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Fan Forum Star
Joined: Dec 2005
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next up is the quotes from book 3.. for those that haven't read this book, close your eyes 
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Finally she looked at Adam.
He was still holding Diana's arm, but his proud, arresting face was tense and alert. His eyes met Cassie's and something like understanding flashed between them, and then Cassie looked away, ashamed. She had no right to lean on Adam's strength. She was about to be exposed for what she was in front of the entire Circle.
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"You've told the story your way," Adam said. "Some of it's been close to the truth, and some of it's been just plain lies. But none of it happened exactly the way you told it."
He looked around the Circle again. "I don't care what you think of me," he said, "but there's somebody else involved here. And*she" he glanced at Cassie, just long enough for her to see his blue-gray eyes, still shining like silver; "doesn't deserve to be put through this, especially not tonight."
A few of the coven members, notably Laurel and Melanie, looked away, slightly ashamed. But the rest simply stared, angry and mistrustful.
"So what's your side of the story?" Deborah said, scowling. Her expression said she felt she'd been taken in, and she didn't like it.
"First of all, it wasn't like that when Cassie and I met. It wasn't love at first sight . . ." Adam faltered for a moment, looking into the distance. He shook his head. "It wasn't love. She*helped*me, she saved me from four outsider guys with a gun. The witch-hunting kind of outsiders." He looked hard at Chris and Doug Henderson.
"But she didn't know;" Deborah began.
"She didn't know what I was, then. She didn't know what*she*was. Witches were something out of fairy tales to her. Cassie helped me just because I needed help. These guys were after me, and she stashed me in a boat and sent them all off running in the wrong direction down the beach. They tried to get her to tell where I was, they even hurt her, but she didn't give me up."
There was a silence. Deborah, who admired physical bravery above all other qualities, looked quizzical, her scowl smoothing out a little.
Faye, though, was squirming like a fish trying to get off a hook, and her expression was unpleasant. "How sweet. The brave heroine. So you just couldn't resist fooling around with her."
"Don't be a jerk, Faye,"*Adam said, giving Faye's arm a little shake. "I didn't do anything with her. We just " He shook his head again. "I told her 'thank you.' I wanted her to know that I wouldn't forget what she'd done ;remember, at the time I still thought she was an outsider, and I'd never known an outsider who did anything like that for one of us. She was just this nice outsider girl; sort of quiet and pretty, and I wanted to say 'thanks.' But when I was looking at her I suddenly felt ;as if we were connected somehow. It sounds stupid now, maybe, but I could almost see this connection..."
"The silver cord," Cassie whispered. Her eyes were full, and she wasn't aware she'd spoken aloud until she saw faces swing toward her.
Melanie's eyebrows went up and Diana looked startled too, maybe just at hearing Cassie break the silence she'd kept so long. Suzan's rosebud lips were pursed into an O.
"Yeah, I guess that was what it looked like," Adam was saying, staring off into the distance again. "I don't know ;it was just this confused impression. But I did feel grateful to her, and I would have liked her for a friend how about that, an outsider friend?" There were murmurs of amusement and unbelief. "And," Adam said, looking straight at Diana, "that's why I gave her the chalcedony rose you gave me."
No murmurs this time. Grim silence.
"It was a token of friendship, a way to repay a debt," Adam said. "I figured if she ever got in trouble, I could sense it through the crystal and maybe do something to help. So I gave it to her and that was*all*I did." He looked at Faye defiantly, and then even more defiantly around the group.
"Except yeah, right I did kiss her. I kissed her hand."
Laurel blinked. The Henderson brothers looked at Adam sideways, as if to say he was crazy but they guessed it was his own business what bits of girls he kissed. Faye tried to look scornful, but it didn't come off very well.
"Then I left the Cape," Adam said. "I didn't see Cassie again until I came back up here for Kori's initiation—which turned out to be Cassie's initiation. But there's one other important thing. In all the time I talked to Cassie I never told her who I was or where I was from. I never told her my name. So whatever she came up here and did whatever poems she wrote, Faye she didn't know who I was. She didn't know Diana and I were together. Not until that night when I showed up on the beach."
"So I suppose that's a good reason for pretending you didn't know each other, for sneaking around behind everybody's back and meeting each other," Faye said, on the offensive again.
