Thin Air

He felt so incredibly warm, real, and solid against me.

“Oh,” I said faintly, and met his eyes. “You found her, right?”

He didn’t speak at all. He traced his thumbs down the line of my chin, and there was a light in him that made me kindle in response. I kissed him, breathless with relief, and he responded so ardently I felt faintly embarrassed to be doing this in public view. The kiss was a promise, intimate and gentle, of a lot more to come. When I pulled back his hands continued to move over me, restless and frantic, silently assuring me that he knew. He knew.

The Wardens were all looking at Lewis. Lewis, in turn, was staring at the two of us with a stone-hard expression and dark, impenetrable eyes.

And then he smiled, and there was a trace of bitterness in it, but just a trace. The rest was pure satisfaction. “Well, that was close,” Lewis said, and jerked his head at the other Wardens. “Glad to be right. Back off. Give them some air.”

The Wardens clustered together, murmuring in low voices. Lewis didn’t join them. He took a cell phone out of his pocket and dialed, said a few words, and sat down on a log to wait.

I focused back on David. “You really thought that bitch was me?” He flinched. “Oh, come on. You didn’t.”

His hands stroked through my hair, combing out tangles and curls. It fell in a shining black silk curtain over my shoulders and his hands. “I love your hair,” he whispered. “Did I ever tell you that?”

“Can’t remember,” I said, and smiled just a little. “Sorry. Nothing personal. The other one’s got my memories. I’m still brain-damaged.”

He sighed and rested his forehead against mine, a gesture of trust more intimate than a kiss. “The morning after we got you to the clinic, you-went crazy. Tried to kill the staff and escape,” he said. “We found you and restrained you, and when you woke up, you…remembered. You were all right again.” Shadows flickered in his eyes. “Except you weren’t. And it wasn’t you. It was her.” He swallowed hard. “But she remembered, Jo. She remembered Imara. She knew your past, she knew me-I had no reason to doubt it. She felt…”

“Real,” I supplied soberly. “I know. It’s not your fault. She knew what you wanted, what you needed, and she played right to it. I can’t blame you. I wouldn’t have believed me, either. She set me up good. Pretty stiff competition.”

“She’s not competition,” he said, and kissed me, fast and hard. “She’s been voted off the island.”

I didn’t know why that was fu

“And clothing optional?” he murmured. “I’d like that, too.”

“Well? Get to it, Magic Man.” I wasn’t serious, and he wasn’t taking me seriously. Man, being responsible was a huge pain in the ass. “David-I still don’t remember. What memories I have, they’re borrowed, they’re not mine. But my feelings…those are mine. And they’re real.”

His hands went still, waiting.

“I have these feelings for you that I really can’t-God. David, look, if you want to go find Joa

He gave me a slow, wicked smile. “But I like working with my hands.”

I fought the urge to melt against him. “What are we going to do about her?”

His eyes, which had faded to a warm human brown, flared back to bronze. “She tried to convince me to kill you,” he said. “I don’t know what she’ll do next.”

“Well, Ve

“Ve

“I’m not so shortsighted,” Ve

At her feet lay Ashan, unconscious.

“I wasn’t just protecting her,” Ve

David’s eyes were fixed on Ashan. “What about him?”

“All locks have keys.”

“You can make duplicate keys,” David said, “when you break one.”

To his credit, David didn’t rip Ashan in half on sight. I suspected that was because of what he’d found in Sedona, and because-maybe-of what Imara had conveyed to him. He hadn’t said a word about it, but there was a deep-seated peace in him that hadn’t been there before. Apparently he was willing to let bygones be…

Well, maybe not. After staying still for several long seconds, David flashed across the intervening space, grabbed Ashan by the back of the neck, and dangled him off the ground like a toy. His lips were drawn back from his teeth, and those teeth were pointed. I remembered Rahel giving me the shark grin when we’d met after the helicopter ride; that was nothing compared to the savage expression on David’s face at that moment. Even predators can be pets, Ve

“If you kill him,” Ve

I was afraid he hadn’t heard her for a second, but then he threw Ashan down-hard-and crouched to converse eye-to-eye with Ve

“The same as you,” she said. “I found her here. I kept her alive. I found Ashan.”

“You kept Ashan from me. Didn’t you?”

“Well, yes, I expected you’d try to destroy him,” she said. “Confess. Aren’t you glad I did? Really?”

“You didn’t do it to help me or Joa

She shrugged.

David looked grim, and almost angry. “Ve

“I can’t,” she said. “It’s not my choice, David; it’s just practical. You may be in charge now, but you won’t be for long, because the old ones aren’t listening to you, and they won’t ever listen. You may be the conduit, but you’re not Jonathan. They won’t obey you. Somebody needs to be able to control them, and it can’t be one of the New Dji

I didn’t know what she was talking about, but it sounded ominous. Worse, it sounded ominous for David. Personally.

“You didn’t save Ashan for me or for Joa

She didn’t even try to deny it. “Yes,” she said. “He deserved punishment, and he was punished. But he doesn’t deserve destruction.” She met his eyes. “He’s my brother, David. He’s your brother, too, in a lesser way. But I wouldn’t expect a human-born to understand what that means to one of us.”

David’s face tightened. “She wasn’t your daughter, Ve

“More loss doesn’t balance the scales. It’s enough, David. Enough.”

He let out a slow, unsteady breath. “You want me to help restore his powers? And trust him?”

Ve

“Excuse me,” I said, and stepped forward. “Could you speak in the kind of English that makes sense? Because it sure as hell sounds like you’re pla