'You?!' I yelped in shock, to the collective amusement of everybody in the room. 'You're not even gay!'
Tristan raised one perfectly arched eyebrow. 'I'm not going to dignify that with a response,' he told me.
'You are gay?!'
'No,' he said, his voice sarcastic. 'I just sleep with guys recreationally.'
I suppose that explained why he and Maya weren't together. Aesthetically, they'd make a perfect couple, but- Oh my god, what am I waffling on about?! I have to sleep with Tristan Darlington!!!
Not that that's the greatest chore in the world.
I shifted uncomfortably, suddenly acutely aware of the fact that I was on the floor with Annabelle, and everyone else was literally looking down at me. I guess Tristan noticed this too and decided to take pity on me, because with one casual wave of his hand everyone suddenly had somewhere better to be, jumping to their feet and muttering unintelligible excuses for leaving the room.
I hoisted myself up on the couch a foot or two away from him and blinked at him dubiously.
'Don't worry Cody,' he said softly. 'As I've been saying all along, we're not doing it.'
'Oh,' I mumbled, looking down at me hands. Despite the somewhat unusual circumstances, the rejection still stung. I decided to steer the focus away from me. 'So Edwin didn't get his powers til he and Gregory...?'
Tristan grimaced at the thought of his dads sleeping together but nodded.
'And Edwin's the most powerful because...'
Tristan shrugged. 'There doesn't seem to be any identifiable reason for it. Nothing genetic or biological. But typically speaking, Virgins tend to end up the most powerful.' That's how he said it too, "Virgins", like it was capitalized.
'So, I'll be...?'
Tristan nodded. 'Sure. If you lose you virginity to someone like me, someone who was born with powers, then you'll be just as powerful as Edwin, after a little practice.'
I frowned. 'What if I sleep with a normal person? Or someone like me, another "Virgin" or whatever?'
Tristan's face twisted slightly, but I couldn't read the expression on it. Wishful thinking indicated jealousy, but obviously that wasn't it. 'Then you'll lose your powers completely.' He paused. 'It would be for the best.'
I was too overwhelmed to even argue with him this time. 'Why don't you want me to have powers?' I asked quietly. 'I mean, obviously I'm meant to. Why won't you let me have them?'
Uncharacteristically worried about his answer, Tristan bit his lip. 'I know this will be hard for you to understand,' he started, 'but if I'd been given the choice... I wouldn't have chosen this. If Kaley weren't so powerful, she wouldn't have been taken. I know having never had to deal with them you won't believe me, but they're more of a burden than a gift, Cody.'
I fiddled for a second before replying quietly. 'But what gives you the right to make that decision for me?'
Tristan laughed bitterly. 'Well seeing as I'd be the one inside you, I think I have some say in the matter.'
I burned red, but refused to be shamed out of arguing. 'It's not that big a deal,' I murmured. 'It's just sex.'
'No it's not, Cody,' Tristan said gently. 'Your entire life would be changed forever. For the first week you'd be volatile and vulnerable; you could be taken just like Kaley was. And once your powers are fully manifested...' He trailed off, running a hand through his hair in frustration. 'Well, to put it simply, you can't die.'
I glanced up at him, surprised. This, they'd managed to keep from me. ''What? Like vampires or something?'
He allowed himself a smile. 'No. You'll die, but you'll be back. Average lifespan of ninety years... Over and over and over again. Forever.'
I stared at him, suddenly numb. For some reason this seemed like an even bigger deal than the sex thing. I guess it was. 'How... How old are you? Like, really, how many times have you been around?'
Tristan smiled at my curiously. 'Four.'
'So you know for sure? You can remember everything?'
He shrugged. 'Almost. As with humans, memories before the age of four or five are blurry to non-existent. But yes, I remember my other "lives", if that's what you want to call them.'
I was suddenly curious to know everything about Tristan. 'Did you have your powers straight away every time?'
He nodded.
'What about me? If I went around again, would I have to have sex with someone again before I got my powers back?'
