The Holders

21



“Why can’t you be there?” Ryland asked, as we walked through fog on our way to Lorcan for his Awakening.

“Because, buddy, they said I can’t. There’s no reason to be scared, it wo–”

“I’m not scared.”

“Right, sorry.” I bit my lip to keep from smiling.

Truth was I’d been trying to find a way to weasel my way into the Awakening all morning, but Min was adamant that it was too dangerous. Apparently there was so much power required for the process that it would be nearly impossible for any Holder who wasn’t actively participating to be in the room without extreme discomfort; much less a newbie like me. I would have been fine with the discomfort, but the idea that I could actually end up hurting someone forced me to accept that, like it or not, my attendance was out of the question.

“Who will be there?” he asked after a minute, tying to cover his nerves by making it sound like he didn’t care, and was only asking to make conversation.

“Joc– Dad,” I caught myself, “and Min.”

“The old lady?”

“Yes, her name is Min. But they will both be doing things, so you may only see them at the start and at the end.”

“What about the scary-looking guy?”

“OK, Taron,” I stressed. “If you are going to be around these people you are going to have to start calling them by their names.”

“You knew who I meant,” he grumbled.

“Doesn’t matter. No more ‘old lady’, or ‘scary guy’, or ‘guy who talks funny’,” I added, figuring I’d cover his nickname for Mr Anderson while I was at it. “Names, you got it?”

“Yeah, yeah.”

We walked into Lorcan and into the lounge where Min, Mr Anderson, Mr Reid, and Taron were all waiting.

“There they are,” said Mr Reid, seeing us enter. I felt Ryland shrink back a little when he saw Taron, but I led him into the room. “Are you ready?” Mr Reid asked Ryland.

“Sure,” he said, with maybe a little too much bravado.

“There’s a good lad!” Mr Anderson said, stepping up. “I’ve a class to be getting to, but I wanted to wish you luck!” He smiled, holding out a hand for Ryland to hit. “Taron?” He turned to the figure lurking in the corner. “You coming?”

Taron grunted, ever the charmer, and the two men stepped out into the cold. However at the moment my attention wasn’t on them. It was on the already familiar warm, welcome pull in my chest, announcing the approach of someone on the staircase. A person who I could tell had already left his room this morning when I woke up, and I had not seen or felt all day.

Alex.

This was my shot. I’d already made the decision to talk to him today, being in a much better and less emotionally driven frame of mind, and was eager to get it over with so the butterflies in my stomach could find a new home.

But unfortunately it would have to wait just a little longer, because right now Ryland needed me.

“Is everything ready to go?” I asked Min.

“Yes,” she nodded. “How about you?” The look in her eye told me exactly what she meant.

“Soon,” was all I said.

“All right then,” she said, looking down at Ry. “Let’s go on back.”

“Are you sure you can’t come?” he asked, again pretending the answer was of no significance whatsoever.

“I’m sorry, Ry.”

Min put a hand on his back and led him out of the lounge and down the hall while I watched, hugging my arms to my chest.

“He’ll be fine, Becca,” Mr Reid said.

“I know,” I agreed. “I just wish he didn’t have to be alone.”

“Here,” he said, turning toward the table with the checker board painted on it. “Why don’t we have a round while we wait? It will take your mind off things.”

I glanced out toward the hall, intending to tell him I couldn’t because I needed to go and talk to someone, but paused, suddenly realizing that particular someone was gone. Alex must have left while Min was taking Ryland out and I hadn’t realized. I peeked my head out into the hall to make sure, only to find it empty.

Damn.

Should I go look for him? Everything in me screamed yes, but deep down I knew it wasn’t the time. Alex and I needed to talk – really talk – and I didn’t want to have such an important conversation while part of my mind would be worried about Ry. Much as I hated putting it off once again, I’d promised Ryland that I’d be in the lounge waiting for him when he got out and that’s where I needed to be; Alex would understand that. I could wait one more hour.

“Sure.” I smiled at Mr Reid, who was arranging the game pieces on the board without so much as lifting a finger. “That would be great.”

I sat down at the table, promising myself that once this Awakening was over and I was sure Ryland was OK, I would go looking for Alex, and not come back until I’d found him.



After seven rounds of checkers, only one of which I won – which I was certain was only because Mr Anderson let me – Min returned to the lounge.

“We’re done,” she said. “Everything went just as it should have.”

“He’s OK? Is he normal?”

“He’s just fine. Cormac will need to confirm it, but as far as I can see his power level is completely normal. No stronger than, say, Anderson or Reid. He will be able to read minds and do some compulsion, but I doubt he will have anything beyond that.”

