Passion - By Lauren Kate Page 0,56

this place? Are we in China? she asked.

If we stood here long enough, we would be, Bill said. But right now, it's Tibet, thanks to the Dalai Lama. That's his pad over there. He pointed at the monster palace. Swanky, eh?

But Luce wasn't following his finger. She'd heard a laugh from somewhere nearby and had turned to seek out its source.

Her laugh. The soft, happy laugh she hadn't known was hers until she'd met Daniel.

She finally spotted two figures a few hundred yards away along the cliff. She'd have to clamber across some boulders to get closer, but it wouldn't be that difficult. She hunched in her muddy coat and started carefully picking her way through the snow, toward the sound.

Whoa there. Bill grabbed her by the collar of the coat. Do you see any place for us to take cover?

Luce looked around the bare landscape: all rocky drop-offs and open spaces. Nothing even to serve as shelter from the wind.

We're above the tree line, pal. And you're small, but you ain't invisible. You're going to have to hang back here.

But I can't see a thing--

Coat pocket, Bill said. You're welcome. She felt around in the pocket of the coat--the same coat she'd been wearing at the funeral in Prussia--and pulled out a brand-new, very expensive-looking pair of opera glasses. She didn't bother asking Bill where or when he'd got them, she just held them up to her eyes and twisted the focus.

There.

The two of them stood facing each other, several feet apart. Her past self's black hair was knotted in a girlish bun, and her woven linen dress was the pink of an orchid. She looked young and innocent. She was smiling at Daniel, rocking back and forth on her feet like she was nervous, watching his every move with unbounded intensity. Daniel's eyes had a teasing look in them; a bunch of round white peonies were in his arms and he was doling them out to her one by one, making her laugh harder each time.

Watching closely through the opera glasses, Luce noticed that their fingers never touched. They kept a certain distance from each other. Why? It was almost startling.

In the other lives she'd spied upon, Luce had seen so much passion and hunger. But here, it was different. Luce's body began to buzz, eager for just one moment of physical connection between them. If she couldn't touch Daniel, at least her old self could.

But they were just standing there, now walking in circles. Never getting any closer to each other or any farther apart.

Every once in a while, their laughter would carry over to Luce again.

Well? Bill kept trying to squish his little face next to Luce's so he could look through one of the lenses of the opera glasses. What's the word?

They're just talking. They're flirting kind of like they're strangers, but at the same time they also seem to know each other really well. I don't get it.

So they're taking it slow. What's wrong with that? Bill asked. Kids today, they just want things to go fast--boom boom BOOM.

Nothing's wrong with taking it slow, I just-- Luce broke off.

Her past self fell to her knees. She began to rock back and forth, holding her head, then her heart. A horrified look crossed Daniel's face. He looked so stiff in his white pants and tunic, like a statue of himself. He shook his head, looking at the sky, his lips mouthing the words No. No. No.

The girl's hazel eyes had gone wild and fiery, like something had possessed her. A high-pitched scream echoed out across the mountains. Daniel fell to the ground and buried his face in his hands. He reached out for her, but his hand hung in the air without ever connecting with her skin. His body crumpled and quaked, and when it mattered most, he looked away.

Luce was the only one watching as the girl became, out of nowhere, a column of fire. So fast.

The acrid smoke swirled over Daniel. His eyes were closed. His face glistened--wet with tears. He looked as miserable as he had looked every other time she'd watched him watch her die. But this time, he also looked sick with shock. Something was different. Something was wrong.

When Daniel had first told her about his punishment, he'd said there had been some lives in which a single kiss had killed her. Worse, in which something short of a kiss had killed her. A single touch.

They had not touched. Luce