"You don't know what you're talking about," Adam said tightly, looking as if he'd like to shake Faye again. "We didn't sneak*anywhere.*The first time we ever talked alone was the night the skull ceremony in Diana's garage went wrong. Yeah, that night on the bluff when your little spies saw us, Faye. But d'you know what Cassie said to me in our first conversation alone since we'd met? She said she was in love with me and that she knew it was wrong. Ever since she'd found out it was wrong, ever since she realized that I wasn't just some guy on the beach, but Diana's boyfriend, she'd been fighting against it.
She'd even taken an oath—a blood oath not to ever show anybody, by word or look or deed, how she felt about me. She didn't want Diana to find out and feel bad, or feel sorry for her. Does that sound like somebody who's trying to sneak around?"
The Circle looked back at him. Soberly, Melanie said, "Let me get this right. You're saying there's nothing at all to Faye's accusations?"
Adam swallowed. "No," he said quietly. "That's not what I'm saying. That night on the bluff . . ." He stopped and swallowed again, and then his voice hardened. "1 can't explain what happened, except that it was my fault, not Cassie's. She did everything she could to avoid me, to keep out of my way. But once we were alone we were drawn together." He looked at Diana without flinching, although the pain was evident in his face. "I'm not proud of myself, but I never meant to hurt you. And Cassie is completely innocent. The only reason she was speaking to me at all that night was that she wanted to give me back the chalcedony rose— so I could give it back to you. In all of this, she's never been anything but honest and honorable. No matter what it cost her." He stopped and his mouth turned grim. "If I'd known she was being blackmailed by this snake"
"I*beg*your pardon," Faye interrupted, golden eyes flashing dangerously.
Adam returned the look, just as dangerous. "That's what it was, wasn't it, Faye? Blackmail. Your little spies saw us that night when we were sayinggood-bye,*and swearing never to see each other alone again, and you decided to make the most of it. I knew there was something going on with you and Cassie after that, but I could never figure out what it was. Cassie was scared to death all of a sudden, but why she didn't just come to me and tell me what you were up to . . ." His voice trailed off and he looked toward Cassie.
Cassie shook her head mutely. How could she explain? "I didn't want you caught up in it too," she said in a voice scarcely above a whisper. "I was afraid you'd tell Diana, and Faye said if Diana found out..."
"What?" Adam said. When Cassie shook her head again he gave Faye's arm a little shake. "What, Faye?
If Diana found out it would kill her? Wreck the coven? Is that what you told Cassie?"
Faye smirked. "If I did, it was only the truth, wasn't it? As things turned out." She wrenched away from Adam.
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Cassie took a deep breath, making herself meet Diana's eyes again, her own eyes begging Diana to understand. "I know I shouldn't have let her have it. I should have stood up to her, then and afterward, but I was weak and stupid. I'm sorry now I wish I'd just come and told you in the beginning, but I was so afraid you'd be hurt..." Tears were choking her voice now, and making her vision blur. "And as for what Adam said about it all being his fault you have to know that isn't true. It was my fault, and at the Halloween dance I*tried*to make him kiss me, because I was so upset by then and I thought that nothing really mattered, since I was evil anyway."
There was wetness on Diana's cheeks, but now she looked taken aback. "Since*what?'
"Since I was evil," Cassie said, hearing the terrible, stark truth in the simple words. "Since I was responsible for killing Jeffrey Lovejoy." The entire coven stared at her, appalled. "Wait a minute,"
Melanie said. "Run that by me one more time."
"Whenever anybody used the skull, it released dark energy, which went out and killed somebody,"
Cassie said carefully and clearly. "Faye and I were the ones who used the skull before Jeffrey was killed.
If it wasn't for me, she couldn't have used it, and Jeffrey would still be alive. So, you see, I'm responsible."
Animation was returning to Diana's eyes. "But you didn't*know,"*she said.
Cassie shook her head fiercely. "That's no excuse. There's no excuse for any of it not even for doing worse things because I thought I was evil anyway and what did it matter? It*did*matter. I listened to Faye and I let her bully me." And I kept the hematite, she thought, but there was no point in getting into that. She shrugged, blinking more tears away. "I even let her make me vote for her for leader. I'm*sorry,*Diana I'm so sorry. I don't know why I did it."
"I do," Diana said shakily. "Adam said it already you were scared."
Cassie nodded. All the words she'd held back for so long were pouring out. "Once I started doing things for her, I couldn't stop. She had more and more to blackmail me with. Everything just went more and more wrong and I didn't know how to get out of it . . ." Cassie's voice broke. She saw Faye, lip curled, step forward and try to say something, and she saw Adam shut her up with a single glance. Then she turned and saw Diana's eyes.
