Fantasyland: Midnight Soul Part 48

I stopped dead.

I hadn't heard him in months. Even before Noc left me. Definitely not after.

She never actually existed, Antoine's voice carried on. A part you played, mon ange, beautifully. But you've quite literally taken off the costume and face paint, put on new, and are now ready for a different role. The role, to be ba.n.a.l, of a lifetime. The role of you just being...you.

I turned my head and saw myself in the mirror.

Was that me, the woman with her hair flowing unhindered, her cheeks pink with excitement (and what Valentine said in her world was fittingly called "blush"), her eyes bright with nervousness, her breaths coming fast from antic.i.p.ation?

I always loved your legs, Antoine murmured.

"Mon cur," I whispered.

Farewell, my Franka. I'd bid you be happy, but I don't need to.

"Why?" I asked.

You'll see.

Those simple words made a tickle run down my spine.

He said no more.

"Antoine?" I called.

He didn't speak to me, and in my soul I knew he never again would.

"Antoine," I whispered, feeling not-so-oddly pleased the last I heard of his voice, he sounded happy.

But mostly I felt uncertain that I was facing my greatest adventure and in doing so had long since let him go and was moving on.

That greatest adventure was not going to a parallel universe where women were referred to as infants (of a variety of species) and wore death-defying shoes.

That adventure was living life from that point on simply as me.

Franka Drakkar.

A woman p.r.o.ne to generosity (even if I had to force it on those who were stubbornly opposed to it), outgoingness and sociability.

And also a woman who was a practicing witch.

On this thought, the room filled with green.

I turned to where I sensed her joining me and Valentine appeared right there.

She c.o.c.ked her head to the side. "Ready?"

I was.

And I was not.

"How odd would I seem if I went to your new world in my own attire?" I queried.

"Nothing is odd in New Orleans," she answered. "This is one of the vast number of reasons it's the greatest city in my world...or yours."

"Then I-"

"Rubbish," she stated before I could even finish my thought, lifting her hands, the green of her magic returning.

"Valentine," I snapped.

"Come closer, ma pet.i.te sorciere."

I came closer but repeated on a sharper snap, "Valentine!"

She smiled again as I sensed the room receding and then there was nothing but her magic shrouding us.

I did not find this alarming.

What I found alarming was her smile.

It was another one I'd perfected many years ago.

And it was the one I'd indulge in when a fine bit of conniving was about to come gloriously to fruition.

"What have you done?" I demanded to know.

I got no answer.

Instead, suddenly, I had earth beneath my feet, bright lights, loud noise and movement everywhere, and I was experiencing an odor so foul, it would have turned my stomach.

It did not because it did not have my focus.

My focus was on the fact that Valentine had gone.

And right in front of me, Noc was standing.

I stared up in his extraordinary blue eyes and watched his head jerk in surprise at my abrupt appearance.

My.

He was right there.

Right there.

An inch away.

So there, I'd barely have to sway and I'd brush against him.

"Frannie," he whispered, saying the name he gave me with unhidden affection and relief.

b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l!

I was going to burst into tears.

"Noc," I forced out.

"Frannie," he repeated.

Yes. Drat it all!

I was going to start weeping within moments of starting my grand adventure!

b.l.o.o.d.y Noc.

Slowly, his lips formed one of the grins I so adored and he raised a hand. In it were long strings of s.h.i.+ny beads, gold, purple and green. He lifted them over my head and settled them around my neck.

They appeared like they'd be heavy, but as his hands moved away, leaving them behind, they were light.

Light and bright and festive.

"Welcome home," Noc said, and my eyes shot from the beads dangling down my front to Noc's. "Laissez les bon temps rouler."

How odd, he was speaking Fleuridian. He'd never done that before.

At that point, before I could ask after this, it seemed he became aware that there was more of me that had been transported, not just my face.

He leaned back an inch as his eyes traveled down my body and I watched his expression begin to change.

G.o.ds.

I had nothing against harlots. I'd fallen in love with the male variety of a harlot and had happily acted as one myself without shame.

Now, however...

"Valentine selected it," I stated quickly, referring to my attire that Noc was right then gazing at fixedly. "I can be risque but-"

"f.u.c.k," he muttered.

I went silent at the timbre in his voice.

His eyes moved, made it to my feet, and slowly, they traveled up.

Halfway to my face, it came as a growl.

"f.u.c.k."

It had been some time, but his tone was not lost on me.

In entering the period of my recent (prolonged) celibacy, I had declared I was done with that part of my life.

Of course, Noc changed all that, and if I was honest, he did it months ago.

But if he had not, he would have done it with that one word, the look on his face as he said it, and the tone with which he uttered it.

And it would seem, in but seconds, any questions (lamentations, anxieties, fears, trepidations) I had about what would become of Noc and me upon our reunion, he answered.

In one word.

Even if that word and the way he said it had answered it, what he did next really answered it.

That being the fact I suddenly had his hand at the small of my back.

It didn't press in.

It hauled me in and I was plastered against his long body.

The instant I was, his other hand dove in my hair, tangling and gripping.

There was no pain at his touch. Thus the gasp that came from my mouth and drifted across his descending lips was indication of an altogether different feeling.

I closed my eyes after his lips crushed down on mine.

It was not instinct but instead a driving need that made me lift my hands and filter my fingers in his thick, soft hair to hold him to me.

And it was not generosity but pure greed that made me open my mouth to invite him inside.

He accepted the invitation with a low snarl down my throat, his head slanting, his hand at the small of my back gliding around and curving at my hip so he could hold me closer to him, all as he deepened the kiss.

He tasted good. Fresh and warm and spicy.

He smelled good, all of those same things.

And he felt good.

Like coming home, and I knew the feeling even though I'd never felt that in my life.

I burrowed into him as I accepted the invasion of his tongue, his talented workings scuttling along my skin, from my hair to my toes, gathering specifically between my legs, forcing me to press my hips to his, grind them against him, seek something I needed.

Intimacy.

Connection.

Just Noc.

I pulled one hand from his hair to wrap my arm around his neck, going up further on my toes to push even closer.

I did not hear the calls or whistles or shouts.