In The Dark Of Dreams Part 36

"We don't have time," she said, voice m.u.f.fled with tears.

"If we don't have time now, we never will," he replied.

She hesitated, then relaxed again in his arms, very slowly. Warm and small, and strong. His girl. His woman.

He was not alone anymore.

Perrin pressed his lips against her brow, listening to her breathing steady. She wasn't asleep, but she was resting, her presence warm inside his mind.

Are you angry with us? whispered the kra'a, also in his thoughts.

No, he told it, wanting to say more, but unable to do anything but throw his emotions at that too-familiar presence that skimmed now along the bond between him and Jenny. The bond felt like a rope around his heart. Physical, throbbing. Hot.

For a moment, he thought about the Frenchwoman who had died on the island, and the dead man on the boat, her husband. Perrin wondered what it had been like for them to be torn apart from each other.

Chilled him. Made him nauseous. Afraid. He felt the surrounding sea, soft and vast, buoying the ship as though it sat upon a curved palm; but all that did was make him feel like they were trapped inside a coffin. Or a hand about to close, and crush.

Perrin closed his eyes and forced himself to take deep, steadying breaths. His body still ached from lovemaking-"lovemaking," what a word-and it didn't take much for him to want to be inside Jenny again. Covering her with his body, sheltering her, holding her safe and full while those green eyes stared into his with that half-lidded pleasure and need-and that trust he craved so badly, he didn't know how he had survived this long without her.

He could survive another eight years on land, twenty, fifty, a hundred-if she was there with him.

All because of one moment on a beach, sixteen years ago.

The only other bonded pair Perrin had ever known was so old, their bodies had practically floated through the sea as shriveled husks. He had been very young. All he remembered was that they were always holding hands. And they died together, one last breath ending another.

Maybe it would make a difference that Jenny was human.

Maybe she would survive his death.

If they kill me, make sure she lives, he told the kra'a. Promise me.

We promise you, all of us, replied the kra'a. All of us, together.

Which was not the comforting answer Perrin wanted.

No one said a word when Perrin and Jenny ventured back on deck. The sky was bright with sun, but after a moment spent blinking hard, his vision adjusted. His eyes were getting better in the light.

Eddie and Rik stood inside the bridge with Sajeev, staring out the window at the distant rise of the atoll. Eddie glanced at Jenny, stared a moment too long-as if he could see the grief she was hiding so well-and then looked away, rubbing his jaw.

A yacht was anch.o.r.ed three hundred yards west. Perrin was no expert, but it looked large and expensive, with many windows and a sleek white hull.

"Pleasure cruiser," Jenny said thoughtfully, her voice still raw from her tears-though she held herself together with a calm that Perrin admired. "Large enough to require a crew."

"Your ship is the same size," he remarked.

"The Calypso Star was designed to be handled by only one or two well-trained people." Jenny quirked her mouth. "I see a lot of skin over there."

Sajeev grinned and tapped the digital player taped to the wall. His finger scrolled down, then clicked. Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get It On" began blaring over the stereos. Eddie frowned at him and turned off the music.

The fishing boat drifted closer to the yacht. Everyone but Sajeev ventured from the bridge to stand on deck. Perrin glimpsed crisp white uniforms, and a lot of bikinis. In fact, most of the pa.s.sengers seemed to be young women, who were lounging on lawn chairs, holding drinks, and laughing. Pleasure cruise, indeed.

Some of the crew watched their boat with concern. He wouldn't have been surprised to see guns, but none appeared.

"Well," Jenny said. "This is awkward."

Perrin frowned. "Go or stay?"

One of the women on the vessel seemed to get a good look at Rik and waved. Her swimsuit was barely there, and she was tanned, long-legged, and lean as a cat. Her white teeth practically sparkled.

"I'm torn," he replied, waving back. "Very torn."

"Rik," Eddie said.

"If it's the end of the world, and they're some of the survivors?" Rik held out his hands, smiling-though it didn't reach his eyes. "Come on, man. I suddenly feel like being a hero."

