Page 1 of Carnal: The Beast Who Loved Me

PROLOGUE

FromA Tale of Two Kingdome, Book 6, Knights of Black Swan

Thursday night Storm and Litha carried on a silent conversation at dinner while Rosie intermittently pushed food around her plate. She hadn’t really expected that Glen would respond to her ultimatum and, perhaps on some deep core level she might have known she wouldn’t have respected him if he had.

In some ways, having been born with her parents’ education and memories, Rosie was both knowledgeable and wise. In some ways though, she was as immature and inexperienced in how to manage life in the world as any twenty-year-old. She was too proud to admit that she’d made a mistake by proclaiming a high stakes, winner-take-all tug of war with Glen overhiscareer choice, and didn’t know how to admit that she’d been wrong and back away from her actions, so she’d determined that she was going to dig herself further into the sinkhole.

Rosie put the fork down and sat back. She looked between the two other people at the table, closer to the physical age of peers than parents. Her eyes flicked to the clock one more time.

“I have something to tell you. I need to go away for a little bit.”

“What do you mean ‘away’?” Storm hadn’t wasted any time slipping comfortably into the role of father and nothing about the unusual character of their situation seemed to deter him.

“I mean I’m going to take a break from what I’m doing.”

Storm choked out a laugh. “Take a break from what you’re doing? And what is that? You aren’t doing anything.”

“Storm!” Litha’s tone was full of reproof.

“Well, it’s true, isn’t it?”

Litha stared at him, angry because she was afraid he was hurting Rosie’s feelings and wanting very badly to be able to argue the point. The fact that he was right didn’t make him more endearing at that moment. Sometimes being consistently right was his most infuriating quality. This was one of those times.

Oddly they really had never gotten around to discussing what Rosie mightdowith her time. In the beginning every day of her existence was a new miracle, right up until those daily miracles were overshadowed by a missing father and a look-alike under house arrest. While everybody was thinking in terms of hour to hour, everybody forgot to talk to Rosie about what she intended to do with her splendid array of abilities and inconceivable list of possibilities.

Rosie wasn’t accustomed to the challenging accusation of paternal disappointment and had flushed pink in the face, either from anger or embarrassment or humiliation. It was impossible to tell.

Storm narrowed his eyes. “Does this have something to do with Glen?”

Rosie’s eyes jerked to Storm’s so quickly that she might as well have shouted yes. “Glen is no longer part of the picture where I’m concerned. Anyway, as I was saying, I’m going to be gone for a while. You’re not to worry.” She looked at Litha. “If there’s an emergency, Lally will be able to find me.”

She kissed Litha on the cheek and gave her a hug. Litha looked a little stunned, but patted her forearm and stroked her hair once, twice. Rosie approached her dad, who sat stiffly. She bent to kiss his cheek and hug him in the same manner. When she put her arms around his shoulders, he melted. He pushed back the chair, stood and put his arms around her.

“Do I need to kick his ass?”

She put her arms around his waist and shook her head. With her cheek against his chest, she said, “No. You went right to the heart of the problem. All I want to do is be with Glen and I tried to force him to feel the same way about me. Maybe, if I spend a little time away… Maybe I need to think about doing something myself. I love you, Dad.”

“I love you, Rosie.”

And she was gone.

As Storm’s empty arms dropped to his sides his mind presented him with a snapshot it had taken on a day when he’d been fourteen years old. He was in the car with Sol, pulling away from his parents’ house. They stood together in the shallow front yard holding hands and watched him drive away. His limited post-pubescent understanding had registered the look on his mother’s face as sadness, the sort that would be forgotten by the time she reached the kitchen and started thinking about what to make for dinner.

Now he knew that look wasn’t something so inconsequential as sadness. It was the face of loss as devastating as the discovery of a missing limb. He made a vow to himself that he would replace the years his mother lost with time and attention. Never too late.

He turned to Litha as his mind replayed part of the earlier conversation. “Who’s Lally?”

Rosie had waited longer than usual on a tabletop boulder on a windswept mountaintop of Prescient Dimension where she went when she needed to contact Kellareal. She spent the time rehearsing how she was going to explain that she wanted a change of environment, where she could take a break from her life and rethink the direction of things.

She knew she’d pushed things too far with Glen, but she also believed that, despite her feelings and desires to the contrary, the relationship wasn’t serious and wasn’t going to be. Not for a while. He’d made his decision. He was going wherever Z Team went and at least she had enough pride to know she wasn’t going to follow along like a camp whore. Even if he’d let her. Which he probably wouldn’t.

So she’d take a lesson from that and maybe look for a little adventure of her own while she was young.While she was young.

The breeze that blew her wild hair back from her face grew a little softer. Kellareal appeared to float down from the sky wearing a long white robe that billowed around him, arms outstretched as if inviting embrace, and landed in front of her soundlessly. She knew he would want to be congratulated on the theatrical entrance, so she clapped.

He bowed.

“Lally. How long do you think I’m going to live?”

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