Omne (All)
He left it all behind. His life, the few and seldom-seen friends he had, his job. Everything. It didn't matter, the instinct was stronger than any ties he had in San Francisco. He wasn't even distressed over it, barely a pang to his heart when he tossed the last family picture into his suitcase and snapped it closed. If anything his heart was lighter, the closer he got to Beacon Hills.
The pull was almost palpable, almost visible. At times during his travel he expected to see an actual string to come out of his chest and connect him to…something in town. He had the distinct impression that a specific point was attracting him, anchoring him too. He felt like his whole life was waiting for him there.
He found a tiny apartment, didn't even try to turn it into a home. Too much to do at work already, too much shit to investigate and be baffled by. A new job, a sheriff that seemed to know a lot but shared little, a bunch of kids that weren't kids, more like adults having to fight for their lives and doing their SATs at the same time. Beacon Hills was no quiet place to settle.
He settled anyway. He found a challenge in the new investigations, found mysteries and made supernatural discoveries. He found questions but also answers about the world and himself. He made friends. All so quick and easy…
Wiping the slate clean and starting over wasn't new to him. Falling into place like a puzzle piece… That was different. This feeling of fulfillment that came over, so quickly, that one never happened before.
With the pack's help he learned that the Nemeton was responsible for his coming. He didn't quite believe it. Actually no, he believed it, but he liked to think that there was more to it. He left it all behind to come to this place and within a few months he found everything. A new life, in every respect. That couldn't be the doing of a tree.
More than anything he couldn't explain Lydia Martin and what she was doing to him with the Nemeton. A chance meeting, strange and fascinating. Morbid. A girl that stood her ground and led the charge, that wouldn't let anything or anyone scare her. An ally, someone who helped him whether he liked it or not. A force of nature that was a support, a friend. More, maybe.
He thought he went blind the first time he saw her. A sudden burst of light cancelled his vision just as he was checking her out. Blinded by her beauty, he joked to himself. It only lasted a second. It was a mirage.
It was the first of many surreal moments. It got lost in the twists and turns of the search for his identity, their fight for survival. He never forgot it though. He might had found his life in Beacon Hills, everything he yearned for, but he couldn't deny that Lydia was the most brilliant, the shiniest part of it.
Trium (Three)
He heard about it in a crappy rom com that was playing in the background, one lazy Saturday. Sexy, smart, and funny, but you couldn't be all three. You had to pick only two.
His eyes immediately flickered over to Lydia, relaxed and lounging on his couch. She wasn't paying him any attention but he couldn't help staring intently. One foot was free and balancing over the armrest, there was a strip of skin that peeked out at her waist where her blouse had ridden up. She had her hair up, with a few tendrils decorating her forehead. Her legs acting as a lectern, she had her hands free. One playing with her bottom lip, teasing it with the tip of her fingernail. The other running along the edge and the cover of her book, over and over again. Effortlessly sexy, that one was a given.
Her focus was solely on the ancient book resting against her thighs. Ovid's Metamorphosis, in its original archaic Latin. They had been researching all day, like they always did when they both had a day off at the same time. After weeks and weeks of analysis and reading, they still hadn't managed to find out what he was. Today she went deeper into the mythologies, beyond the creatures of the Bestiary, all the way back to the origin of all tales. He had tried to help and bring up points of investigation but she was, as usual, leaps and bounds ahead of him. Making connections faster than he could follow them and now buried in a book and a language he couldn't even begin to understand. Smart didn't begin to describe Lydia Martin.
His eyes must finally have weighed on her because she glanced up and her finger stopped mid-page turning. "Yes, Deputy?" she asked. Her tone was that playful tease that could drive him hot and crazy all at once. "Something I can help you with? Besides leading this sort of study group and providing priceless glamour to this place?" she said, gesturing to his austere living room.
He chuckled and shook his head, blushing in spite of his best efforts. She was funny too, in his opinion. Funny in a dry way that some would consider haughty, some other would think it flirty. He never allowed himself to try and qualify it this way.
"No, nothing Lydia. Don't mind me, I was lost in my thoughts." He smiled, rubbed the back of his neck and returned to the notes in front of him.