Perrin wasn't fooled. Shape-shifters mated for life. And Rik, young as he had been all those years ago, had loved Surinia enough to claim her as his-if not in body, then in soul. A pretty face wouldn't be enough to heal that wound, but there was nothing wrong with pretending.

"The atoll is over a mile wide," Eddie said. "If we anchor on the other side, no one should be able to see anything strange."

"I'm more worried about luring trouble here," Jenny said, but even as she spoke, the yacht's anchor began to crank up, and the engines purred to life.

"I think we made them nervous," Perrin said mildly, as the girl who had been waving to Rik screamed good-bye at him, then bounced back to her friends with a loud, delighted laugh.

Sajeev turned the music back on. This time, no one stopped him. Perrin glanced at Jenny and found her rubbing the back of her neck.

Her knees suddenly buckled. He caught her as a tremor poured through her body, from head to foot-deepening into a violent quaking shiver that made her teeth chatter.

"What-" Rik began, just as Jenny's entire body bent backward, rigid, seizing. Horrifying sounds tore from her throat.

Her muscles relaxed just as Perrin began to lay her down, but the pain didn't seem to ease. She cried out, a deep throaty sound that was part scream, part groan, and that rose from so deep inside her he imagined it was the sound of her soul.

He saw, inside his head, a shimmer of darkness. A vision of terrible golden eyes straining to open, buried in the fire burning below the earth's crust. Listening for dreams that would not come.

Close, whispered the kra'a. We are still close. The dreams will come. Dreams always come.

Perrin shuddered. And then the pain hit him, too.

He went blind. Lost the ability to breathe. Fingers dug into the base of his skull, but his hands were firmly around Jenny, and it was only memory, terrible memory, though the pain was real and the same. Taking an ax to his skull would have been kinder, faster, than the prying, the sensation of someone trying to pull out his spine-along with a sudden liquid heat that felt like acid pouring into that old gaping scar.

When it stopped, it was sudden-and felt like death. Or maybe heroin. The relief was bliss, sinking into his veins, pooling in all the parts of him that were still and quiet. He'd taken the drug only twice but had been frightened of how good it made him feel, how bereft of thought and any instinct to survive. He felt the same now.

Except for Jenny. Fear for her crashed him down.

Perrin tried to open his eyes, but it was impossible, at first. Nothing worked right. He felt Jenny beside him, his hand around her arm. Her skin was soft, cool. He heard the faint hiss of her breathing and wanted to press his ear against her heart.

If he could even move.

"Perrin," Jenny murmured.

"Here," he whispered, relieved beyond measure to hear her speak.

Eddie crouched, pale. "What just happened?"

Jenny shuddered. Perrin said, "Earthquake."

Not the entire truth, but close enough. He was certain there had been an earthquake, just as he was certain that he did not want to explain the vision of a waking, increasingly restless, Kraken.

Rik held a water bottle to Jenny's mouth, and helped her drink. Her color improved, but the faint, rea.s.suring smile she gave him was deeply shaken.

"We're running out of time," she said.

Less than fifteen minutes later, Perrin and Jenny were in the sea.

The fishing boat was anch.o.r.ed less than twenty feet away. The atoll was another twenty feet behind them. If Perrin stood on his toes, he could keep his head above the surface. Jenny alternated between holding his shoulders and treading water. Every inch of him wanted to transform into his water-body, but he forced himself to stay human.

Jenny's face was pale and bruised, but her eyes remained intent. Focused. Perrin thought of everything they had shared, what she had told him, and a desperate love clawed up his throat, along with an equally desperate desire to protect her.

Perrin could not help himself. He kissed her, long and slow, wishing he was in a time and place where he could bury his body inside hers, and take her-in the sea, on the beach of the atoll-and watch her body, straining and naked beneath his, in sunlight.

He got hard. Jenny sighed against his mouth and deliberately swiped her hand over him. It took all his strength not to groan in pleasure, or do something even more embarra.s.sing. Like f.u.c.k her in front of the men standing on the boat.

Jenny said, "I think I heard that."

Perrin cleared his throat. "When this is over-"

He stopped, unable to finish that sentence. When this was over, he might be dead. Both of them, dead. But if he wasn't . . . if they weren't. . .

