Mona Lisa Awakening

Chapter Three

The gentle fingers of the moon caressed Gryphon with loving care as he lay beside me, asleep, a creature so beautiful that he stopped my breath, his lovely perfection so unreal I would have doubted its true existence were I not touching him, my leg entwined with his. His arm was flung over me, chaining me to him in sleep, desiring as I desired, that skin-to-skin contact.

He was cool to the touch, cooler than I, and I didn't know if that was his normal condition or a result of the poison within him. He had seemed better than in the hospital, more rested, his strength quite evident in the soreness I now felt in my thighs, between my legs. But his trembling, in the end, had been equal parts passion and exhaustion and he had fallen deeply asleep immediately afterward. I let him sleep, knowing it was the best therapy for him, content to lie there beside him, secure in his arms, and to listen to the soft soughing of his breath and the slow beating of his heart.

It was frightening. No, terrifying, in truth, the fierce possessiveness I now felt for him. I needed this quiet period of companioned solitude to absorb the changes and revelations he had wrought with his entry into my life.

He stirred several hours later, making the transition from sleep to total awareness with one blink of his piercing eyes. His arm tightened around me, then relaxed. "I didn't dream you, did I?" he asked, pulling me closer.

"No." I breathed my soft confirmation against his shoulder where my head nestled, my heart settled and happy once more inhaled the essence of him. "You smell so good."

I felt him smile against me. "What do I smell like?"

"Like the night, the soaring wind, the verdant fields below… and of feathers." I lifted up to gaze down at him. "Why do you have soft down at the base of your neck?"

"My other form is a falcon."

"Your other form?" I tasted the strange phrase slowly, unable to prevent my voice from rising to a squeak. "You mean you can become a bird?"

Gryphon nodded, smiling as if I had amused him.

Gryphon. Gyrfalcon. A fierce bird of prey.

I could see it now in some of his features—his sharp, piercing eyes, the strong hooked blade of his nose, the wide shoulders, the long, slender fingers. Would they become talons? I wondered.

"What is your other form?" he asked.

I shook my head, dazed. Was that what it was, that wild thing caged within me that I suppressed? "I don't know."

"Do not worry. You are young. It will probably come to you later, although not all Monère possess the ability to transform into another creature." He frowned and reached up to smooth back my hair with a gentle touch. "Exactly how old are you?"

"Twenty-one years old. When did you attain your other form?"

"When I reached puberty at eighteen. But you are a Mixed Blood. Part human. It may come later for you."

"Do you know that for certain?"

He hesitated. "No. You are an entirely new entity."

"What other forms have Mixed Bloods attained?"

"None of them have had other forms, as far as I know."

"Bummer," I said with relief. I did not wish to have another form. Not if it meant unleashing that scary, restless force that had prowled within me since puberty.

"But you are an entirely new territory, to all of our kind."

"What do you mean?"

"That you are a Queen is a frank miracle in itself," Gryphon said with grave solemnity. "There has never been a Mixed Blood Queen before."

"Ever?"

"Never in our entire history since the Great Exodus from the moon."

"The moon?"

"Four millennia ago, a disaster befell our moon. The seas dried up and mountains crumbled. Monère desperately departed their dying planet. Many came to this world, carving out an existence here, all hoping that one day the moon would return to its former glory and we could return to our home."

"Where do others of your kind live?"

"We carved out colonies across the face of the earth, in the forests, amidst the deserts, on islands, along the high steppes. Most remain pure, though some have lived among the humans, but it is not easy to live in isolation among them, away from our kind."

"So just how old are you?" It had been a question that had bedeviled me since he first opened his mouth and those delightfully quaint words and phrases flowed from his lips.

Gryphon laughed, a rusty sound that twisted my heart. It made me want to entice it from him again and again until his laughter came freely with ease. "Not that old. I am only seventy-five years old."

"Seventy-five! But you don't look more than thirty."

