Chapter 74 Try harder
“I can handle a little shaking.” Astre smiled, and my mood darkened.
But Hale cut in before I could get a word out.
“This is no joke, darling. Ageir is too old to be wrong about this sort of thing.”
“I trust your wolf.” She leaned closer, kissed his lips firmly and then pulled away. “I’ll be careful, I promise. I will see you in one week? You’ll still be here, right?”
“One week?” Hale frowned, hesitant to let her go.
“I had a Jukers F 13 arranged for her,” Konrad said from behind. “We cannot have Astre taking a ship.”
“It’s laughable that you would assume I'd let my wife go to Asia on a ship anyway.” I couldn’t hold back anymore.
Konrad blinked, startled.
Hale shot me a scolding look, and walked off to the man. I watched him settle in the empty couch space beside the German and start up a conversation about his recent military activities to break the tension.
Astre was gone.
“You know, I don't remember you being such an unsupportive husband towards Nympheae or even Flore.” She said as soon as I walked into her dressing room.
I shut the doors gently behind me.
“You let Nymphaea wear whatever she liked to that French court of yours, and even hitch up her skirt to walk or run.”
I frowned. “Why are you speaking about yourself like it’s someone else?”
She banged a cabinet shut, her hands bunched into fists as she walked further into the room, past shoe racks and hat stands.
“You are Nymphaea.”
“That is the bloody problem, Mordaine!” She spun around, fire in her eyes. “I am Astre Walsh. I’m not your French Queen, I do not feel like her. That woman was bold, courageous and downright perfect. I cannot even clean up after myself and mostly forget that I leave doors open and my wardrobe a mess. Her shoes are too damn big for this simple Irish girl to fill.”
I frowned, exasperated with this same old cause of conflict.
She said the same thing as Flore, now as Astre. How could a person keep denying herself when she was reborn with all her memories intact?
But then I saw her eyes mist over, and my shoulders slumped.
“You are too caught up with the idea of the woman I was, the woman I do not even remember how to be anymore.”
She frowned, her eyes darting around.
“Here.” I pulled a cigarette packet out of my pocket, and lit it up for her with my fingers.
She hurried forward, pulled it from my fingers with a trembling hand, dragged it into her lungs and puffed white smoke out.
But her eyes darkened again when she glanced at me and saw the disapproval on my face.
“I cannot smoke too, right, because your perfect queen would never smoke.” She made a face.
I would have laughed in another circumstance. How could a person be jealous of their own self?
“You would have stocked a room full of cigarettes if they were a thing in the early 1800s, and you know it.” I sunk my hands in my pockets. “But you'll do so just to be rebellious, not because you need it. We are dragons. What do you need a bloody stick of nicotine for?”
She stepped back, the cigarette hanging from between her fingers and dusting ash onto the floor.
“You don't see me, Mordaine.” Her lips were trembled, “You cannot see me for who I am. You never saw Flore either.”
I yanked her close, gripping her face on either side.
“What are you saying, ma royne?” I leaned my forehead against hers, “I see you, I love you. Your promise to always return to me has been my only reason to remain in the ugly, dirty world.”
She whimpered, moving her forehead against mine, like those were the wrongest words I could have said.
“This attitude of yours, do you think it's fair to me, to Hale, the man who has been with you now for nearly a hundred years?”
I pulled my head back.
“Don't do that.” My eyes narrowed. ”Hale understands. And I love him. You of all people should know what I’ve done to prove that love.”
“There!” She wrenched away from me, her voice climbing. “Stop doing. Let fate play out for once, stop messing with it.”
“Please shut up.” My head was beginning to ache.
“No.” She snatched a glass bottle off a shelf and hurled it at me. I ducked.
“That attitude is what started all this.” She screamed over the sound of shattering glass.
“What did you expect me to do, Nymphaea?” I was yelling now. “Fate stole from me, cheated me and called it a cosmic error. We're immortals. You were not supposed to die.”
She turned her back to me, panting, “You should have let me die.” She whispered.
My teeth snapped. “Never say that again.”
“I mean it.” She spun back around, voice low, in control once more. “Promise me, Mordaine, if the day ever comes again that you have to choose, Please let me die.”
Her words hit me like a sledgehammer.
My body stiffened, my heart slamming painfully against my ribs as I stared at her in disbelief.
She folded her arms, pressing her lips flat as she tried to hold back her tears.
“Look at me, Mordaine.” Her voice shook, “Really, look at me. I bet you would never have chased a woman like me, loved me, married me if I was not your late queen reincarnate.”
“gods,” I cursed, looking away. Anytime she compared herself to Nymphaea as if they were not the same person, it made my brain glitch.
I took a deep breath, closed the distance between us and hugged her close.
She did not struggle this time, but leaned into my chest instead.
“Listen, my treasure. I'll love you in any shape or form you return to me in.”
She sniffed once and started to cry.
Dread crept into my chest and I held her tighter. I may just lose her this time again.
She claimed to be tired of this curse, but I was the one who had to wait years till she reincarnated every time.
Who had to send my Ashbounds scouting every continent, so I never missed her birth, so I knew exactly what country she chose to come from each time.
“You'll love me through anything.” She whispered now, “Except doing the one thing I am passionate about.”
“I just don’t like my wife as a spectacle. All those men, they gather in those opera houses to look at you.”
“They look at me because I sing.” Her hands circled my waist, hugging me closer. “Singing isn’t the worst thing I could do, could have been. I could come back as a dancer next time, what then?”
I shut my ears because I did not want to hear it.
The thought of it alone was making the lava in my core come to a boil.
“You have no idea what you’re talking about, ma cher,” I kissed her forehead, swaying on my feet while hugging her, the way she liked.
“I promise to support you from now on. But please, no Japan trip.”
She pulled away, eyes hot lava. “Are we still on this? I'll not disappoint the people who have been waiting to see me for half a year now.”
I ran my hand over my face. “You're twenty-eight, mon amour. We’re supposed to be working on your memory now, remembering your real cause of death.”
“You think I am not trying!” She yelled.
“Try harder!” I caught hold of myself again. “I'm sorry. I am just terrified of losing you. I cannot bear it this time.”
I brought my hand up to my aching chest. She stared at me with sad eyes, hurting for me.
“You’ve already lost me.”
She turned her back to me, and I found myself pulling away from Berlin.
When I opened my eyes, it was to Nymphaea, now in a man’s body, staring down at me in my Hollywood West mansion.
“Are you OK?” Those aqua-colored eyes were concerned.
We must have both fallen asleep while trying the memory exercises as soon as Hale left with his fairy.
“You’re not going on that trip with Hale.” I got out of bed. “I’ll not lose you this last time. You’ll not go to Japan.”