Jenny grazed her fingers over his mouth, her eyes dark with understanding. "Tell me what to do."

Perrin captured her hand, kissing her palm. Unable to keep from noticing the tremor that raced through her. He wanted to pretend it was because of his touch, but the longer he looked at her, the more he sensed a wildness. Like some small part of her was ready to bolt.

"When I was first chosen to be a candidate," he said carefully, "I was forced to learn a series of meditations in an effort to prepare me for having another mind residing within mine. We don't have time for that, and besides, it seems that you've merged quite well already."

"I think the . . . bond . . . between us helped," she replied, and again, he sensed her trepidation in his mind. "The kra'a already knew me."

Such dreams, whispered that dry voice, and Jenny closed her eyes.

Perrin said, "I heard it speak."

"Good," she mumbled. "That should help."

"The key," he went on, uneasy, "is in your mind, what you feed the kra'a. A Kraken must be soothed, and that can't happen with violent thoughts. Its dreams must be quiet and gentle. You must lull the beast."

"We're being watched," she said.

"Ignore it," he replied, wondering if it was A'lesander or that strange cult that had gathered. This place wasn't safe-but then, in the sea, there was no such thing as safety.

They had to be in the water for this. At least no one would be able to ambush them from below or behind. Just to the sides and from under the fishing boat, where Sajeev and his uncanny senses-and impossible aim-stood guard with his sniper rifle.

"Dreams," he continued. "The Kraken sleeps because of dreams."

Jenny began shivering. "Peaceful dreams. Okay."

Perrin frowned, gripping her arms, then her face. He reached around to touch the kra'a, and was slammed with an overwhelming wave of uncertainty and fear.

I can't do this, he heard Jenny think.

"You can," he told her.

"Just take the d.a.m.n thing," she snapped, trying to pull away from him. Perrin refused to let go and drew her tight against his chest, nearly losing his footing and sinking them both.

"We talked about this," he said urgently. "The kra'a doesn't makes mistakes when it chooses a host. It picked you. You, Jenny. Never mind the link between us. It wanted you. It rejected A'lesander when he tried to steal it, just as it has rejected many others over the last seven hundred years. But it sees in you the strength that's required. And so do I."

Jenny dragged in a deep breath. "I think you're wrong."

"And I think you don't have a choice." Perrin focused on the kra'a, which wasn't in his mind, though he felt it close, in hers. Can't you help her?

Open your mind, it replied. Show her what she needs to understand.

Open his mind. Open himself so she could see all the ugliness inside him.

If Jenny was disgusted afterward, if she hated him, the bond would not dissolve. She was stuck with him. Neither would be able to venture far without being pulled back to the other's side. Cage or bliss. A bond like theirs did not require love, though it usually led to such. Or for others, he had been told, a need so profound that it masked as love.

Perrin knew better, with her. No masks for what he felt. He had loved Jenny before he even realized what love was, or need.

He had taken the punishment for that. Would do so again, in a heartbeat.

Perrin heard a splash behind them. Rik surfaced a moment later, golden light streaming from his eyes. His jaw was set, earlier smiles gone. Cold now, faintly mocking-perhaps to hide a split-second glint of uneasiness.

"I'll watch the waters," he said, and without another word, sank below the surface. Golden light shimmered beneath, and seconds later a dolphin appeared, sleek and blue-gray. Rik dove again out of sight.

Jenny didn't seem to notice. Her eyes were closed.

"You can trust me," she said to him, quiet. "I won't judge."

She had heard the kra'a, realized Perrin-and felt like a fool for forgetting that she would. He was not a Guardian any longer. He was not a host. Just an exile with a hole in his head and a bond that allowed him to share a part of what he had lost.

Not just a part, said the kra'a. We are together.

Together, he replied, and inside his head he heard Jenny whisper, You lost nothing.

"Jenny," he said.

"I'll show you mine, if you show me yours," she said, floating close against his body, burying her face in his throat as though she couldn't stand the sunlight. "I don't know what to do and we don't have time. Words won't be enough."

Perrin hesitated. Jenny said, "Please."

Please, no, he remembered saying once, eight years ago. Please, no.