"What are you doing?" he asked as I bent over him and combed my fingers through the long, thick strands.

"Checking for white hair," I muttered, then jerked and moaned as he nuzzled my breast and drew a nipple into the warm, wet cavern of his mouth. "Oh, no you don't. I want some answers first."

"I have no white hairs," he said, giving my pert tip one last luscious laving of his tongue before drawing away. "Seventy-five is considered young among our people. A warrior is considered mature at one hundred and seasoned at two."

"Two hundred?" I said, squeaking like a mouse again, which drew a smile from Gryphon. He watched me, pleasure alighting his eyes as I walked naked to my closet. Drawing on a robe, I returned to the bed to perch beside him.

"Our average life span is three hundred years."

"And Mixed Bloods?"

His smile faded, elusive once more. "They possess the lifespan of humans. One hundred years, mayhap."

Again I felt a mixture of emotions. Pleasure at hearing that I would likely live until a hundred—a lengthy age that few humans reached—and pain that I would not live to three hundred. I felt cheated somehow.

"Do not worry. 'Tis my belief you shall live longer than that. More Monère blood flows within you instead of human blood, and your heart beats slower than those of your human kind."

"Fifty beats per minute."

"The few Mixed Bloods I have encountered have rhythms of sixty and higher, like other humans."

"So?"

"So do you not see that the slower one's heart beats, the longer one lives? A hummingbird's heart beats more than three hundred times per minute and they live briefly, gloriously, for one year. A turtle, on the other hand, possesses a rhythm closer to mine. It is not unusual for them to see two hundred, sometimes even three hundred years of life."

"So you're saying I will live longer than most humans."

He nodded, his eyes a quicksilver flash of ebon darkness. "That is my belief."

I took his hand and lay it against my cheek, my smile bittersweet. It was all a moot point. Two hundred more years to live with him would be a lovely prospect, but a longer life would be pointless without him. An amorphous aloneness and gray solitude was all I had know up till now. I had not truly begun to live until my eyes first fastened upon him. I wondered if my new life, my life with him, would be even more fleeting than that of a hummingbird.

"How much time do you have before the poison kills you?" I asked.

"No longer than a full cycle of the moon."

Thirty days. Shit. "When did she…"

"Yesterday."

Just one day, and how weak it had made him in that short period of time.

"What is it?" he asked, his hand moving down to stroke my neck, his thumb brushing against my pulse.

"I was suddenly worried about the proper care and nourishment of my Moonie," I said, forcing a smile to my lips.

"I wonder who your parents are," Gryphon mused.

"The only thing I have from them is the silver cross you saw." Retrieving the cross, I turned it and showed him the engraving etched on the back.

"Mona Lisa," he read. "Your name."

"Yes."

I watched as his eyes narrowed. "May I?" At my consenting nod, he took it from me and held it by the chain. Very lightly, delicately, he grasped the cross and examined it more closely. There at the base was another word etched so tiny, so meticulously, that human eye could not have detected it without the air of a microscope.

"Monère," he read. Carefully, he released the cross and returned it to me, rubbing his fingers together absently where he had touched the silver.

"Where did you get this?" he asked.

"It hung upon my neck when they found me as a newborn and the name engraved on the back was the name I was given at the orphanage."

He gazed at the cross I clutched tightly in my hand and stilled into that sudden immobility, a deep stillness that was beyond human. "Your hand," he said with odd carefulness. "May I see it?"

I set the cross down and gave him my right hand. He uncurled my fingers. With reverence, he touched the mole there in the center of my palm. It was just a slight roundness, like a pearl buried halfway in my flesh. He held out his other hand and I passed my left palm into his care. He looked down upon the slight rising there, also, then gazed from one hand to the other.

"What is it?" I asked.

He did not speak for a moment. When he finally did, it was with a question of his own. "What powers do you possess?"