He shook his head. 'No. If you got them this time, you'd have them from the word go next time.'
'So I wouldn't be as powerful?'
'No, you would.'
He was giving staccato answers to my similarly bullet-like questions and I realised this was descending into a Q&A session, rather than a conversation. 'So when were you born the first time? Tell me everything.'
'I was born in the 1720s,' he said, grinning because he knew that would amaze me.
'Were you always called Tristan Darlington?' I interrupted.
'No. First time I was John Williams the Third,' he grinned. 'Much less flowery.'
'The third?'
He nodded. 'My father was a member of the House of Lords, and I inherited his title once he died.'
I stared at him, awed. 'So you're like royalty or something?'
Tristan looked at cynically. 'No Cody,' he said patiently. 'I had an empty title for twenty years in the 1700s. Nothing more.'
I slumped, disappointed. 'Oh.' Then I perked up again. 'Did you have any kids?'
Tristan raised an eyebrow. 'Gay, remember?'
'Oh yeah. Wasn't that illegal and stuff?'
'Yes. But as you may have noticed, I am somewhat unusual. I had ways of getting around that.'
'Oh. So really you're like four hundred years old!'
'Three hundred and seventy seven.'
'Dude that's really old. Like really old.'
'For all intents and purposes I'm seventeen,' Tristan reminded me. 'I died three times, remember?'
'What's dying like?'
He shrugged. 'It's different depending on how you go. Gregory likes it, Annabelle too. They think it's... Liberating. I'm not such a fan.'
We stayed in the sitting room talking about Tristan's past for hours, until it started to get dark outside and he excused himself to his room to prepare for tomorrow.
It was only after sitting there by myself, ruminating on what I'd learned, for several more hours until the clock on the mantle struck midnight, that I realised, with a pang of annoyance, that he'd successfully distracted me from trying to get him to give me my own powers.
I'm an idiot.
-----------------------------------
I climbed the stairs softly, pausing for quite a few moments outside Tristan's door before finally gathering up the courage to knock.
'Come in,' he called monotonously, and I opened the door to see his eyes fading from black back to their usual deep brown. He sighed. 'I was hoping it would take you longer,' he muttered, and I flushed. It had taken me ages to realise what he'd done.
I took a deep breath, knowing full well how desperate this was going to make me sound, but knowing I'd never forgive myself if I didn't try. Particularly if something happened tomorrow night that screwed the whole thing up.
'I think we should do it,' I said, quietly but firmly.
'No,' Tristan said cheerfully, amicably.
'Look,' I said seriously, trying not to let my temper rise. The last thing I needed now was for my "latent powers" or whatever they were to make an appearance; it wouldn't exactly work in my favour. 'I heard what you said before and I accept it. But the whole reason I'm here is because you guys thought I could help somehow. I wouldn't even be here if you didn't need me to be. Gregory's already said I have to be there tomorrow, but what if something goes wrong? What if I can't protect myself and I get hurt?'
Tristan's jaw clenched on that, but I ignored it and kept going.
'What if somebody else gets hurt because they're too busy trying to protect me, to protect themselves? I need to be on the same level as everybody else, it's not fair on anybody if I'm not. It's okay for you, you'll be off getting Kaley on your own, a whole different branch of what's going on, but if we get in trouble while you're not there, it's me and the others that will suffer. Edwin and Gregory keep saying that you're a natural leader and I need to learn to trust you, but I think it's irresponsible of you put us all in danger just because you don't want to sleep with me.'
Tristan opened his mouth to say something but I continued before he could.
'A real leader needs to know when to let the people he's leading work for themselves. All you have to do is give me the tools to do it.'