She let out a huff that held no real annoyance, and his grin widened. No one else could make him smile so freely, make him feel so much. She was the total package. It wasn't the first time he realized it but it was the first time he was acknowledging that she was… She was perfect to his eyes. Everything he could want.
It was pointless. It couldn't work, for a multitude of reasons. College for her in a while, his work keeping him here, the distance, the constant dangers of this town. It was hopeless and he shouldn't even entertain the idea. Better focus on the research.
But the words in front of him blurred and faded, erased by a sudden white light that flooded his vision. He blinked a few times, and it was gone before he could panic or worry about it. Again. It was just a weird thing about him, another one on the list. Not that he mentioned it to Lydia.
Perfectum (Perfection)
The heart wanted what it wanted. More importantly, Lydia wanted and Lydia got. He brought up all the arguments, all the defenses he used for himself, to guard his heart.
Nothing worked. She smiled, and smiled, and kept walking towards him. He kept retreating, until his back met the wall and no escape was possible.
He didn't fight her, didn't want to either. He should've resisted but instead he wrapped his arms around her waist. He let her cradle his face in her palms and kiss him and, worse, he kissed her back with everything he had.
It was everything he dreamed of and more. A taste of cinnamon and fire, her mouth was demanding, pulling his desires out of the depths where he'd hidden them. Like the one making him grab her waist, lift her up and pin her to the wall. Or the one that lead him to bite down her neck, that perfect column of skin that quivered with every breath.
Perfect. That word kept coming to mind when he thought about her, when they were together too. What else could he use, how else could he describe this plenitude?
There wasn't any other way to see it. She hooked her legs around his waist just as he was about to ask her, pulled on his hair to tilt his head back and kiss him just as he was missing her lips. She was reading his mind (maybe she was psychic after all), leading and responding with an instinct that was never wrong.
He wanted more and that very second she murmured in his ear, begging him to take her to bed. She ripped his shirt off his body when it started to get unbearably hot. She pushed him onto his back when he felt too aggressive on top of her.
They ended up spooning only, discovering each other with timid but purposeful touches. It was… Perfect. And while they paced themselves, it only grew and became better. She fit into his life and arms like she was meant to be there.
They kept it quiet, secret, without having to discuss it. The rhythm of their relationship was as the one of their hearts, instinctual, vital.
She came back after a terribly lonely week with him on stakeouts and her tackling finals. No call needed. He left work because he had to, headed for his place directly. She was dropping her suitcase on his doormat when he came out of the elevator. She turned around at the sound of the doors opening and the look in her eyes, the fatigue that vanished instantly at the sight of him… It took his breath away.
She let out a relieved breath and ran into his arms, kissing the life and words out of him. "I love you, I love you so much," she murmured against his mouth. "I missed you like crazy, you have no-"
"I have an idea," he whispered back. "I love you too. God Lydia you're…" He pulled away, a few inches so he could look into her eyes. She was staring back with such love, her hands gently cradling his face. "You're…"
"You're everything I could ever want, you're so perfect for me," she sighed with a smile.
Exactly what he wanted to say. Her tone carried the same honesty he felt behind those words. She pulled him in again so he closed his eyes to savor the kiss and the way his soul sang with the confession and the closeness.
He saw the flash behind his eyelids, pure white light everywhere. Just a second, like a lightning striking and sealing the moment.
The Rule of Three ( omne trium perfectum)
Three times he was blinded, three times while he was with Lydia. Like the sheriff would say, three was a pattern and required an investigation. For all things strange and probably supernatural, Deaton was the logical reference.
That was without taking into account his personality. Jordan had only started telling him about the three episodes that already Deaton was stopping him with a cryptic reply.
"Go ask Derek. He'll know."
Annoying, but he had no choice if he wanted answers. He went to Derek's loft and found him reading but otherwise not busy.
"Deaton sent you?" Derek poured him a coffee and slid the coffee across the counter to him. "Weird, he usually thrives on being the one with the knowledge."
Jordan shrugged and held the cup between both hands, tightly. "I don't know. He seemed to think you were the only person to talk to regarding this."
"This being what exactly?" Derek sat in front of him and took a sip of his own coffee. "Let's see if I can really help more than the emissary."
Jordan started his tale, the white flashes, three of them, the feeling of being struck by light, for just a second. It didn't take long, but after only a few sentences, the most basic description, Derek's face was illuminated by a look of knowing.
