Dark Miracle

Szeren replaced the ancient blade carefully in its scabbard then fell to his knees, bleeding, in pain, and heartsick with worry. Where was Rhys? He reached out with his mind and found him, thank all the gods, though Szeren couldn't determine exactly where he was or even his location in relation to the cavern. Weak from blood loss, Szeren had no choice but to shut down parts of his body. He sent a frantic call for aid to Aidan before slumping to the cavern floor, the two swords clenched in his hands.

****

Rhys came aware in a small room, his abdomen feeling very warm and tingly as something rubbed it very soothingly. A wonderful, delicious aroma drifted about his head, teasing his nose with the various scents of lavender, orchid, meadowsweet, and aloe. Rhys smiled, as it had to be Szeren touching him so gently, treating him so sweetly. He opened his eyes expecting to see his handsome blond lifemate, and instead was greeted by the sight of a wholly unfamiliar male, a stranger, who actually wasn't all that strange, because he engendered a feeling in Rhys that he immediately recognized. Rhys's eyebrows shot up in understanding.

"It's you!" he said, sitting up quickly and then wincing as something in his belly pulled uncomfortably.

The male offered him a tight smile. "Yes, it's me. How are you feeling?"

"My stomach hurts."

"I imagine it will for a while. You took four feet of steel through it."

"So... you're the one who's been watching me for..."

The male sighed. "All your life, Rhys."

Rhys frowned. "I don't understand."

The male held out a wooden cup with what looked like water in it. "Here, drink this."

Rhys took it and was drinking it before he realized that he probably shouldn't just be doing whatever this stranger told him to do. He didn't know the man, didn't know anything about him, and he had been basically kidnapped, after all. But whatever the liquid was, it made the twinge in his gut go away, and helped his headache, too. Rhys sighed, and took another swallow. He eyed the man.

His exact same height and build, the male had hair that was, well, exactly the same color as Rhys's hair. In fact, were they to stand side by side, it would be incredibly difficult to tell them apart from behind. As far as Rhys could tell, they had only two features that were radically different: their eyes and their ears. Rhys had his mother's eyes, deep beautiful blue eyes that Szeren spent a great deal of time staring into, while this man's eyes were truly alien. Aside from the vertical, diamond-shaped pupil that seemed twice as large as a human's, his iris was striped: bright, luminous green with bands of brilliant yellow. His ears, though, brought Rhys's thoughts to a standstill. They were pointed. Not like Spock, but like... an elf.

"Are you... an elf?" Rhys asked.

The man smiled his tight little smile again. "I hate that word. No. We are not...elves. Elves are stupid little gits who wear funny shoes and make toys for a fat man at Christmas." He brushed his long hair back so that Rhys could clearly see both of his long, tapering, pointed ears and sat down next to the cot that Rhys was lounging on.

"We are the Danae, Rhys, or the Hidden Folk. Any other names are just made up by the humans as stories to entertain their children. The Danae are nature deities, and we are almost all gone. Almost," he breathed, reaching out and stroking Rhys face. "I am... so proud of you. You have grown to be so beautiful. So strong. I admit I was not entirely thrilled that you turned out to be the lifemate of a Carpathian male, but at least he will keep you safe. They are a ferocious species if a little... misguided."

Rhys stared at the man... the Danae. "Are you..."

He couldn't bring himself to ask the question.

"Your father. Yes. But I expect it would be difficult for you to call me that. You may call me Tamarisk, or Risk, for short."

Rhys just stared at him for a long moment. He didn't look a day older than Rhys, and certainly not old enough to have fathered a teenager. The male laughed.

"Trust me; you do not want to know my true age. It would just upset you. Now," he moved to help Rhys sit up. "I imagine you'll be wanting to return to your mate, as he's in need of some healing himself, and he's dispatched that vampire he was toying with when I removed you to heal you."

"Yes!" Rhys said, feeling at that moment Szeren touch his mind, frantic with worry for him. Risk was right; Szeren was badly injured. Rhys turned desperate eyes to his father. "Please! I don't know how to heal yet! Help me!"

"Be of ease, young one," Risk said, face calm. "I would never allow the mate of my own to suffer." He drew forth another wooden cup full of the clear liquid. "Give him this to drink. He will refuse it initially as Carpathians drink nothing but the elixir of life, but reassure him that it's a potion, not water or a beverage. Worry not, he will be fine. Another of his kind comes even now to give aid. I will return you to the hollow hill so that you will be there when he arrives."

