Read Online Midnight 01 - Luisa's Desire by authors_sort - Free Book Online

gripped the gate that rose before her and pulled herself to her feet. The bars were strong. Immovable even to her. They glowed with opalescence as if they'd been carved of pearl. Martin felt her relax, her head dropping back in tired surrender.
     
    Yes, she thought, I am dead now and they must let me in.
     
    But the gate did not open. The wind blew through it and the sun shone on it but no one came to see.
     
    "Speak to me," she demanded, clenching the pearly bars. "Tell me if I am damned."
     
    The air stirred behind her. Luisa spun. A man stood on the path in a dusty robe. He was tall and bearded, gaunt but strong. His eyes looked out from soulful hollows, their expression too beautiful to bear. Martin sensed Luisa knew who he was.
     
    "Answer me," she said in a choking voice. "If I'm damned, I want to know."
     
    The man said nothing, only stared at her sadly. Despite his humble garb, a golden shimmer bathed his skin. He reminded Martin of a bodhisattva, a wise old soul come to earth again.
     
    "I want the ability to choose how I live," she said. "I want my free will freed."
     
    You chose, said the man. You chose when you let your master make you what you are.
     
    With that, the man disappeared, and the gate, leaving nothing but grass and sun as far as the eye could see.
     
    "I am damned then," she said.
     
    She waited in the silence, empty of everything but despair. Tiny, starlike daisies waved in the gentle breeze. They did not care. No one cared but her. She thrust back her shoulders and firmed her jaw. If she was damned, so be it. She still had herself to answer to. She would live what life she had as she saw fit. If it ended, she would pay the price without demur. Her God had rejected her. Perhaps He had a right to. But from now on, her heart and mind were the only judges she would heed.
     
    Something changed with her decision. Martin felt it. The silence was ringing, the air brightening as if the sun were rising yet again. Each blade of grass glowed like a gem. Luisa's edges were dissolving. The barrier that had guarded her heart for seeming ages had been destroyed. Energy burst from the earth in a golden flood. The sweetness as it rushed inside her was indescribable, a heady mix of light and love and—
     
    And then the link between Luisa and Martin snapped.
     
    Thrust from her vision, Martin gasped. Here, in the material world, Luisa's body began convulsing. Martin could scarcely hold her shoulders down. She had succeeded in tapping the auric resources of the earth. Now energy poured into her unchecked, energy she obviously was not meant to have. To Martin's finely honed senses the flow seemed an angry, caustic river. With every second, the violence of her struggles heightened. Tendons stood out on her neck. Her hands curled into claws.
     
    "Luisa!" he cried, pulling her to his breast.
     
    He could not connect their minds. The energy was a torrent that swept his attempts aside.
     
    The door crashed open. Geshe Rinpoche had been alerted by his distress. "Speak to her," he panted, robe askew. "You must reach into her vision with your voice."
     
    "But how can she hear?"
     
    "Those in trances still hear those they love," said his teacher. "You must have faith."
     
    Martin could not refuse to try. "Luisa," he said, rocking her gently in his arms, "what you are doing is not safe. I know it feels lovely in your dream. I know it feels as if your angels had at last welcomed you home. But if you do not come back, your physical self will die. You said you did not want that. You said you loved your life."
     
    His throat choked up but he forced himself to speak. "I do not wish to lose you, Luisa. I wish… I wish to get to know you on this plane, in this life. Please do not make me wait. Please come back to me now."
     
    With an abruptness that shocked him, her convulsions stopped. Her body relaxed, then went completely still.
     
    He could not help but fear she died.
     
    "Lay her down," instructed his