They were as luminous as peridot crystals held up to the light, liquid with unshed tears, but also with something else. It was a look Cassie had never expected to see again, especially not directed at*her.*A look of pain, yes, but also of forgiveness and longing. A look of love.
Something broke inside Cassie, something hard and tight that had been growing since she had started to deceive Diana. She took a stumbling step forward.
Then she and Diana were in each others' arms, both crying, both holding on with all their strength.
"I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry for everything," Cassie sobbed.
It seemed a long time before Diana drew back, and when she did she stepped away from the group, turning to look into the darkness. Cassie wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand. The moon, hanging low on the horizon, shone like old gold on Diana's hair.
There was absolute silence except for the distant roar and crash of waves on the beach. The entire group stood motionless, as if waiting for something that none of them could quite define.
At last Diana turned back to them. "I think we've all heard enough," she said. "I think I understand, maybe not everything, but most of it. Listen, everybody, because I don't want to say this again."
Everyone was quiet, their faces turned toward Diana expectantly. Cassie had the distinct feeling that a judgement was about to be rendered. Diana looked like a priestess or a princess, tall and pale, but resolute. There was a strange dignity about her, an aura of greatness and of certainty that belied the pain in her eyes.
I'm waiting to hear my punishment, Cassie thought. Whatever it was, she deserved it. She glanced at Adam and saw he was waiting too. His expression asked no favors, but Cassie knew what he must be feeling underneath it. They both stood before Diana, connected by their crime, glad to have it in the open at last.
"1 don't want anybody to discuss what's happened tonight again," Diana said, her voice soft and distinct.
"Not ever. Once I've finished talking we'll all consider the subject closed." She looked at Adam, not quite meeting his eyes. "I think," she said slowly, "that I know how it must have been for you. These things happen sometimes. I forgive you. And as for you, Cassie you're even less to blame. There was no way for you to have known. I don't blame either of you. All I ask"
Cassie drew a shuddering breath and broke in. She couldn't hold back any longer.
"Diana," she said, "I want you to know something. All this time, underneath, I've been angry and jealous because Adam belonged to you and not me. Even up until tonight. But all that's changed now truly. Now all I want is for you and Adam to be happy. Nothing is more important to me than you and the promise I made." For an instant it crossed Cassie's mind to wonder if Adam were*less*important, but she shoved the thought away and spoke earnestly, with utter conviction. "Adam and I we both made that promise. If you'll just give us another chance to keep it just one more chance ..."
Diana was opening her mouth, but Cassie went on before she could speak.
"Please,*Diana. You've got to know that you can trust me—that you can trust us. You've got to let us prove that."
There was a slight pause, then Diana said, "Yes. Yes you're right." She took a deep breath and let it out, looking at Adam almost tentatively. "Well, then, what if if we just forget all about this for a while? Just wipe the slate clean?"
A muscle in Adam's jaw jerked. Silently, he took the hand Diana extended toward him.
Diana held her other hand out to Cassie. Cassie took it and held on tightly to the slim, cold fingers. She wanted to laugh and cry at once. Instead she just gave Diana a wobbly smile. Looking at Adam she saw that he was trying to smile too, although his eyes were dark as storm clouds over the ocean.
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Cassie lifted her hands. There was no longer a guilty secret between her and Adam, but every time she looked at him, she felt a connection. A new connection, that of two people who'd been tried by fire and had come out stronger. There would always be an understanding between them
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Over Nick's shoulder, she met Adam's eyes.
The moon was shining full in his face, turning those eyes odd colors, blue-violet like the bottom of a flame. Like the sky before some strange storm. She thought she could see silver reflecting in his pupils.
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Adam turned from his brick-replacing, and the three of them looked at each other in the light of the cold, quiet kitchen. They were all dirty; even Diana's beautiful cheekbones bore gray smudges. Cassie was still sore and exhausted from what had been one of the longest and most horrible days in her life. But at that moment she felt a warmth and closeness that swept the pain and fatigue away. They were connected, all three of them. They were part of each other. And tonight they had won.
They had triumphed.
If Diana hadn't forgiven us, where would we be? Cassie wondered, as she looked down at the hearth again.
