Soulbound

37. Dani

“You are as radiant as the sun,” I tease, my eyes tracing the veins of blue fire that simmered beneath her unmarked skin. Where were her tattoos?

I take a closer look at the redhead and, although she looks relatively unchanged from the moment she waltzed through Café Roasted's door and enchanted me, I notice for the first time how innocent she seems now. Like the shadows of the world haven't swallowed her whole just yet. Did this version of Ashe ever exist, or am I dreaming of the person I so desperately want her to be?

“Aye,” she chuckles, her tone so carefree it melts my heart. “You have a power over me, farm girl. You set my soul aflame.”

I rest my head under her chin, pressing an ear to her chest as I soak up her warmth. “I wonder if your heart burns just as brightly.”

Ashe's smile is unwavering as she whispers, “Always, for you.”

We lay like that awhile, the dull chirping of crickets in the surrounding woods serenading us as Ashe continues to stroke my hair, and I find myself wishing that this moment would never end. But a heaviness swirled in my gut the longer we stayed, something that had been weighing on my mind but that I'd been too afraid to say. It was something that would shatter this peace that I've grown so fond of over the last few years.

“God spoke to me yesternight.” I can feel her breath hitch in her throat and her fingers falter as Ashe cranes her neck to look at me. I let a sigh whistle from my nose and prop myself up on my elbows. “In a dream. He wants me to fight for France, to liberate our people and reinstate our rightful king to the throne.”

That wasn't what I expected. But nothing about this dream had been normal so far, and it was so rare that I didn't dream up a nightmare. I wanted to enjoy this moment while it lasted.

Ashe groans and tilts her head back. “Then let Him fight in this war. The battlefield is no place for a woman, Jeanne!”

Jeanne? Oh my God, am I dreaming that I'm Joan of Arc? What the hell did Catalina have me smoke earlier!

But this felt all too real to be a dream. It was like I was picking out fragments of a memory in the middle of a fog, some parts were lucid and others were tinted by an ethereal haze. I felt what Jeanne felt, I knew things that I couldn't possibly know outside of this reality. Was this another vision, like what I had about Rose? Was I seeing Ashe's past—or mine from another life?

No, that's insane. This is just a silly dream! A strange, hookah-induced dream fueled by illegal substances and maybe one too many episodes of Little House on the Prairie. I really need to watch less television.

Ashe shifts uncomfortably in the silence that settled between us. “You know how much I detest violence.”

“As do I, but it is just as wrong to simply stand by while innocent lives are taken. Not while I can do something to change it!”

“Damn your visions!” She inhales sharply as I push myself off of her, but she does not allow the distance between us to linger for long. “Stay here,” she begs, her hands finding mine as she sits herself up. “Please? Stay with me. We can live on the farm, far away from the fighting. Let these men wage their wars but at least we'd be safe! At least we'd be together.”

“You speak of such sweet things while not far from here the English are driving our people from their very homes! How long must we wait before they are on our own doorstep?” I clench my teeth, trying to bite back the words but they spill out of me all the same. “I never would have thought you to be a coward.”

“If it is cowardly to want to keep you from certain death then yes, I am a coward! I am not ashamed of wanting to choose my life!” She places her hands on either side of my face and leans her forehead against mine. “Or yours.”