Forever Yours

Chapter Thirty

Makaria sat up, the sheet that covered her upper half falling to pool around her middle. She smiled at Thánatos, reaching out with her hand towards him. "What happened?" she asked softly as he clasped her hand in his, helping her to slide off the stone tablet she was sitting on. Feet touching the ground, Makaria swayed for a movement, her balance not yet steady.

Thánatos caught her, holding her in his arms. "You died," he explained softly, looking down into her eyes. Never in a million years would he thought he'd be so happy to see such a brilliant color. But when her eyes focused on his, Thánatos felt his heart skip. "Athena killed you."

Makaria held on to his arm, her eyes going from him to her surroundings as images begin to filtering through her brain. Different scenes of Athena as she thrusted her sword into Makaria's back before the goddess pulled out Makaria's still beating heart. Makaria remembered seeing her mother's shock and horror over what the other goddess had done. Turning to Thánatos, her turquoise eyes held fear within them. "What if she finds out I'm ali-.... Wait... That woman," Makaria said as an image of the old woman came to her. 

"What woman?" Thánatos questioned. They had moved away from the stone table. He didn't want to be near the thing any longer. "Did she have long dark hair and soft green eyes?" Makaria nodded her head as they moved towards the thrones of her parents. He helped Makaria to sit down as she gained her senses. "What did she say to you?"

Makaria looked up at him, her hand going to her head as she felt the crown of olives around it. Lifting the twisted branches up and off her hair, she placed it on her lap as she thought about what the woman had said in her dream. "I don't know who she was, I'd never seen her before. But she said that I wasn't to follow the path before me, no matter how much it called to me. She also said that Athena was dead," she explained as she fiddled with the small white lilies that lined the branches. "When I asked where we were, she said the land of the dead and that Charon was waiting for me."

"But you weren't to go to the beach, right?"

Makaria nodded her head. "Thánatos, what's going on? Am I still dead? But if I was, then how are you here? Where are my parents?"

He didn't speak for a moment, not quiet understanding what was going on. Then it dawned on him. She hadn't called him 'Ian' since she'd woken up, which meant... "What do you remember? Before now?"

Makaria stared up at him, brows furrowed in confusion. Thinking, she discovered that she couldn't remember anything past moving to Mt. Olympia. "Not much, I'm afraid," she told him as her eyes moved past him. "I remember my mom... I remember moving... but... that's it."

Kneeling to her eye level, Thánatos gently gathered her hands into his. He brushed a strain of her dark hair behind her ear, watching as his fingers played across her skin and could feel the happiness well up inside him. He could start over with her. Make her fall in love with him all over again, the right way like it should have been. Not enemies thrown together because the world was ending, but two people meeting for the first time. "Doesn't matter," he told her tenderly as he made her look him in the eyes. "Just know that I'll always be here for you, no matter what."

Makaria nodded her head as she removed her hand from his and brought it up to cup his hands against her face. She could feel the tears as they begin to descend down her pale cheeks. For reasons unknown to her, she felt sad as if she'd lost something important. "How come I remember you?" she whispered as she stared into his eyes. "I know your name; I know who you are and what you stand for.... I know you..."

Thánatos smiled as he blinked back his own tears. "You know me because I live in your soul, our soul," he explained as he laid a hand on her breast, over her heart. "We are the same, you and I. Same power, same destiny, my love."