I'm glad you're the one who has him; I really am, she thought then. Glancing up, she saw that Diana had tears in her eyes, almost as if she knew what Cassie was thinking.
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Adam, she tried to call to him with her mind.*Adam, it's Cassie. I'm in trouble.*She wished she had the chalcedony rose to hold while she called; Adam had told her it would help make contact with him. But the chalcedony rose was Diana's.
Don't think about that now. Think about Adam. You need to make Adam hear you.
Adam,*she called again, putting all her strength behind it. Strange that the ability to push with her mind, to do whatever she did to send the power lancing out, didn't seem to deteriorate with use. Instead, it was like a muscle, getting stronger as she exercised it.*Adam,*she called again, keeping the message simple and clear.*It's Cassie. I need help.
He'll come, she told herself. He'll find this place somehow; he'll come if I can just stay calm and wait. It was the thought of what might happen*before*Adam came that chilled the blood in her veins.
So here she was, stuck in the middle of nowhere with four witch hunters. And the silence was getting on her nerves.
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"We were already on our way when you called to Adam," Diana said. "Laurel saw their car speeding down Crowhaven Road and Adam felt there was something wrong. He guided us to their car, but it was Raj who tracked you through the woods."
Cassie just nodded gratefully. She couldn't speak.
"Since Cassie's all right, we won't hurt you four," Diana said aloud, then. "But we're going to take*this"
she picked up Jordan's gun, holding it as if it were a poisonous snake"and we're going to leave you here. Your car has a few flat tires. You can walk home."
The four outsiders said nothing. Sally, still on the ground, was panting; Logan, with Nick's arm around his throat, was trembling-still; Portia remained frozen against the tree. But it was Jordan who held Cassie's attention. He was staring at Diana with eyes of pure hatred, like a cornered wild dog.
It will never stop, Cassie thought. They'll hate us even more after this. They'll do something else to us, and we'll do something to them, and it will never stop.
On impulse, she walked over to where Jordan lay sprawled on his back on the forest floor, and she held out a hand to him.
"We don't have to be enemies," she said. "Can't we just end it now?"
Jordan spat on her.
Cassie went still, too surprised to be upset. Nobody had ever spat at her before. She looked in shock at her outstretched hand, then wiped it on her jeans.
What happened next she heard later from Laurel, because she was actually looking down at the time.
Nick started toward Jordan instantly, but he was hindered by having to get rid of Logan, and anyway Adam was simply*faster.*He moved faster than the eye could follow, grabbing Jordan by the front of the jacket and hauling him up, then knocking him down again with one lightning-quick blow to the face.
Behind Cassie, the bonfire shot up in orange flames ten feet high. Jordan landed on his back, both hands clapped over his nose.
"Get up," Adam said. The flames roared and crackled, sending a shower of sparks floating into the darkness of the woods.
Nick was beside Adam now. His face was emotionless, utterly cool, the old Nick. "Naw, buddy, I think he's had enough," he drawled, taking hold of Adam's arm.
Jordan lifted one hand from his nose, and Cassie saw the blood. "She's a little liar. You'll find out," he yowled in a thick voice, looking from Cassie to Adam.
For a moment Cassie thought Adam was going to hit him again. Then Adam turned away, as if forgetting Jordan existed. He didn't seem to notice Nick's existence either. He took Cassie's hand, the one Jordan had spat on, turned it over, and kissed it.
Cassie thought that somebody had better do something fast.
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He'd said she didn't have to say anything—but she did. She had to try to explain to him.
"It's not because of Adam," she said softly. "I mean, it's not*for*him, because I know there's no hope.
I—*accept*that now, and I'm happy for him and Diana. But I just..."
She stopped and shook her head helplessly. "This is going to sound totally stupid, but I can't be with anybody else. Ever. I'm just going to have to . . ." She tried to think of a way to put it, but all she could come up with was a phrase out of one of her grandmother's Victorian etiquette books she'd read one rainy afternoon.
"I'm going to have to live a life of single blessedness," she mumbled.
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Cassie looked at Adam.
His blue-gray eyes were something like the ocean outside and full of turmoil. "You can do it," he said tersely, answering her unspoken question. "And I think it's best for the coven. I don't know if it's best for you."
Cassie let out her breath.
