Victoria dropped her arms and shivered in the cold as she took a few steps back from him. Chris didn't understand. He couldn't know. She wasn't telling him everything , but he knew it was the truth. The only truth she was willing to tell him at the moment. The wind beat through him then. He felt it go through his bones as he watched her. An emptiness he hadn't felt since before he'd met her came over him again. A premonition even and he didn't want it. He didn't want any of it.
"What are you dying?" he asked her in disbelief.
"In matter of terms, yes," she replied bitterly.
"But the Elders," he scrambled.
"They were wrong," she replied in a hard voice. "They screwed up and now I have to fix it, Chris. In a matter of thinking, what I'm going to do will save thousands of innocents."
Chris opened his mouthing shaking his head in denial as he did, but she cut him off. "Don't you dare ask. Just don't, Chris. It's already hard for me."
He didn't want to lose her. He didn't want to fight her. He didn't want to see her die or be in pain. He didn't know how to fix it though. Whatever was happening to her, he couldn't fix it; he was utterly powerless against it and he hated himself for it. What was all the power he had good for if he couldn't save the one person in the world he loved? Maybe if he'd known before any of this had happened they would be alright now. Maybe, he could still figure something out. If she wouldn't tell him what was killing her maybe he could some magical elixir that would save her.
"Why didn't you tell me before?" he whispered. "Maybe if you had maybe we could..." he tried to say.
Victoria looked up at him. Tears running down her cheeks slowly. She shook her head and stepped towards him. Her hand coming to his face. Then, she leaned into him and held him as hard as she could as the wind thrashed through them.
He held her back as hard as he could. Neither cared if the other was holding too hard. They just stood there with the wind battling them. Their clothes flapping around in the wind as the rain started slowly falling down on them from the blackening sky. She turned her head up to meet his green eyes and tried to smile up at him reassuringly.
"What's coming?" he asked her.
Victoria looked down a moment. She saw his pale hand bleeding. She gently took his hand and held it lightly in hers. She kissed his bleeding knuckles and then covered it completely with her other hand. She ignored everything that tried to make its way into her mind. She wouldn't know the life and death of him. She would ignore everything that her new power was trying to beat into her and she was going to stand there and hold onto him the best way she could before everything changed.
Then, she did smile up at him reasuringly and nodding her head to herself knowing that what was about to come was for the best. There was no time like the present to say goodbye to him.
Victoria stood up on her tiptoes to kiss him. Their kiss started soft like the rain then their kiss turned into rapid smaller kisses. She held onto him tighter. Even when the kiss ended she held onto him for a long while. The world slowly came back to them as the rain pounded down harder. She let go of him then and did something she hadn't done in years. Instead of seeking cover from the rain, she raised her hands to catch the raindrops. She let her head roll back on her neck and she caught raindrops in her mouth laughing softly as she did. She barely paid attention to Chris as he watched her as if he'd never seen her before.
Ironically, it was the first time in a long time that she'd felt alive.
When she did look at him and dropped her hands from the raining sky she took a deep breath. Her hand nervously through her long, curly, wet hair for a moment and then she touched his face one more time. Her eyes scanning his whole face trying to remember every little mark on it as she did knowing she could never make anything right again for him.
"Forgive me," she asked meeting his eyes.
"For what?" he asked his eyes all over her as if he were memorizing her face, too.
Damn truth spell.
She put her hand on the back of his neck and then tapped a few spots over his body. A few valuable pressure points that would render him unconscious for the time being while she had to get things done without any added problems. She knew what she was about to do would ostarcize her in the sisters eyes until they truly understood what was happening. Then, maybe they would forgive her or at the very least understand. But Chris, her Chris, she could not risk him getting hurt through this whole process- not any more than she had already hurt him in all the confusion that had lead up to this. She wouldn't allow him to get into danger because she lost control in the last moment and she wasn't about to hurt him because he got in her way when he didn't understand what she was doing or else when he understood all too well.
Chris started to fall to the ground, but she stopped his fall. She caught him with her own weight and slowly fell to the ground with him in her arms. Victoria held onto him for a moment looking down at his peaceful innocent face. She loved him. That was all she could do now. She blinked away the rain and the tears smoldering her eyes and started to rest him up against the bridge. In the end, she had leaned him against the railing of the bridge as she kneeled a few feet from him breathing heavily at the struggle of doing so.
Chris looked peaceful laying there as the wind tore at his clothes and the rain beat down on him. She wasn't going to leave him out in the rain like this though. She had one or two tricks left from living with the sisters.
"Wind and clouds, not allowed. Rain and cold, never escape suns hold. Warmth and light, come to me. Stay off the night, and warm the day." Victoria whispered. As soon as the words were spoken, the wind stopped. A moment of darkness came where the rain paused and then the clouds dissappeared.
Victoria's attention went back to Chris. He laid still in the warm sunlight. Now, the worst case scenario would be a small sunburn not a cold of some magnitude. She brushed his soft brown hair off of his pale face. Then, she leaned in and kissed his forehead. Her tears fell harder, but she could barely feel them through the chill of the cold rain drenching her body.
"Everything," she whispered in reply.
The last thing she saw as she left him on the top of the world was the dried blood on his healed hand.