"But how will I find you again?" Rhys asked. He had so many questions he wanted to ask, so many things he wanted to talk to his father about.

This time, Risk's smile was wide and genuine. "Come here to the sithen. This is my place, the only place I can cross over to this world now on this continent. Come here and think of me, and call my full name three times. I will come."

Rhys took up the cup and surprised them both by embracing the male. Risk melted in Rhys's arms, relaxing totally into the touch.

"You honor me," Risk whispered. "You could have hated me for abandoning you and your mother, yet you embrace me as a friend. You are a pure soul, Rhys Rasmus, Beloved Fire of Szeren."

"I'll be back," Rhys promised. He stepped away, cup in hand, and let his father guide him to one of the trees. With a sweep of his hand, the form of the tree seemed to waiver, and Rhys took a deep breath, then stepped straight into it.

He emerged back in the cavern to see Szeren lying on the cavern floor in a pool of blood. He was neither bleeding anymore, nor breathing, and Rhys panicked. Just as he was about to begin CPR, Aidan strode in.

Shedding his physical form and becoming pure, healing light, Aidan entered Szeren's body and repaired the damage done by Mirek's blade. When he was done, Szeren took a great, gasping breath, his eyelids fluttering open. Rhys was right there with the cup, urging him to drink, telling him it was a healing potion. Aidan watched, curious, as sure enough, the liquid in the cup finished what Aidan started. The males recounted the tale of what happened as they left the hollow hill, though Rhys kept his meeting with his father between he and Szeren, telling Aidan only that he'd fallen into a trap and had to free himself before he could come to Szeren's aid. Szeren was flatly astonished to learn he had mated one of the last of the Danae, the actual fey folk. He just kept staring at Rhys with a look of wonder and awe on his face.

"So now that you have the sword back, are you going to return to San Francisco to live?" Aidan asked. They were walking under the dark sky in the cold, crisp night air, drawing it into their lungs greedily.

Szeren and Rhys looked at each other. "We'll be stopping in San Francisco," Rhys said, a grin on his face. "Szeren has to meet my mother."

Aidan laughed. "Oh, that should be fun. I'd like to be a fly on the wall for that."

Szeren grumbled. "Is there something I should know about your mother?"

Rhys snaked an arm around his waist. "Not at all. She's going to love you. Even if you do look about 15 years older than me. I'll just tell her I married you for your money and you married me for my ass."

Aidan choked, and tripped, as Rhys laughed and Szeren scowled. "Not funny."

Aidan got his breath back. "I thought it wasvery funny," he said, gasping.

"After Szeren escapes my mom, he's going to take me on a real honeymoon. You know, without swordfights and vampires."

Aidan laughed again. "And well deserved it is, too."

"I want to see his home in New Zealand," Rhys said, gazing into Szeren's amazing eyes.

"Home is where ever you are,ainaak enyem," Szeren said, drawing him in for a kiss.

"I'm going to get back to Alexandria. She'll be worried until I'm home."

"Thank you for coming to help us, Aidan," Rhys said, sincerity in his voice.

"Anytime, Rhys."

Shifting to mist, the legendary hunter flowed through the night leaving Szeren and Rhys alone.

"So, Mr. Kizevicius, what should we do now?" Rhys asked, one hand tucked in the front of Szeren's pants.

"You had a sword through your belly not 60 minutes ago,sivamet," Szeren said, seriously. "I do not want to hurt you."

Rhys leaned in and feathered his lips gently over Szeren's. "I have every faith that we can make love without hurting each other. Take me home, husband."

"As you wish, husband."

****

The next night, Halloween, the two men prepared for the Carpathian's masquerade ball. Szeren looked amazing dressed in a suit of ceremonial plate mail armor his father created in the fifteenth century. Rhys was astonished at the amount of work it took actually getting into the thing, not to mention how heavy it all was, and he understood why a squire was required to assist a knight. Nobody would've been able to put a suit of armor on by himself!