I shrugged. "I can see through the darkness and hear miles, around me, if I wished. My sense of smell is acute. I am fast like a cat, strong as a lion. With effort, I can control people's minds with my gaze. With my hands, I can detect ailment within the body and, to a small degree, ease some of the pain, but I have yet to obtain the ability to heal."

I waited for Gryphon to speak but he just stared down at my palms.

"Well?" I finally prompted.

He kissed each mole with careful deference and pulled me down until I lay beside him once more. " 'Tis my belief that you bear the mark of the Moon Goddess, her tears."

"The Moon Goddess? "

"Yes, a deity whom we worship. Our earliest ancestress, the mother of us all."

"And why do you say you believe? As if you're not sure," I mumbled against the hollow of his neck.

"You are most uncommon, my young Queen. We have only heard of the mark of the Goddess's tears through our lore and legends since the time of our Exodus. Those few Queens who were blessed with such marks were extraordinary healers and great warriors."

"So what happened to these blessed Queens?"

"Great gifts beget great peril. They were both blessed and cursed by their gifts."

"Sounds like a mixed review to me."

My stomach suddenly growled and I jumped. Gryphon gave that rusty laugh again and I rewarded him with a grin. "I'm starving. Do you eat? Or do you need to drink blood?"

His brows rose. "And would you offer me your lovely neck if I did?"

"Sure, if you needed it."

"Ah." He sighed, his eyes growing soft. "You are like a fresh breath of wind. No, we do not drink blood. We partake of food as humans do. Did you think me vampyre?"

"Yes," I blushed. "I craved your crimson blood the first time I saw it. I was overwhelmed with a desire to taste it. And when I did, my heart melted. It was the first time I'd ever felt such an urge."

"That is because it was the first time you have been with one of your kind. The urge to taste each other only arises between Monère lovers, never with humans. The resulting bite mark is the highest form of honor, evidence of the deepest of passion.."

"You didn't taste my blood." I touched the unbroken skin of my neck where he had pressed his teeth.

His blue eyes sparkled with simmering heat. "I restrained myself because of those who hunt me. It would be my honor and even greater pleasure to taste you and leave my mark upon you when the time is right."

I blushed. "So we're not vampires by nature. Are there such things as vampires, then?"

A bare hesitation, then, "No, there is no such creature. The vampire stories originated from those of us who can take on the form of a rat or a bat."

"How about werewolves? Are they real?"

"Again, that lore is based on those of us who can shift into wolf form. But as with the vampyre, there is a little truth and much misinformation that humans have concocted."

"Like holy objects causing you to burst into flames. What about wooden stakes through the heart and garlic cloves?"

"Myth only. Stakes through the heart… that would not kill us. Our healing body would eventually spit the wood out."

"So, what are our fata! vulnerabilities?"

"The usual ways. Cutting our hearts out. Severing our heads off. But the most painful and lingering deaths are through silver or sun poisoning."

My eyes grew round at the gruesome methods he ticked off. "The sun can kill you?"

"Most definitely. Its hot rays burn us even at its weakest hours. Does it not burn you?"

"No, I have no such problems."

"Ah," he said, pleased, as if I had confirmed something he had already suspected. "The ability to withstand the sun is not unusual for Mixed Bloods."

I swallowed. "Do you have to sleep in a coffin or in the ground?"

He kissed me, a light peck of affection. "No, a soft bed will do very well. We are nocturnal. We sleep during the daytime hours. Humans are made for the heat of the sun. We are cold-blooded creatures. The night," he glanced longingly out the window, "is our domain. The darkness, the soothing air, when the world is shrouded in serenity, and our bodies, enlightened, are infused with energy from the moon. Don't you feel that, too, when night falls and your soul awakens to the calling from above?"

"Yes, I have felt that way since my childhood, only I didn't know then what it was, what made me so different from other children."

"That must have been hard for you, not knowing what made the days dreary, the sun glaring, and your body leaden with fatigue." He stroked my hair. "Tell me more about your childhood."

