Okay everyone, here is the fourth chapter of "The Season's Connection". Everybody give a cheer!

Now, on to business - THIS IS A NOTE YOU MUST READ - I've realized that many of you are under the impression that this will be a four chapter story, that there will be one chapter for each of the four seasons, and that will be it. I really have to clear that you for all of you. There will be more than four chapters. And the only reason that this story is titled "The Season's Connection" is because that is the title of selections of music. I choose the music that goes with each chapter (or in some cases, each chapter for the music) based simply on the feeling and connection I make to that section of the music. Because of this, I have no control over how many "summers" or "autumns" or "winters" or "springs" there will be. Sorry guys, that's just the way it goes.

So I hope you all understand that.

Now, this story is dedicated to my made-of-awesome beta reader, Megan, my good friend and bosom companion, who is phenomenal. Seriously.

“The Promise Made”
The Four Seasons: Violin Concerto in F Minor, RV 297, “Winter”: III. Allegro (Vivaldi – as performed by Janine Jansen)

She sleeps. The night envelops her, settling into all of her curves, resting between her fingers and twining with her hair. She lies with her face to the pillow, on her stomach, and the night closes her eyes like coins for the dead. On the bureau is the glass jar – she refuses to throw it away; it is a fist that clenches tight about her, that will not let go.

She wakes. A weight is on her, against her back. For a moment she is on the beach, the surf rushes past her legs to chill her thighs, and warm blood drips down her neck.

She struggles; she bucks, she twists. She cries out, hopes to be heard. He subdues her, first with the physical weight of his body and then which his voice. It is like she remembers it – deep, raspy, raw like the fresh bite of a shark and beautiful like the froth of foam on the beach.

She does not, did not, expect him.

A year and a month passes after she throws the shell back into the ocean to bring them to this place. She thinks she has ended it – she believes that she had severed herself from him so that the relationship may emply from her life like poison, and leave her clean. It is only the eye, the strange, macabre gift that holds her in an unending spell. He refuses to let her end them – her and him.

On a deep, repressed level, both are glad that he is doing this.

She waits for him to speak; she takes long, shallow breaths that quiver in her chest and skin. She clenches her fingers around the sheets and the pillow is scratchy against her face as she waits. She feels nerves and uncertainty simmer in her throat.

Finally, he speaks. “You did not come.”

She swallows and sighs. “Was I still supposed to?” She sounds unsure. She knows that he saw her throw away the shell.

“Always.” They sound as if they are two normal people, a man and a woman, meeting, always meeting so that they may part.

They move – he kneels, she sits up, they face each other. The night is too dark for her to see more than the whites of his remaining eye, but their breath mingles in the space between them. It is the only sound, imitating the rhythm of waves on rocks. It keeps her from jumping when he places a hand on her.

That skin of his is pale and she can see a blurry outline, like he is glowing, against her sheets. His temperature is cool, and the hand has nails longer than hers and calloused palms. She feels a thick-ridged scar on the right hand that presses into her neck.

“Why did you give me the eye?” She finally asks. The question is tense. Makes her pulse race, and she glances unconsciously in the direction of the grim offering, feeling the eye focus on her.

He does not answer her, but speaks his own agenda. “I need you to come back. Always come back. Always. Always.” He urges this on her, takes her face in his hands. “Always. Always.” He murmurs to her ear.

She feels the difference in temperature between her warm red cheeks and his hard, cold hands clearly. It reminds her that the person, the thing speaking to her is an alien, a monster. It makes her edgy, and she runs her tongue along the inside walls of her cheeks, imagines that he can feel it. He can, and shivers.

“Why?” She demands, shaking his hands away. She holds the power now. “Why?” She repeats. “What is this?”

He grips her hands and both of them tangle themselves in the silent allure. Neither can leave. “What is what?” He does not want to answer her.

“What is all this that we are doing?” Her voice sparks with confusion and resulting frustration. “Why must I come back? Why did you give me the…the…” She cannot say it again, her breath coming heavily between them. The sound of the wind murmurs in her ears now.

The noise is the tension that builds, tightening the rope, pulling in the slack of the line that connects him with her. Nature’s songs grow louder and louder against her eardrums as the silence goes on longer and longer.

She feels like the house being buffeted by the nighttime wind – and he is the gale that whips past her. She feels the wind on her cheeks for a moment, sees the myriad decisions rushing past her, brushing, bullying by her, waiting for a moment and dancing before her. Bowing farewell as she fails to choose.