Szeren wore a lovely handsewn doublet of soft cotton padding that went over bare skin, then the mail shirt. Rhys got to help him dress from the feet up: sabatons, cuisses, greaves, the breast and backplates, or cuirass, couter and pauldron, vambraces, gauntlets, his sword, and last, his helmet. Rhys couldn't believe real people - humans - actually wore this stuff and fought in it at one time. It seemed impossible. Szeren could regulate his body temperature, turn to mist and streak out of the suit if it got to be too unbearable. A human would be stuck in it until somebody helped them remove it. And heaven forbid they have to use the bathroom!

Rhys decided to make a bit of joke, and went as a fey prince, complete with pointed ears and great, sweeping wings. He wore satin tights and a velvet doublet, and brushed his hair until it shone. The makeup might've been a little much, but it made his eyes look huge, and much bluer than they did without it, and besides, when else was he going to get a chance to wear glitter all over his cheeks and in his hair? Rhys knew it was silly, but the look on Szeren's face when he walked down the stairs, the lights sparkling off the glitter on his wings and hair and across his forehead made it all worth it.

They took Aidan's Bugatti to the inn, simply because Rhys liked to drive it, and because Szeren couldn't shapeshift wearing 150 pounds of steel. He smelled like a piece of steel wool and clanked when he walked, but Rhys wasn't going to complain, not when Szeren looked at him like he was the center of the entire universe. As they stood in the doorway of the inn, conversation ground to a halt as they earned a solid stare from everybody in the main room.

Then the party seemed to start back up, and they walked inside, heading over to where Aidan and Alexandria stood, dressed as Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf, in leather and chains, no less.

"You two look amazing!" Alexandria exclaimed.

"So do you," Rhys said, smiling, as he looked around at the party and the guests. "Although I kind of thought Halloween in the Carpathian Mountains would be a bit scarier."

Szeren was shaking his head as he took his helmet off to Aidan's accompanying laughter. "Because getting attacked by one master vampire wasn't scary enough for you?" Aidan asked, one eyebrow raised.

"You know, fear wasn't even a part of Halloween until recently," Szeren said. "Originally, the holiday was about getting rid of weakness."

Rhys scrunched up his nose and even Alexandria looked a bit perplexed.

"Sorry tin man, you lost us," Rhys said.

"You'll have to give us poor 'Mericans a history lesson, Szeren," Alexandria said, laughing and bumping Rhys with her hip.

"The mythology of Samhain was that it was the time of year when there was a crack in the wheel of the year - a time that didn't belong to either the old year or the new year - so it was a great time to get rid of weaknesses. Kind of like throwing junk into a void. Since there's no distinction between years and no distinction between worlds, spirits and entities were free to cross the non-existent boundaries. Anytime there are spirits wandering around there's fear, and so suddenly Samhain stopped being about getting rid of weaknesses and started being about appeasing those wandering spirits."

Aidan nods. "He's absolutely correct. Samhain was the end of the light year and the beginning of the dark year. Anything that wasn't strong enough to survive the dark was traditionally sacrificed. We keep the tradition alive to a certain extent with the well."

Pointing across the room, he indicated what looked very much like an old-fashioned wishing well set up by the inn's buffet table. Decorated with autumn flowers, pine cones, small pumpkins, and other Halloween decorations, the small table next to the well held little pieces of parchment and pens. Alex grinned madly and tugged on Aidan's leather jacket.

"So what are the paper and pens for?"

"You're supposed to write down whatever weakness you want to get rid of this year, and drop it down the well, my love."

Alex's mouth dropped open. She stared at Aidan, then at the well, then back at Adian, then at the well again.

"That's... AWESOME!" she crowed. She dashed to the well and started scribbling on parchment. Aidan sighed.

"Alex," he called, walking toward her, "Sweetheart... you're supposed to be writing downyour own weaknesses. Not everybody else's."

She smiled sweetly at him. "I am writing down mine. And yours. You can just sign them."

Aidan sighed.

Rhys was working hard not to burst out laughing. He went up to the table, took a piece of parchment and a pen, wrote a quick note, and dropped it into the well. When he returned to Szeren, his knight wrapped him in strong arms, feathering his lips over his jaw.

"What weakness do you think you need to get rid of?" Szeren asked. He nuzzled Rhys's newly pointed ear. "I happen to think you're perfect."

Rhys smiled and shook his head. "That's between me and the ghosts."

"Are there ghosts here?"

Rhys quirked an eyebrow. "You can't see them?"

Szeren laughed. "Such a comedian."