"Spill," Jordan said once his story was over. "You know what's going on with me, tell me."
Derek pushed his empty cup away and leaned back on his chair. "Do you know the rule of three?"
"The rule of three?" Jordan looked at the counter, stared at the rings the cups have left there. "It's a literary device, no? Something about the structure of stories? I didn't listen much during English class, sorry."
"It's okay," Derek replied with a smile. "And you're not wrong. But there is more to it. It comes from the Latin omne trium perfectum, which translates intoeverything that comes in threes is perfect."
"So my three flashes are what? Perfect? They weren't exactly pleasant I'll have you know, so-"
Derek shook his head. "No, they're signs. Three signs that can take any form. For you it's flashes. For my mother it was 3 rings tattooed around her finger, one after the other. I've seen this happen to her, that's why Deaton sent you here, he knew I could explain it better."
"Signs?"
"That you have found your one," Derek replied casually. "They appear when you find your perfect fit. Your soulmate. Three moments, three signs to confirm what you already know."
Jordan felt a pit in his stomach, a disbelief that made him shiver. "No, come on soulmates aren't real. It's the stuff of fairy tales and besides Lydia and I are not-"
"Don't try me. Everyone knows, even now you smell like her. You're together and it's very real." Derek had a small smile stretch his lips, sadness tinting its edges. "Not everyone has a soulmate. It's actually pretty rare. My parents were but I never saw another example."
Jordan's mind, still spinning, managed to form a question. "What does it mean?"
He had an idea but between legends, folklore, and reality he learned there was a lot of room for the truth to be different.
Derek looked back up with an air of compassion. "Nothing to worry about. Soulmates don't mean spell or destiny or magical bonds. It's more like… Something easy. You don't have to look any further, nothing will ever be as simple as it will be with Lydia. It's not necessarily better, or more intense, or stronger. I love Braeden, I'd fight and die for her. We're not soulmates but I love her just as much as you love Lydia. The difference is subtler. Being with your soulmate is just… Natural. Easy." He couldn't seem to find another way to explain it.
"We didn't have it easy so far." Jordan said in a murmur.
"Together, the dynamic is easy. You two will find your rhythm easily, you will understand each other at once, that kind of thing. That sort of easy." Derek got up and patted Jordan on the shoulder as he passed him, grabbing his empty cup on his way. "Nothing else can be that way around here, so enjoy it."
Four is for forever (aeternum)
He made his way back to his place in a stupor, driving on autopilot with Derek's revelations running wildly in his head.
Body, mind and soul. You get one sign for each of them.
He was right. Jordan could admit the first time he saw Lydia his eyes traveled up and down and liked absolutely everything he saw. The flash came a second later. The second one was right when he'd realized how her personality was so attractive, in every way. The last one, when she looked at him and said the words… It did speak to his soul.
He was right. About everything. Which meant…
"She's my soulmate. Lydia's my soulmate." He was parked in front of his building, motor turned off and he hadn't realized it yet. He had more important to focus on.
"Lydia's my soulmate. Jesus…" He shook his head, all the way up to his apartment.
For once he had certainty in his life, love that wouldn't stop or disappear or turn sour.
By the time he stepped inside he was shaking all over. Lydia looked up from her spot, curled up in his armchair. "Hey there," she said softly, pushing away the mass of curls that had slipped on her shoulder. "I woke up and you were gone so…" she shrugged, "I made coffee and bought croissants."
He grinned and kneeled next to her. "It's…"
She smiled back, reached over and traced the edge of his chin with the back of her index finger. "Yes?"
So much love shining in her eyes, understanding, patience.
"It's perfect," he replied in one breath. He meant it, a confession as natural as breathing.
"I hoped so," she said. She stretched and kissed him gently. "What did Derek say?"
"Soulmates," Jordan breathed out without thought. He blinked, the words sinking in, and pulled back quickly to judge her reaction.
"Thought so," she said.
He frowned, perplexed, but all she did was kiss him again and whisper "I read when I don't know about something. Normally I hear voices, not see flashes of white."
She wound her arms around his neck and rested her forehead against his. "So this is it, you and me. It doesn't get any better than us. Get used to it."
Jordan chuckled. "I'm ready. I'm ready for an eternity with you," he whispered before kissing her.