“So, no erasing minds like Jocelyn, or hearing dead people or anything like that? He’s just a normal mind-reader?” I asked, ignoring the oxymoron.

“Yes. Perfectly normal.”

“Where is he?” I asked, having assumed Ryland would come back with her.

“Still in the Chamber with Jocelyn. I told him he wasn’t allowed out until he finished every drop of the elixir I gave him. You can go in and see him if you want.”

I hurried down to the Chamber where Ryland was sitting on a long table, drinking out of one of the jars I recognized from Min’s office. Jocelyn looked up and gave me a stiff nod before stepping through the back door to his office.

Nice to see you, too.

“How’d it go?” I asked walking over to Ry, relieved that he seemed to be fine.

“OK,” he said, peering down into the jar. “This is gross.”

“Just drink it. Trust me, if it’s from Min, it’s good stuff.” I leaned against the table next to him, noticing the new necklace he had around his neck. It was a lot like Alex’s only his cord was brown leather and the stone in the center was red. “So it wasn’t scary?”

“Nah,” he said downing the rest of the drink. “Plus Alex was with me.”

My head snapped up, “Alex was here?”

“Yeah, he said you didn’t want me to be alone.”

“He held his hand the whole time,” came Min’s voice from the door.

“He didn’t need to,” Ryland said, not about to let us think he’d been scared.

“No, of course not,” Min said, smiling at him. “You were one of the bravest I’ve seen.”

Ry looked at me proudly as if to make sure I’d heard, but I was looking at Min. “He was here?” I whispered. “I thought you said…”

“That it would be very difficult, yes. And it was. I told him as much before we began, but he would have it no other way.” She turned to Ryland as I stared off, completely overwhelmed. “Now then, let’s go and get you something to eat.” She took the jar from him, and helped him down off the table. When they passed by me, Ryland poked my arm.

“You coming?”

“Becca has something she has to take care of up on the covered balcony first, I think,” Min said, urging him on. “Maybe she’ll come and join us later.”

“OK, bye Becca,” he said, following Min out of the Chamber, as I stared after them in a daze.

Alex had sat with Ryland so he wouldn’t be scared. Despite all the strangeness between us he’d been there to take care of him when I couldn’t. The swelling of emotion that fact caused in me was so strong that it was hard to breathe.

And, not just of nameless emotion… of love.

I loved him.

Yes, I was bonded to him, but that wasn’t the same thing. Maybe to some people it would have been but as far as I was concerned the ideas were separate. My bond to him as my Anam had made it so my life would no longer be complete without him. It had rearranged my world, placing him in the center, fulfilling me in ways I hadn’t realized I was empty. And yes, it had caused me to fall in love with him, and maybe that’s where a large part of my love had stemmed from, but I also know it was much more than that. If I was being honest, my feelings for Alex had started long before the Anam bond had, even if I hadn’t been ready to acknowledge them at the time. I didn’t love Alex only because some supernatural connection told me I had to. I loved him because I knew him. Because I’d seen the man he truly was inside, and it never failed to amaze me. I loved him for his heart and his strength. For his endless compassion and his unbreakable spirit even in the face of everything he’d been through. I loved him because he was the person I wanted to be, and I was a better person just through the privilege of knowing him.

I’d only been to the covered balcony once before, but my feet seemed to remember the way all on their own and I was down the hall and up the stairs before I’d even realized I’d moved. As the door to the balcony came into sight, I felt the pulling in my chest and knew that Min had been right, he was out there. I gently reached for the handle and pulled open the door, surprised by how warm it was inside. The balcony was entirely glassed in as well as heated, but I’d still expected it to be chilly.

I stepped into the enclosure, shut the door softly behind me, and looked down to the other end, where Alex was standing in the corner with his arms crossed over his chest, gazing out over the thinning fog.

I slowly walked toward him, not sure where to begin. He tilted his head, glancing at me as I drew near, though he didn’t turn to face me.

“Thank you,” I said, stopping a few feet away from him. “For Ryland I mean. You didn’t have to do that, I know it must have been hard–”

“It was nothing,” he interrupted, trying to smile. “Just a little tiring that’s all. Min says it will wear off in a few hours. Besides, he shouldn’t have had to do it alone,” he added, turning completely away from me, pretending to look out the back wall of windows, though I could see by his refection in the glass that his eyes were shut. “It was nothing.”

“It was something to me.”

