“Seventh floor?” A young man that greatly resembled a ruddy-coated Highland cow chewing its cud stood beside the wall of magic buttons, his finger poised as he waited for Graham’s response.
“Aye, lad. Please hurry. ’Tis quite urgent.” He flexed his hands open and closed against the roughness of his jeans as he waited for the doors to shut and the damnable box to move.
Several of the other people called out different numbers to the shaggy-haired lad beside the wall. He obligingly jabbed a finger against the corresponding buttons until several of the numbered circles glowed with their tiny lights. The doors slid shut and the box jerked with the same stomach-thumping bump as it had the first time Graham visited the strange place.
They didn’t travel but a few seconds before the box shuddered to a stop and the doors slid open. Graham shoved his way to the front. He had to get out before the doors closed again.
“Nah, mate.” The pimply-faced lad pressed a hand to Graham’s shoulder. “Ye said seventh floor, aye? This here’s just the second level.”
Son of a bitch. Why the hell had he not waited for Vivienne?“I thank ye.” Graham stiffly bobbed his head. Damn, if this didn’t sorely grate on his pride. “I canna make out the strange glyphs. I thank ye for yer help.”
“Forgot yer glasses, eh?” The young man smiled and nodded. “Me da has the same problem. Can’t see a fecking thing without his specs.” Whatever the boy was chewing popped and crackled with his toothy smile.
“Aye.” He didn’t have a clue what the lad had just said but apparently, the kind boy was offering a wee bit of balm for his bruised pride.
The box shuddered to a stop again and the doors shushed open. Graham glanced over at the lad and waited.
“This is yer floor,” the boy whispered with a wink.
“Thank ye kindly.” Graham rushed out, filled his lungs with a deep breath then slowly hissed it out between clenched teeth. Thank the gods.He glanced around. Aye. This was the place.He hurried down the gleaming hallway. An eerie quietness filled the air. The few people standing around softly murmured to one another in low reverent tones. Even the beeping of the strange machines seemed muted. Death walked these halls.He stifled a skin-prickling shudder. This place must surely be the gateway to the other side.
He gently pushed open the door to Mistress Eliza’s room and his heart fell at the scene revealed as the door slowly swung aside. The tiny old woman lay curled on her side in a tight knot as though she were still in the womb. Lilia had pulled a chair close to the bed, her face pale and shining with tears as she hugged one of Eliza’s mottled, blue-veined hands tight against her cheek.
Lilia’s eyes were closed. She rested with her head on the bed, tucking her shoulders up under Eliza’s thin arm in a heartbreaking attempt at gleaning one last frail cuddle. Eliza’s other hand rested on Lilia’s head, the knotted arthritic fingers barely twitching as though struggling to find the strength to stroke the tangle of golden locks flowing across Lilia’s shoulders.
“Lass . . . ” Graham eased forward. “I am here.” It was all he could think to say. Words could not begin to convey how badly he wished he could shield her from this sorrow.
Lilia slowly opened her red-rimmed eyes, her lower lip quivering as she tearfully whispered, “She’s leaving me, Graham. Please . . . please make her stay.” She hiccupped a soft sob and a new onslaught of tears streamed down her face. “Please,” she whispered. “I can’t take it if she leaves me now. Don’t let her—please, not yet.”
Lilia’s pain tore into him, cutting him deeper than any length of steel ever could. It grabbed hold and twisted his heart until he was consumed with how terribly she was suffering. Nothing else mattered but getting his Lilia through this darkness.
Graham knelt at Lilia’s feet and gently wiped the backs of his fingers across the curve of her wet cheek. Lore a’mighty. He wished he could bear this sorrow for her.
When Lilia finally met his gaze, he nodded at Eliza. The rattle of the dying woman’s labored breathing was growing more pronounced. “Mistress Eliza will always watch over ye, my dear sweet love. She will never really be gone from ye—not ever. Ye ken that—aye?”
“But I want her here.” Lilia’s voice quivered, hitching in and out, weak and trembling as she gave way to more tears. “I need her. I am so afraid of life here . . . without her.”
“Ye have nary a thing to fear, my darling one.” Graham drew closer, gently combing his fingers through Lilia’s tousled hair and smoothing it behind her ear. “I swear to ye, ye will never be alone. I swear it upon every breath I take and with every beat of my heart.”
A harsh rattling wheezed free of Eliza. Her thin pale lips twitched. “Bind.” One word. Exhaled in a barely heard whisper. Her thin form shuddered, death rattling within her shallow breathing as she struggled to speak louder. “Witness ye bind.”
Lilia pressed a kiss to Eliza’s cold, bent hand then tucked it gently atop the pillow. She slowly rose from the chair, her hand lightly caressing Eliza’s colorless cheek as though branding the feel of those last moments permanently in her memory. She straightened the covers across Eliza’s thin sagging shoulders, her fingers trembling as she smoothed back the sparse, cottony bit of hair surrounding the failing woman’s drawn face.
Tears streaming down both cheeks, Lilia sadly shrugged. “She keeps saying that and I don’t know what she means.Witness ye bind?” She turned to Graham, coughing out a choking sob. “How am I supposed to make this easier for her if I don’t know what the hell she wants? Why don’t I understand?”
Graham ached for Lilia. Lore a’mighty, he had never felt so helpless and he hated that damn feeling worse than anything he had ever encountered before. He took Lilia’s hands and gently pulled her closer. He turned her toward Eliza, hugging her back against his chest as he pointed down at the dying woman. “Look at her. See the existence she now has. Would ye wish her trapped in such a prison a minute longer? I have learned ye well by now, my love. I ken ye would never wish Mistress Eliza’s suffering prolonged just so ye could keep her by yer side.”
Lilia rubbed her cheek against her shoulder, staring sadly down at Eliza. In a small voice, so very soft and low Graham had to bend closer to hear it, she replied, “No.” She barely shook her head. “I don’t want her to suffer any longer. But I don’t understand her request. I don’t know what she wants me to bind.” Her face crumpled as she pulled aside and stared forlornly up into his face. “I can’t live with myself if I can’t grant this wonderful woman her last request—not after all she has done for me.”
Graham brought Lilia’s knuckles to his mouth and pressed a gentle kiss against the coolness of her fingers. Slowly bending, he eased his dagger out of its sheath inside his boot, held out his wrist, and rested the edge of the blade against it. “She wishes us bound. Joined in the old way. Eliza shall be our witness. She will carry our vows with her and record them in eternity’s books on the other side.”
Lilia looked up at him, her deep green eyes glistening with yet-to-be-shed tears. She trembled, furtively glancing down at his extended arm, then back up to his face. Graham waited to make the cut, fearing she would collapse. He didn’t wish to foist anything upon her that she didn’t want but this was right—this was how it should be. He felt the pure truth of it deep in his soul with more certainty than he’d ever felt about anything.
“Bound forever?” she finally whispered. “Married?”
“Aye.” Graham held his breath, willing her to say yes.
She looked at Eliza, then looked back to him, a maelstrom of emotions and tears shining in her eyes. “Joined,” she said with a note of finality.
