CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

**OLIVER**
My eyes fluttered open and I groaned at the intense and steady pounding in my skull. My eyes snapped open in shock as I looked around my eyes staring up at clear blue skies. I slowly stood to my feet and looked around in confusion. I was surrounded by bright blue waters that stretched as far as the eye could see. Water and nothing else. I looked down and jumped back in shock as I realized that I was standing in water, my feet planted solidly on the blue waters.
“What the fuck is happening?” I muttered to myself.
I looked down at the water and blinked rapidly in an attempt to force my brain to interpret what my eyes were seeing. In the blue waters, a reflection stared back at me. No, not mine but another…another familiar reflection, one that I was all too used to.
The goddess stared back at me, every movement of my head and face replicated in her features. I bent over at the waist and stared deeply at my reflection with my hands on my knees as an anchor.
“What’s the problem, Oliver? You look like you’ve seen a ghost?” she said and laughed, her sickly sweet voice carrying on for miles.
“I don’t understand…what is happening?” I muttered under my breath.
“What do you mean?” She asked, a somewhat concerned expression on her face.
“You’re…I…you’re me…”
She shrugged and laughed, her voice carrying on a sinister tone that greatly unsettled me. “Of course, I’m you, silly goose,” she said. “Who else would I be?”
I could feel a headache coming on. Everything was wrong. The world was spinning. Had I died? Was that it? Was that why all this was happening?
“No, Oliver. You’re alive.”
Her voice broke through my thoughts, and I swore again as I realized I had said that out loud. My hand flew up to my chest and felt my heart beating erratically underneath my clothes.
“Tell me what’s happening!”
She giggled, “We're finally bonded, Oliver. Isn’t that lovely?” She asked. “You sure took your sweet time, but I guess destiny and fate had other plans.”
“What do you mean bonded?!” The question tore through my throat in a high-pitched scream, my mind struggling to grasp everything that was happening. “I never agreed to that!”
She smirked. She was enjoying this a little too much. I didn’t like that. “You don’t remember, do you?”
My brows drew down in confusion. “Remember what?”
“You don’t remember the events that brought you here, do you?”
As though by some sort of strange magic, her question opened the floodgates, and my mind was flooded with memories. Memories of when I was kidnapped by Joshua, memories of the dungeon, memories of being taken down a mountain, memories of Gabriel. A small smile made its way to my lips, as I remembered how he had charged through the forest. My very own knight in shining armor.
And then there was something else…
I remember killing Joshua. A two-pronged spear through the back, and I remember him falling to the ground and dissolving into ashes and black smoke. The goddess threw back her head and laughed, her mocking voice shaking me out of my thoughts.
“I see you’re all caught up.”
“But I don’t see how that relates to me being you.”
Her voice came out in an exaggerated sigh, as one would do when faced with a dumb toddler. “You see, Oliver, when Joshua was trying to pull me out of you, he did something to you. Your spirit; he subdued it,” she said slowly. “And then he didn’t complete the ritual…that was a big mistake.”
I didn’t need her to complete the story, it all fell into place. It all made sense. My spirit had been what had been pushing back against her complete control, my spirit had fought until it was unable to fight. I closed my eyes and took in a deep breath, my mind wondering what this meant for me. What about Gabriel, was I going to love him the same? Look at him the same. Would I lose myself? How long did I have before I did?
“Relax, Oliver,” her voice drawled as she spoke. “You’ve been very faithful to me, so I’m going to do just one thing as a reward.”
“What?”
“You can retain your subconscious,” she said, and I breathed a sigh of relief. “But I’m going to move forward with my plan.”
I froze as my mind recalled what this ‘plan’ was. This plan involved me cheating on my lover. The plan involved a whole child for her to embody and love as a mortal. This child would no doubt be targeted for who she was. This child that she wanted to use his body to obtain.
“No,” I answered firmly.
She threw back her head and laughed. “You think you have a choice…” she said. “That’s cute. You should be grateful…thankful that that’s all you’re getting. That’s all I’m taking. I could take more.”
I swore loudly and kicked at my reflection, her face still staring back at me only adding to my frustrations. What was happening? How did I get here?
“What about Gabriel and me?” I asked.
She cocked her brow. “What about it?”
“What does it mean for us?!”
She shrugged nonchalantly, “Nothing. You can go back to your cute, little relationship after you’ve given me an heiress.”
I nodded as I continued to stare at her, my mind absorbing all the information. Hating it, but absorbing nonetheless.
“And what if I refuse?”
She threw back her head and laughed. “Oh dear…you can’t refuse. You seem to forget that I am you!”
“But…”
She sighed and rolled her eyes. “That’s it. I’m done with you.”
She waved her hand and just like that I jolted awake, my breathing uneven and hard, my throat parched. I looked at the nightstand, grateful to whoever had placed a bottle of water there and drained it. I sighed as the last sip of water transferred from the bottle to my throat. As I sat there and caught my breath, my mind went back to the conversation with the goddess. I thought about my next course of action. What to do. What to tell Gabriel.
I sighed and swung my legs over the side of the bed, and paced the room, running my hand through my hair and over my face. This couldn’t be my new reality. It just couldn’t. I loved Gabriel. I loved him too much to even consider this.
But she had made it clear that my wishes on the matter didn’t count. We were the same now. She had won. She had gotten what she wanted.
I turned around sharply as the door opened, and there stood Gabriel, dressed only in a tank top and basketball shorts. Our eyes met, and in that second, millions of emotions moved between us. He looked haggard, like he hadn’t been getting much sleep, an overgrown stubble graced his chin, and his eyes were red and bloodshot.
“You’re awake,” he said. “I thought I heard you moving around. How are you?”
I ignored his question, crossed the room in long strides, and took him into my arms, smashing my lips down on his and kissing him like a man possessed. Gabriel kissed me back, his lips danced with mine, our lips saying all the things our hearts couldn’t. I made quick work of his clothes and mine, tossing them to the side and lowering myself to my knees.
“Are you sure?” Gabriel asked breathlessly. “You just woke up.”
“I’ve missed you so much, Gabriel…”
“I’ve missed you too…”
His words died on his tongue as I ran my tongue from the base of his shaft to the top, and lightly sucked on the knob, looking up at him as I took him in my mouth. My hands cupped his balls, massaging them slowly and softly as my mouth worked his rod.
He pulled me up and pushed me down on the bed, his eyes roving my form, raw need hidden in the brown depths. He joined me on the bed, our bodies re-familiarizing themselves with each other again, showing our love as our bodies moved together.
I lay next to him long after we were done, wrapped in his arms, my mind racing; imagining a world where he left me. I closed my eyes against the sudden pain in my gut and sighed.
I had to figure a way around this. I needed to figure something out fast.