I shouldn’t have been surprised. Of course he would think it was nothing – because to him it truly was. He was always taking care of everyone around him, always giving. This truly was his family and he would do anything for any one of them, and the fact that he actually thought that it was unremarkable, only made it more so. I knew how much he loved Min and Chloe, and enjoyed the antics of Mr Anderson and Mr Reid. I also knew how close to his heart the scouting he did was, and how attached he was to the Order and his overall life at the school. And of course there was Jocelyn, who I knew Alex looked up to and respected as much as any son would a father, and it was more than apparent that each and every person in this little makeshift family loved Alex as much as he did them. And yet, as I watched him now, staring off into the falling snow, for the first time I could see how lonely he was. He didn’t have what he truly wanted, what he needed. Even with all the people around him every day, when it came to the ways that mattered most, he was alone.

But it didn’t have to be that way.

He had me.

I took a silent breath and steadied my shaking arms as I realized it was now or never.

“You’re an amazing man, Alex,” I said, watching the refection of his face. His eyes popped open but he didn’t move. I took a step toward him and continued. “You take care of everyone, but who takes care of you?”

He cleared his throat, and it took him a moment to respond. “I don’t need to be taken care of,” he said quietly without turning.

“Everyone needs to be taken care of.” I reached out my hand, placing it gently on his arm. He stiffened for a moment but didn’t turn, so I stepped around in front of him. “Everyone needs someone,” I told him softly, “and I need you.”

He shut his eyes again and shook his head. “Becca, please don’t do this to me,” he breathed, begging.

“Do what? Tell you how I feel? You told me once never to apologize for that.”

I waited for a response, but none came. He simply stared out into fog. Finally I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to know what he was thinking, what he was feeling. I remembered the conversation we’d had on the plane the morning we landed. The conversation about Sciaths and – weaknesses.

Before I could think about it and change my mind, I lifted my hands, letting them slowly make their way toward either side of his neck. Seeing my movement he finally glanced down, and as my fingers touched the clasp of the cord, fear shot across his face and his hands flew up, pinning my wrists to his shoulders.

“No,” he said, dread in his voice.

“Why not?” I asked, at the very least happy to have gotten a reaction. “It’s only me.”

“Yes, exactly. It’s you,” he said, keeping my hands firmly locked in place.

OK, that one hurt. I understood why he would be worried, but if he was so set on keeping his feelings hidden and me at arm’s length then why was he still here? After all, he could have left. He could have let go of me and stepped away, I wouldn’t have stopped him. But he did neither.

After a few moments his hold on my wrists started to loosen a bit. I don’t think it was conscious on his part, but I found myself able to slide my hands out from under his. Again I went for the clasp of his Sciath, fully expecting him to stop me, but this time he didn’t. I unfastened the clip and slid the cord from his neck, and waited. Waited for… well, actually I had no idea what I was waiting for. What did emotions look like? Would I actually see them? Or maybe I would hear something?

But nothing was happening. It wasn’t until I looked up at him and saw the rock hard strain in his jaw that I realized what the problem was. He was holding everything in and keeping me out. He had said this was possible, but he’d also said that it was very hard to do. I probably could have waited him out, as it was clear he was already exhausted from attending the Awakening and wasn’t going to be able to keep it up for long, but that wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted him to want to let me in, not be unable to keep me out.

As I watched him battle to stay in control it was easy to see that he was losing. And yet as desperate as he seemed to keep me out, again I couldn’t help but notice, he didn’t leave. All he had to do was turn and walk away, and his internal war would be over.

I didn’t know what he was feeling – and he seemed hell-bent on keeping it that way – but if I could do nothing else, I had to make sure he knew that he could trust me, and that I would always be there for him no matter what. I was slightly irritated that he didn’t realize this already, but if I had to spell it out for him, then I would.

I reached up, took his face between my hands, and said the words that had been hovering at the back of my mind for weeks now. “Alex,” I said, tilting his head, forcing him to meet my eyes, “I love you.”

“Becca…” It was no more than a shaky breath, but it held so many different threads of emotion in it that I could barely tell them all apart. “You are meant for someone else.”

“No,” I said, beaming, hoping he would see the truth in my eyes. “I’m meant for you.”

Before he could draw breath to argue with me, I pulled his face in to mine and kissed him.

The moment our lips touched he tensed, sucked a sharp breath, and grabbed my hips hands like iron, holding me at a distance. Undeterred, I moved my hands from the sides of his face to the back of his head, lacing my fingers through his hair, as his ridged mouth began to give way. Slowly, his lips parted and began moving in time with mine, sending my heart slamming into my ribcage. His arms slid, snaking their way around my waist, dragging me against his chest. Finally, I felt the remainder of his strain and tension snap with a shudder…