Vampire in Atlantis

Daniel’s exposed wrists, and then she raised her face to the sky.
    “Element of air, we offer you our breath and ask that you heed our call.” She blew out a long, soft breath, and was pleased when Daniel immediately did the same.
    “Element of water, we offer our own, and ask that you heed our call.” She closed her eyes and thought of the sisters she had lost, and her tears fell freely to the ground.
    “Element of fire, we offer you the heat from our bodies, and ask that you heed our call.” She shivered as a chill wind wrapped around them, soaking up their body heat and then whisking it away.
    Shivering hard, she was barely able to speak the last sentence without her teeth chattering. “Element of earth, we offer you the life force of our own bodies, and ask that you heed our call.” She nodded, and Daniel bit his wrist and turned his hand, still holding hers, so that a few drops of blood fell onto the ground.
    A profound silence fell, as if even nature herself were holding her breath, and then a spiraling wave of pure golden light danced through the opening of the cave and surrounded them, at first wrapping itself around their bodies in a gentle caress and then clamping on to them like a giant’s grip. The world expanded and contracted in time with Serai’s pulse, and she closed her eyes, only to see that the vortex had entered her mind.
    Daniel was working hard at remaining calm, but the vortex magic was more powerful than anything he’d ever encountered, and it seemed to be trying to swallow them whole. He fought against it as it tried to consume him, tried to swallow his mage powers whole and spit him back out as a hollow shell of a man. Serai’s grip on his hands was unbreakable and he didn’t know what she’d done or how to save her.
    He’d promised to save her, and now he was already failing. No. Not again.
    “Not again,” he shouted, and her eyes flew open.
    She stared at him from eyes gone fully dark blue, again, and he was afraid the magic had already swallowed hers, but her voice, when she spoke, was still her own.
    “Daniel, it’s fine. Trust me. Open yourself to the magic, and to me. Open yourself to the power of the soul-meld and we will be stronger than even this ancient vortex magic. You have to trust me.”
    He looked into her incredibly dangerous, insanely beautiful eyes, and he realized he did.
    He trusted her.
    He’d gladly and willingly step into the sun for her and with her.
    “Yes,” he said, and he opened his soul to the magic.
    It took him down with a knockout punch, funneling into him like a whirlpool of hot, bright, old—so very old—power.
    “Daniel, trust me,” she said again, and he leaned forward to kiss her, because she was the only thing that had ever made sense in his entire long, hideous, immortal life. He kissed her because he had to kiss her; because kissing her was his only reason for living.
    She kissed him back, and the power exploded through them, between them, roared its way into every dark place in his heart and soul and purified them as it bound them together even more tightly than they had been before. He laughed and she cried and then they both laughed while the power soared through them, amplifying their emotions, intensifying their magics, and expanding their understanding of the universe.
    When she finally nodded, he closed his mind to the onslaught, and the vortex energy gracefully surrendered, not a ravaging conqueror after all, but a healer, a magician, a wizard come to play and depart. A lifetime encapsulated into a handful of minutes, and he would never, ever be the same.
    He looked at Serai, and her eyes were pure, glowing blue fire.
    “Your eyes,” they said simultaneously, and she laughed and touched his face with her hand.
    “Your eyes are glowing like sea sapphires,” she said, awed. “But where did the red go?”
    “Yours are glowing, too, mi amara , and I am in awe of your beauty.”
    She kissed him again, and this time the kiss was more than just a kiss, since the magic in each of them resonated, one with the other, and he could feel what she felt, even as the Emperor itself decided to join in the fun and send a bolt of its power driving through Serai.
    “The women—your sisters,” he said. “I can feel them.”
    “Yes. Yes!” She tightened her grasp on his hands and concentrated, hard. He could feel her focus, and together they somehow channeled a beam of pure energy across the land, down through the ocean’s