Startled Remnant glanced up at the sky. "I—I don't know how," she whispered shakily.
But I did.
Purring softly, I pulled my soulmate into my embrace, her legs straddling my lap as she fell into me, her face imploring me desperately for help. Gripping her hands and turning them over, I rubbed my thumbs into her palms. "Breathe with me, my love," I whispered. "Inhale." She inhaled and I smiled encouragingly at her. Kissing her lips softly, "Exhale," I breathed against them.
Her eyes fluttered closed, her dark lashes brushing against her pale cheeks while she exhaled.
"It's just you and me, in a bed of clouds, rainbow crystals dance across our skin, you're listening to my heart beat, the way my chest rises and falls where your head rests, fitting perfectly into me." I kissed her again and her eyes snapped open, blazing with resolve, her fear gone. "Now, little umbra. Release it, release the night."
She blew out a shaky breath before the sky slowly receded back into the cosmos.
I grinned at her, nuzzling her nose with mine. "Well done, my fierce shadow savage. Pulling the night sky on your father…I am in awe of you."
She relaxed in my hold, her hands splaying across my chest beneath my rainbow furred vest, brushing her lips conspiratorially against mine. "Barely Emon, he was right. I didn’t have control."
“But you did in the end.”
She sniffed, “I really don’t like him.”
I chuckled darkly seeing Shea’s gaze flicker with hurt before smiling against her lips, "Sometimes we have to play nice to get what we want." Leaning away, I swept her hair aside, before brushing my lips against the shell of her ear. "But you can play dirty with me later if that is what you still need, my little umbra."
Remnant blushed but it was the intensity of the look she leveled on me that had me holding my breath. "You're not givinghim your soul, shifter. There will be no Sheol for you in the afterlife if you do this, Emon. That is what my mother gave up. An eternal life if she dies. Your life will just come to an end and you will leave me here. Alone. Always searching for my other half but never finding it. Selfishly, I will not let you do this, we will have to find another way."
"I know," I sighed.
Tilting forward, I gave her one last lingering kiss, one that promised of whispered worship, and watched as her eyes fluttered closed in sweetness. Exhaling softly, I forced my limbs to move, pulling away and determinedly placing her back on her cloud perch.
Her eyes opened, studying me, a small smile playing on her lips when I pulled her seat closer, grunting irritably, unable to tolerate not even an inch of air between us. Our thighs brushed, my hand searched for hers, holding it in tenderness, resuming my tracing on her soft pure skin.
Giving me one last assessing look, that pulled a smirk from my lips, Remnant turned back to her parents, squeezing my hand gently. “I will be okay now,” she said softly.
I squeezed her hand back, my other reaching for my own tall glass of ambrosia, delicately pinching the thin stemware between my fingers, annoyed with the worry that I may break the damn thing before it even reached my lips.
“Let’s start over, can someone please explain to me what the lilin are?”
I arched a brow over the rim of the glass, my lips smirking against the cool surface.“Did you just say please?”
“I am attempting diplomacy,”she snapped back.
I snickered, my laughter rumbling along our bond before slugging back the sweet ambrosia liquid, confident that I was not going to turn into a rutting animal this time like I had back in The Under.
"The lilin are not shadows like you believe, daughter. They are souls. Vengeful female souls that serve only one being. The God or Goddess of The Well."
I frowned, setting the glass down, tapping it lighty with a singular claw. "What is The Well?"
The death god's eyes gleamed hard as they fell on me. "The Well of Souls is where all of us go upon death. There we are judged and if deemed worthy, given permission to live our afterlife howeverwe like. Some remain in The Well along with the soulless, having never truly died. Others choose the Eithne, and some…some choose vengeance, they pledge themselves to the God or Goddess of the Wells, waiting for him or her to collect them. Those are the lilin." He paused and looked at us thoughtfully. "I was once that God, conquering the lilin nearly a millennium ago…but then you were born daughter,” his gaze shifted to her with a soft smile, “I passed the lilin down the moment your eyes opened, ready to champion your world. Thus crowning you Goddess of The Well of Souls.”
"The Goddess of The Well of Souls. That is what you called me when I came here," Remnant murmured.
I squeezed her hand and purred proudly, “Your fan club just became so much more interesting, little umbra. At this rate I am going to have to fight off your admirers when they come sniffing around.”
She snorted and I chuckled again, refraining from adding that it didn’t matter who the fuck came around. I was the one and only in this fan club, and anyone who challenged me on it would meet a swift defeat.
“So the lilin are vengeful souls but for what purpose?” Remnant continued.
The death god nodded. "To rectify the wrongs of the past by preventing it in the future. Their power is vast, in all my years of godhood, I have yet to see anything else like it. Because of this, they can only be conquered by overpowering The Well itself, and only then, can their master abdicate them to others—like I did for you.” He leaned in gravely, “I must warn you The Well is treacherous, it does not give up its own easily.”
“Neither do we,” I snarled.