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"Cassie did it" Nick was beginning again, irritably, but Adam had leaped up and grabbed Cassie and was whirling her in the air. Cassie shrieked and kept shrieking as he swooped her around. She hadn't seen Adam this happy since ... well, she couldn't remember*when*she'd seen Adam this happy. Since the beach on Cape Cod, she guessed, when he'd flashed that daredevil smile at her. She'd forgotten, in their months of trouble, that grimness wasn't Adam's natural state.
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.Cassie looked at her doubtfully, then shook the box. It rattled lightly, as if there were something small inside. She glanced at Diana again. Then, hesitantly, with an almost scared feeling, she opened it.
Inside, there was only one object. A little oval of rock, pale blue swirled with gray, embedded all over with tiny crystals which sparkled in the sunlight.
The chalcedony rose.
Every muscle frozen but her eyes, Cassie looked at Diana. She didn't know what to do or say. She didn't understand. But her heart was beating violently.
"It's yours," Diana said again, and then, as Cassie just crouched there, immobile, she looked at Melanie.
"Maybe you'd better explain."
Melanie cleared her throat. "Well," she said, and looked over at Adam, who was sitting as still as Cassie.
He hadn't said much all morning, and now he was staring at Diana wordlessly, riveted.
"Well," Melanie said again. Adam still wouldn't look at her, so she went on anyway. "It was when Adam was telling us about how he met you," she said to Cassie. "He described a connection what you called a silver cord. You remember that?"
"Yes," said Cassie, not moving otherwise. She was looking at Diana now too, searching Diana's face.
Diana looked back serenely.
"Well, the silver cord is something real, something in the old legends. The people it connects are soul mates you know, meant to be together. So when Diana and I heard about it, we knew that's what you and Adam are," Melanie finished, sounding glad to be done explaining to people who wouldn't look at her.
"That was why I was surprised about Nick, you see," Diana said to Cassie, gently. "Because I knew you could only love Adam. And I was going to tell you at the very beginning, but then you were asking me to give you another chance, to let you prove you could be faithful . . . and I thought that was a good idea.
Not for me, but for you. So you'd know, Cassie, how strong you are. Do you see?"
Cassie nodded mutely. "But Diana" she whispered.
Diana blinked, her emerald eyes misting over. "Now you're going to make me cry," she said. "Cassie, with all the unselfishness that's been going on around here, do you think I'm not going to do my part? You two have been waiting for months because of me. Now you don't have to wait anymore."
"There's nothing anybody can do about it," Melanie put in, sympathetically but pragmatically. "You and Adam are linked, and that's it. There isn't anyone else for either of you, so you're stuck together for this lifetime. Maybe for a lot of lifetimes."
Cassie, still frozen, shifted her eyes to Adam.
He was looking at Diana. "Diana, I can't just ... I mean, I'll always"
"I'll always love you, too," Diana said steadily. "You'll always be special to me, Adam. But it's Cassie you're in love with."
"Yes," Adam whispered.
Cassie looked down at the rough little stone in her palm. It was sparkling crazily and she felt very dizzy.
"Go on, go over to him," Diana said, pushing her gently.
But Cassie couldn't, so he came to her. He looked a bit dazed, but his eyes were as blue as the ocean in sunlight, and the way he smiled at her made her blush.
"Go on, kiss her," Chris said. Laurel smacked him. The rest of the Circle looked on with great interest.
Adam glared at them and kissed Cassie formally on the cheek. Then, under cover of the groans, he whispered "Later," to her in a way that made her pleasantly nervous.
Can I handle Herne? she wondered, looking up at his hair that was so many colors: dark like garnet and bright like holly berries, threaded with gold in the sunshine. I guess I'm going to have to, she thought. For a lifetime, Melanie had said; maybe a lot of lifetimes.
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Cassie looked at Adam and found him looking at her. He took her hand, closing it in his own, both of them holding the chalcedony rose.
Cassie looked down at their intertwined fingers, and it seemed that she could see the silver cord again, wrapping around their two hands, connecting them. But not just them. Filaments of the cord seemed to web out and touch the others of the group, linking them together with silver light. They were all connected, all part of one another, and the light shone around them to touch the earth and sky and sea.
Sky and sea, keep harm from me. Earth and fire, bring my desire.
They had. And they would in the future. With her inner vision, Cassie saw that the Circle was part of something bigger, like a spiral that went on and on forever, encompassing everything, touching the stars.
"I love you," Adam whispered.
From the center of the Circle, Cassie smiled.
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Can't believe we have thread 2 already!
please add me 
Should put as a future title!