The shudder of her breathing makes him answer, the glow of his face in the dark disappearing as he tilts his head down. “To watch you. I want to watch you. Always. I will not ever let this go. It is why you must always come back.”

For a moment, the idea seduces her and lures her and wrenches her in. “To come back. To stay.” Whispering words that snap at her lips. She leans forward, her body sways, and his follows suit in anticipation. She feels herself part under his gaze, knows that she is opening, seeping the leverage in their twisted relationship until it pools around them on the bed.

She jerks back, realizes with whom she is sitting. She closes her eyes and hopes he doesn’t see. She doesn’t want to face this anymore. So much complication and the wind picks up again, the quick strikes of a bow against a violin, they brutalize the house. Drawing in a deep breath, she leans back until the wall braces her and keeps her upright.

“No.” Though her eyes still close against the onslaught she turns her head away. “No. You’re not…You are a-“

He cuts her off. He wants to face this conflict as much as she does; he sits there though, knowing that it is inevitable. “Not a what?”

Her eyes open, the whites of her eyes, the pupils, the irises, reveal themselves. “Human.” The word emerges breathless and in pain.

He says nothing, he only moves. His body surges forward in a burst of power and his face is close enough to her own that she can see it clearly now. He softens, his breath gusting over her cheeks.

He gentles, slows, commits one soft, electric kiss.

The press of lips, the opening of mouths, the swirl of tongues; they happen slowly, yet all at once. He tastes like what she imagines claret to taste of – of honey thick richness, and there is a bite of salt that still permeates his saliva. She tastes like summer ripened fruit and the satisfaction of a hard day’s work, feels like the ardor one feels when lounging in the sun.

The gentleness confines itself not to his mouth, and softens his hands on her neck, on her shoulders, on her arms. Pulling her away from the wall, they fall closer and closer together.

She jolts away, scrambles away, backs away. She convinces herself, tries to, that it is all wrong, a sin, a dire offense. He stands up to advance on her and the wind whistles in her ears, picking up as his temper rises. “No.” She demands he understand. “No!”

He refuses, roars. “Always!” Every line in his body tenses, his eyes darken, his lips compress to a tight, angry line.

The house shakes under the weight of their conflict and the bustle of the wind against its stone walls. The floor is cold against her feet, and the feeling soaks into her, but fails to temper her feelings. They rise in her, furious, wretched and confused. She feels her face contort as tears slide down her cheeks and knows that he sees them, smells them.

“No!” Her voice is shrill and thin, a wail, a sound desperate and sobbing.

His face is incredible with its fury, with his anger, and without his comprehension. This is not how he wants everything to play out, and this is not how it all should end. “Always! This will never end!” He shames himself to hear the raw note of desperation in his tones, the breaking point that thins with every second.

He swells forward, not an overwhelming surge, but an inescapable wave. He pushes her back into the wall, his hands are warm now, from her touches and her skin; they carry the presence of her in them, and tells her that he speaks the truth.

She hits the wall, allows him to do this to her, then hardens herself. She is not the feather that tangles with the wind, nor is she the fish that the ocean swallows. She is the rock that buffets the wind and she is the rock wall upon which the crests of waves break. She sinks, but she does not drown.

Pushes him back, fingers clench, nails scrape his skin from his body in thin, bloody streaks. He stumbles back, is caught unawares, but he too, is a powerful force. Standing his ground, he meets her rage and takes her anger, like the fire that consumes the dry grass.

Soon they stand face to face, they pant, they swallow, they step back and they step closer. Their eyes form a twisted dance with each other, a line that shifts the balance that is them every moment.

He takes her head in his hands, just as before, feels the sheen of sweat on her skin, knows that she feels the same on him. He presses his forehead against hers, blinks, and their eyelashes collide.

“It will never end. Never. I give you my sight so that I might watch you. So that you can never leave, so that you must always come to me, and I to you. We are always to meet, so that we may part. This I promise you.”

He straightens up and backs a step away, till they are two silhouettes of light in the dark. “It is not so bad. Think on it. Accept it. Come to me.”

He is gone. For now.

As noted before - THIS IS NOT THE LAST CHAPTER - although I have no idea where this story will end up going, but I know there will be more of it. Speaking of ideas, if any of you have any of them for this project of mine, I'd be happy to entertain them and see if they fit with my very general vision of it all.

Also, this story is nominated on Fiction Press Supernatural Stories Awards! I know that I've said this before, but...I can't help it! Its so awesome! It's nominated for Best Written, Best Plot, and Best Non-Mainstream Creature. Cool, huh? So go message them and tell them how awesome my story is! Hee hee. Thanks for reading and please, please review!