Beverly Barton - Raintree - Santuary

“You can’t allow him to stay here!” Sidonia shouted. “No good will come of it.”

“He needs to be here to protect Eve,” Mercy explained.

“If he’s going to kill his brother anyway, why doesn’t he just go ahead and do it?”

“Lower your voice. Eve might overhear you.”

Sidonia snorted. “Not likely. She’s too wrapped up in spending time with her daddy to be eavesdropping.”

Keeping her voice low and calm, Mercy said, “Cael has a group of friends who guard his back, so until Cael issues Judah a one-on-one challenge, which Judah believes will happen soon, the wisest course is for Judah not to hunt his brother down.”

“For all you know he’s playing you for a fool. Again.” Sidonia’s gaze met Mercy’s. “This could be some sort of ploy to ingratiate himself with you, to show himself in a favorable light, when all he’s doing is buying time to bond with Eve so that when he decides to take her away, she’ll go with him willingly.”

“Judah is bonding with Eve. And he does plan to take her from me,” Mercy said. “But his hatred for his brother and Cael’s threats to Eve are real. I know it.”

Sidonia nodded. “You’ve sensed this, and you are certain?”

“Yes.”

Knowing that Mercy would never lie to her about such a vitally important matter, Sidonia reluctantly agreed. “Very well. Keep him here, and somehow we’ll pass him off as a human visitor when the others ask. For now, you and he will stand against his brother. Then later, when the brother is no longer a threat, you’ll have to fight Judah to save Eve.”

“I know.”

“When that time comes, you’ll need Dante and Gideon.”

“Probably, but not now. Not yet.”

“When? You mustn’t wait until it’s too late.”

“Eve will know when Judah decides to take her. She’ll tell me when it’s time.”

Sidonia’s gaze held numerous questions.

“Eve can’t leave the sanctuary without my knowing in advance what is going to happen,” Mercy said.

Sidonia gasped. “No, tell me you didn’t!”

“I did. I had no choice.”

“But when did you do it? You would have needed another Raintree to help.”

“Eve helped me. When she was only hours old and completely dependent on me. I had no way of knowing if Judah would somehow realize I was carrying his child and come after me-either to kill her or take her. I used the old binding spell because I had no other choice. I had to be able to know at all times where Eve was.”

“If only you had told your brothers who your baby’s father was before she was born, we wouldn’t have to deal with him or his brother now. They would have hunted Judah down and killed him.” Sidonia squinted as she looked soulfully at Mercy. “You poor child. I know. I know. You loved him. You didn’t want him dead.”

“Enough! We’ve had this discussion too many times.”

“You still love him, don’t you?”

“Of course not!”

Sidonia grabbed Mercy’s arm. “What if he wanted you as well as Eve? Would you go with him?”

“Shut up! Stop talking nonsense.” Mercy stormed out of the kitchen and through the house, stopping only when she reached the open front door and heard Eve’s laughter.

She eased open the screen door and stepped out onto the porch. Twilight had settled in around the valley, a pinkish orange glow in the evening sky, a haze of translucent clouds hugging the mountains surrounding them. Out in the middle of the grassy green yard, Judah stood holding a glass jar, holes punched in the metal lid, and watched while Eve chased fireflies. Several little captives already blinked brightly inside the jar.

Eve zeroed in on another lightning bug and caught it between her cupped palms. “I got him! I got him!” She ran to Judah, who opened the jar’s lid a fraction, just enough so that Eve could drop her hostage into the glass prison.

When Eve sensed Mercy’s presence, she looked at her and smiled. “Daddy’s never caught lightning bugs before, not even when he was a little boy. I had to explain that I wouldn’t hurt them, and that after I see how many I can catch, I’ll let them all go free.”

“Well, I believe it’s emancipation time,” Mercy said. “It’s after eight. You need to take a bath before you go to bed, my little princess.”

“No, not yet. Please, just another hour.” Whining, Eve put her hands together in a prayer-like gesture. “Daddy and I are having so much fun.” She turned to Judah. “Aren’t we, Daddy? Tell her. Tell her that I don’t have to go to bed right now.”

Judah handed Eve the jar filled with fireflies. “Let them go.”

Eve tilted her head to one side and stared up at him. “I guess this means I have to do what Mother told me to do.”

He playfully ruffled her hair. “I guess it does.”

Once again, Judah’s actions showed him to be like any other father. How was it possible that an Ansara could be so similar to a Raintree? Perhaps Sidonia was right. Judah could be playing her for a fool, showing her what she wanted to see in him. A false impression.

Reluctantly, Eve unscrewed the lid and shook the jar gently, encouraging the lightning bugs to fly free. When the last one escaped, she walked up on the porch, handed the jar to Mercy and put on her sad face, the one she used to evoke pity.

Heaving a deep sigh, Eve said dramatically, “I’m ready to go-if I have to.”

Mercy barely managed not to smile. “Go inside and let Sidonia help you with your bath. I’ll be up later to kiss you good-night.”

“Daddy, too?”

“Yes,” Judah and Mercy replied simultaneously.

As soon as Eve went into the house, letting the screen door slam loudly behind her, Mercy set the empty Mason jar on the porch and stepped down into the yard. Judah looked up at the sky and the towering hills surrounding them, then settled his gaze on her.

“Nice evening,” he said. “It’s certainly peaceful here in these mountains. Don’t you ever get bored?”

“I stay busy,” she told him.

“Healing the bodies and hearts and minds of your fellow Raintree?”

“Yes, if and when I can. It’s my job as the Keeper of the Sanctuary to use my gifts as an empathic healer to help those who come to me.” Her gaze met his and held. “But then, you already knew that, didn’t you? You knew the day we met that I was the appointed one.”

“The moment I saw your eyes, I knew you were Raintree. I managed to see into your thoughts enough to learn you were a princess and that you were slated to become some sort of guardian,” Judah admitted. “I picked up only fragments of thought before I realized that, for the most part, your thoughts were shielded.”

“You used a shield, too. A powerful shield. I just didn’t realize it at the time,” she said. “I thought it strange that I couldn’t read you at all, that when I touched you, I sensed only that I could trust you. You blocked me completely and then sent me a deceptive message.”

“I did what was necessary in order to get what I wanted.”

“And you wanted me.”

“Very much.”

Why did he make his reply sound as if he were talking about the present and not the past? Even if he did want her now, he wanted only the use of her body, just as he had that night seven years ago.

No, that wasn’t the complete truth. He had wanted more than her body that night. He had wanted to take a Raintree princess’s innocence and make her fall in love with him. He had done both.

“Why didn’t you use protection that night?” Mercy asked.

His mouth curved upward in a sarcastic smirk. “Why didn’t you?”

“I could say that it was because I was young and stupid and got carried away with feelings I’d never experienced. But the truth is that when I knew I was going to spend the night with you, give myself to you…I tried to conjure up a temporary protection spell. Apparently it didn’t work.”