Rhys frowned. "No. Really." He looked at Alexandria. "You can't seem them either? None of you? Carpathians don't see... spirits?"

All of the Carpathians turned and looked at Szeren's lifemate, including Szeren, who pulled him closer. "You truly see spirits here... in this room?"

"Yes. I've... seen them since you converted me. I thought... I thought it was something we could all do."

Szeren stared at him. Then started laughing. Then he kissed him full on the mouth, right in front of them all. "You're just full of surprises, mate of mine."

As the party continued, as Szeren held him and they danced beside Aidan and Alex, Rhys watched the spirits float and twirl, spinning among the living in joyous parody. A line from e.e.cummings bubbled up into his memory, and he grabbed it, whispering it in Szeren's ear as his mate stroked one tender hand down his hip.

"We are a miracle that will never happen again."

"I don't know about that, my fiery fey boy. I think our miracle will happen several times a night. At least until I meet your mother..."

Rhys would've smacked his ass, but it was encased in steel. He settled for sending a very graphic image of what he intended to do to Szeren when the armor was gone after the party. Szeren groaned.

"Wicked Danae, you should feel what you're doing to me."

Rhys just smiled. Every now and then he'd catch one of the unmated males staring at them with a hard, blank look. Before he could get worried, though, a semi-translucent spirit would hover and obscure his view. He stared up at Szeren.

"So, in ancient times, when you celebrated Samhain and got rid of weaknesses, what happened when the ritual was over? When it wasn't Halloween anymore?"

Szeren frowned. Rhys tried to be clearer with his question. "I mean, what happened when the weaknesses were gone? When the sun came up the next morning?"

Szeren nodded. "Ah, I see. Well, for humans Samhain marked the end of summer and the beginning of winter, but for Carpathians, it was the time to celebrate the beginning of the dark portion of the year. So for us, Samhain was a celebration of the best part of the year: the longest nights, the darkest days. It still is, really, that's why we have this masquerade. It's the first party they'll have in a long line of holiday celebrations. You'll see." He nuzzled Rhys's neck. "We'll attend them all if you want. If you don't want, we'll do something else. Whatever you feel like. You know..."

"Miraculous things?" Rhys teased.

Szeren looked at him with such love in his eyes that Rhys's breath caught. Without another word, the two threaded their way through the dancers to the door and slipped out into the chill of the night. The time had come to return home, to remove the costumes, clean off the makeup, and again be skin to skin. The pair could think of no better way to celebrate to beginning of the Dark Year than to join once more as lifemates, merging minds and bodies, heart to heart, soul to soul.

Because tonight was Halloween, when the boundaries between worlds were thin enough that spirits walked the earth, and Rhys was right, Szeren thought.

They were a miracle that might never happen again.

Let the spirits watch.

The End

A Note From the Author: As a longtime fan and admirer of Christine Feehan's "Dark" Series, I've enjoyed the adventures, trials, and agonies as her Carpathian males have struggled through the darkness shrouding their souls to find their lifemates. The wonderful richness of her world, the fantastic tapestry she weaves into each tale of love, longing, and loss makes the inevitably taking of the female (for every lifemate is an innocent, virginal female) that much headier, and I've eagerly lapped up every book she's written. It was not my intention with this story to bash her, insult her, or in any way "parody" her or her characters. On the contrary, I feel as though she left something out, and maybe it wasn't her fault. Maybe she just wasn't brave enough to write it, or her editors weren't brave enough to let her, and I understand that. Even though we've come leaps and bounds forward in what we as a culture accept today, we are still not nearly as accepting as we should be about what love is, and what it can mean. This story was meant to be, first, a logical extension of her world - a logical leap of what really would happen if an evil mage started tampering with biological imperatives. Life will always find a way, as it has for thousands of years. Second, the story was meant to show that pure love, soul-binding love, exists across cultures, races, species, and time, and can certainly exist across something as insignificant as gender. I thank you for reading "Dark Miracle" and I hope you enjoyed it. You can find all 21 of the "Dark" Series by Christine Feehan, including the newest release, "Dark Peril" at your local library or bookstores; I highly recommend them. For male/male erotica of the vampiric nature, try starting with "Midnight Hunger," a delicious compilation of short stories guaranteed to get to your blood. Happy Halloween, and a Blessed Samhain to you all! Please don't forget to cast your votes in the Halloween Story Contest!

Wicked - Halloween 2010