"I will, later. Your well-being is what concerns my heart now. We must act to find the cure soon to stop this poisoning. Thirty days is not a long time."

He smiled and whispered in a most gentle tone, "I care not that I live another moment. I care only that I am in your arms. I feel like a camel reaching an oasis after a long trek in the dry desert. I feel as if I have lived my life, that I could close my eyes and fall asleep and rest in your presence forever."

"Don't close your eyes now." I pressed a kiss to his brow. "You are too young to die."

He looked at me quietly for a moment. "I could just stay here and use the rest of my days, however short they may be, to pass you knowledge, teach you of our kind, acquaint you with people and names that may prove useful to you as a Queen," he said gently.

He lay there in my arms and my vision was suddenly keener. more perceptive, allowing me to glimpse deep into his weary, battered, undernourished soul and see with sharp clarity what he had chosen—death. He wanted to rest, to die here in the comfort in my presence instead of fight to live. And I saw clearly that neither soft kindness nor sweet pleading would sway him from his chosen path. He needed something harsh, something stinging to wake him up; I knew this, somehow, deep in my heart. A core of hidden knowledge within me seemed to have awakened with his entry into my life.

"You call me your Queen," I said, my voice cracking like a whip, "but in your heart you do not truly mean it."

"No—" He jerked back at my sudden attack and sat up.

I ruthlessly cut off his cry of bewildered protest and continued scornfully. "You have resigned yourself to death, even welcome that final rest, for you are tired of the pain and suffering of living. You lie when you call me your Queen, for you serve no one but yourself in giving in so easily to the death waiting to claim you."

Gryphon tensed wildly beneath the lash of my words, but he was unable to deny the sting of their truth.

"You appease yourself by offering to pass me a pittance of knowledge before you die in return for the comfort and ease I give you." I smiled contemptuously. "You treat me no better than a whore if you believe I am willing and desperate enough to settle for so little in return."

"No," he choked in agonized denial, shaking his head furiously. "No, my Queen."

"I will not settle for thirty days of your half-hearted service and then allow you to leave me alone and unprotected while you go to your rest," I said harshly. "If I am truly your Queen, then I require and demand from you all that is due me from a male in my service."

I glided to him and he watched me as if mesmerized, with something new in his eyes—a touch of fear and caution.

"You are mine. Every part of you belongs to me," I said, caressing his chest just above that slow, steady beating, feeling him tremble and smiling because of it. "Your brave warrior heart, your poisoned body, your weary soul." I breathed the words against his lips as I buried my hand in his hair and gripped his scalp hard. "Your brilliant mind," I whispered and brought my lips against his in a chaste kiss. "By my right, I claim every part of you in my service, and demand and require that you desire to live with your entire breath and being, with your very heart and soul. I hold you to your duty to seek a cure for yourself and to not abandon me. You owe me two hundred and twenty-five more years of servitude and I will not be cheated with a paltry thirty days, do you understand?"

Gryphon sank to his knees before me, silent tears of shame coursing down his cheeks. "Yes, my Queen," he said, yielding all because I demanded it.

"Your oath on it."

"I swear it," he said harshly.

"Swear it by that which you hold most dear."

He lifted his eyes to me. "I swear it on milady's heart," he said, bowing his head.

I tenderly stroked Gryphon's hair, a bittersweet smile twisting my lips. I had won. For now, I had won. I had seen what weapon to use and had used it ruthlessly to achieve my own end because I did not want to be alone, because I had only just begun to truly live and did not want to see that life die in its mere infancy. I smiled bitter-sweetly because I did not know that I was any better than that other terrible Queen, Mona Sera, in her calculated cruelty and, even more frightening, I did not care.

"I will not make it so easy for you to leave me." It was a soft promise, a gentle threat.

Gryphon drew in a deep gulping breath. "No, my Queen," he whispered.