The Portal 00 - Legacy of the Witch

of the night.
    “I know a cave where you can hide,” he
said. “I’ll bring you food, blankets, but you’ll be safely out of
sight.”
    “I don’t want to leave them,” I insisted,
turning back. I heard the raised voices of the soldiers and the cry of one
of the women I adored, and I lunged as if to go back, but Harmon held
me.
    “It won’t do them any good. You can’t
fight an army. You’ll only suffer, too, and your beloved ladies will suffer
more because of it. They want you safe. Give them that gift.”
    Tears were streaming down both my cheeks,
but I saw the wisdom of his words.
    “If they are arrested, I’ll get you in to
see them. I promise you I will.”
    I looked into his eyes, and I knew he was
telling the truth. “All right,” I said. “I trust you, Harmon.”
    “Good. Let’s go, then.” He tugged my hand
and led me away from the oasis that was our city, into the desert, up into
the craggy foothills that were the farthest-reaching fingertip of the
distant mountains. And there he led the way into a cave. Vast, cool—cold
even—and dark as pitch.
    I hugged my arms and shivered.
    “I don’t want to leave you here,” he said.
Then he wrapped his arms around me and held me close to him, warming me with
his body. “I promise I won’t be gone long. I’ll return with a lamp,
blankets, food and water. It might take an hour or more, but…here.” He took
off his cloak, draping it around my shoulders. “Be still, and promise me you
will not return to the city. Wait for me right here, all right?”
    “Yes.”
    “Promise?”
    “I promise.”
    Nodding, he turned to go, but I caught his
shoulder. “Will you check on them? Tell me what is happening?”
    “I will,” he said.
    “And…and…”
    He tipped his head sideways. “And
what?”
    I lowered my eyes. “And…before you leave,
will you kiss me again?”I should have felt guilty, I supposed. He was
promised to another, after all. But I didn’t. They’d never even met, and I
knew his heart belonged to me.
    He smiled, catching my chin on his
forefinger and tipping my head up. “And again when I return,” he
promised.
    And then he kissed me, and I tried to take
comfort in it, even though my blissful existence was, I thought, coming to
an end. As, I feared, were the lives of the women I loved most in all the
world.
    “This doesn’t look good,” Harrison said.
    His voice snapped me out of my fantasy, and I looked at the
house in front of us, realizing the Jeep was sitting still. There was a police
car in the driveway of the little Cape Cod, its lights flashing. The front door
stood open, and light spilled from inside.
    He opened his door, glanced down at me, and when I looked in
his eyes I knew for sure they were the same eyes I’d seen in the fantasy, the
memory, that illusion…. He was the same boy, just grown-up. And I was the same
girl. Slave girl to the slave girls.
    “I—I’ll stay here,” I said, thinking his feelings for his ex
were none of my business. And yet they were. He belonged with me.
    He nodded but gave a look around. “Lock the door. Blow the horn
if you see anyone, okay?”
    “Okay.”
    He closed his door. I pushed the locks down and watched
intently.
    I saw the blonde woman appear in the doorway, fling her arms
around his neck and bury her face in his chest. My belly tightened. And then a
man stepped up behind her, and she stepped away from my soldier and into the other man’s embrace, even as he reached
around her to shake Harrison’s hand. The two police officers spoke to Harrison
briefly, and then, after a final word with the blonde, he returned to the
Jeep.
    I unlocked his door to let him in.
    “They were here. And they got the box,” he said.
    “Oh, no!”
    He backed out the driveway and started driving back the way
we’d come. “Who was the man with your ex?”
    “Her husband.”
    I blinked.
    “They fell in love while I was overseas.”
    “That must have been devastating for you.”
    He looked at me. “Oddly, it felt more like relief.” Then, with
a glance at my eyes, he added, “I’m starting to think maybe it was for the best.
I’d have hated like hell to have met you and been married to someone else.” He
quickly looked back at the road. “That was probably way out of line.”
    “No, it wasn’t,” I said, way too quickly.
    He smiled at that. “You feel it, too, then? It’s like there’s
something between us, and it almost feels like something that’s been going on
for