Morana

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My mouth hung agape and their answer echoed in the living room. I had looked up from Alejo, wanting to stare at the Shadows, but since I couldn't, my eyes fell down again and my mouth closed.

He had consented to killing our mate bond?

It didn't make sense. If he had, then wouldn't he know about it? Such an agreement didn't feel like something that could be easily forgotten. Depending on how specific the consent had to be...

But that would be questions for Alejo to answer since I doubted the Shadows would give me a more in-depth answer. And Alejo would do best in having a damn good answer. There was another part about that, though, that I needed to know.

"Why did the bond return?"

"The mate bond lives..."

"...for as long as the two mates do," they began explaining.

"When the two mates have died."

"So does the mate bond."

"To be reborn when the mates are."

"So when your mate died..."

"...the mate bond had lived its full life."

"And as such, the life of the mate bond give had run its course."

A headache slowly formed. It was a lot to wrap my mind around, and it all still didn't make complete sense. I understood parts of it. I should have died, had died, twice in my life already and Alejo now one time. So I understood the part of that our mate bond, as such, had lived its full life. But that still didn't explain...

"But he wasn't dead when it returned," I pointed out, and the Shadows hummed as if in a merry song.

"He died, but had a moment of life left," was all they said and though that still didn't completely make sense to me, I assumed I wouldn't get any more answers. And those answers mattered little. What was more important was to figure out the best way to bring Alejo back, for I refused to let him stay dead.

I looked down at him as I asked the next question. "What did you mean by the life I would have had with my parents?"

"One's life is made of possibilities," they explained.

"Creating different potential lives."

"Most are weak and not worth anything."

"But the potential life a baby could have had with their parents."

"That is a strong and rich life."

So I hadn't been abandoned. The realization was somewhat bitter sweet.

"You said my mother's life was the third one, but my father is still alive?" I asked next.

"No," they said and sounded subdue and saddened.

"He lost both you and your mother and was never quite the same."

"So he gave his life to another."

I swallowed and felt a certain level of loss. Though I had never known him, never met or spoken to him, he was still my father, and the idea of how he must have suffered saddened me. I didn't have to even imagine much to know how he probably had felt, having just lost Alejo myself.

But I didn't dwell on it. In fact, if anything, it made me more determined to get all the answers I needed so I could make sure I wouldn't have a similar faith. I looked up from Alejo again as I continued.

"The consent needed. How does that work? Like does a person specifically need to say that they'd be willing to give their life?"

The Shadows gave off a creepy and echoing noise that made my hair stand on end. It wasn't until it had almost died down that I realized they had laughed.

"The consent can be vague," was all they said, and I had a feeling they would refuse to say more. That they wanted me to figure out what was needed. Though I thought I already knew.

"Okay, I just have a few final questions," I went on. All my sadness over having lost Alejo was now going. Determination to get him back had taken over completely. "I should have died twice. Once as a baby and once a few months ago when the truck hit me."

"Yesssss," they answered and once again there was a clear excitement in their voices.

"Both of those times, you should have cleansed me and then I should have been reborn."

"Yesssss." Their excitement was even more pronounced.

"And both of those times that I should have been reborn can be considered potential lives and, I assume, strong lives as well."

"Yesssss!" they practically screamed.

I stood up and lifted Alejo onto the couch. I brushed his hair to the side, let my fingers linger on the wound on the side of his head. Then I pressed a light kiss to his forehead before backing away.

All the while, the Shadows buzzed around me in anticipation. It felt almost as if they were starving and I had offered them the grandest of banquets.

I went over to the poster. I touched it and the inside was revealed. From there I took the knife that always laid there. Then I went to stand in the middle of the living room, in front of Alejo. My eyes fixated on him as I spoke to the Shadows.

"I want to bring him back to life," I said.

"But of course."

"Blood for blood and a life for a life."

"That's the price to pay."

I cut my palm. Just enough to have a bit of blood slip out. It should have hurt, but I felt no pain. I watched as the blood came up. I turned my hand over. Watched the blood fall to the floor. But the moment the drops touched the floor, they disappeared.

"I give you my blood and the potential life I would have been reborn to had I stayed dead as an infant."

They purred and vibrated all around me, and I could feel a shift in the air. They latched onto me, but at the same time spread throughout the room, made the darkness even thicker.

"The price was asked, and the price was paid," they said all as one and in the next moment they were gone. Light came back to the room, and I watched as Alejo opened his eyes.