We stared at each other in silence across the room for a moment, but then Tristan shook his head and I knew I'd lost. 'No, Cody. I'm sorry, but no. I hear you, I really do, but if you think I don't know how much sex means to you, you're wrong. Even if I didn't know you personally, people in your position, Virgins like you and Edwin, it always means so much more. Your subconscious knows on some level what's gonna happen once you give it up and makes the first time a really big deal. I'm not gonna let you give it up on a whim just because we're doing something dangerous tomorrow night. The chance of anything going wrong is minimal. Gregory has this planned down to the smallest detail, down to the second. You'll be fine, I promise.'
I glanced down at my feet. I wasn't about to beg him, I had some dignity left. 'Don't make promises you can't keep,' I whispered instead, before turning around and leaving the room.
I climbed slowly up the last staircase to my attic room, shutting the door softly behind me before throwing myself down on the bed, crawling under the covers and pulling them over my head. I didn't want to cry at the painful throb of rejection that was churning around in my tummy, but before I could stop it rogue tears were starting to run slowly down my cheeks. I bit my lip hard to try and make them stop; if I had red eyes at breakfast tomorrow everybody would know why and I don't think I could handle much more humiliation.
I'm not sure how much time passed but I was jolted out of my self-pitying reverie by a soft knock on the door. Still too scared to be seen by anybody in case they could see I'd been crying, I kept silent and still, hoping they'd think I was asleep and go away.
No such luck. The door creaked open and somebody asked, 'Cody?' It was Tristan. Obviously. Who else would it be? Who else would fate send my way at this worst possible time?
I mumbled and shifted under the covers to make it seem like I was asleep and resented being woken up. Tristan snorted.
'You'd never win an Oscar,' he told me, shutting the door behind him. Stubbornly, I remained under the covers, and he sighed. 'I've been thinking about what you said. You're right.'
My heart started to pound erratically in my chest.
'It's unfair of me to send you into a dangerous situation ill-equipped. Even if nothing goes wrong, you deserve the peace of mind of knowing you could protect yourself if it did.'
I stayed stock still underneath the covers while he was speaking, then slowly peeped out from underneath them. He was standing at the bottom of my bed, wearing his usual uniform of sweatpants and not much else. Not for the first time, I wondered if he knew just how good a look that was for him.
He moved around to the side of my bed. 'So if you still want to, yes, of course, I'll give you your powers.'
I lay where I was, still shocked, blinking at him.
He jerked his head slightly. 'Come here.'
But of course, he wasn't the only stubborn ass in the house. 'No,' I said petulantly.
Tristan rolled his eyes. 'Just come here, would you?'
I weighed my options, then sat up and shifted towards him on my knees, still glaring at him. 'Lovely and all as it is for you to deign to have sex with me, I actually-'
Tristan cut me off my slipping one hand gently around the side of my neck, and leaning forward to press his lips to mine.
My breath caught but I stubbornly knelt there, stock still, refusing to kiss him back on the basis of pure petulance, until he moved his lips against mine gently and my whole body melted. With a contented sigh I let my arms wrap around his neck and kissed him back, his other arm circling my lower back to pull me closer.
Tristan's lips were soft but his kissing increased in intensity until we were both gasping but too caught up in the pleasure of it to stop.
He pushed me down so I was laying on my back and his body was pressed against mine on the bed, his hands running across my ribs before slipping under my shirt and tugging it off over my head. He resumed kissing me, his lower body rubbing against mine slightly until I was so turned on I could barely breathe.
Before I could even comprehend the magnitude of what was happening, he was between my legs and looking down at me, his eyes completely black. 'Are you sure you want this?' he asked, his voice deeper than usual.
I nodded, not trusting my voice. Tristan put his hand on my chest and I could feel a warmth spreading from where his skin touched mine all over my body; I knew somehow that it was some sort of anaesthetic to deal with the pain and wondered how many times he's done this before, if he'd ever done this before.
'No,' he said in the same voice. 'I've never done this before.' I was about to demand if he could always read my mind or if it was because of the situation we were in, but all thoughts were obliterated from my head when I felt the greatest, most pleasurable sensation I've ever felt.
Tristan leaned down to kiss me again, muffling any sounds I might have made, not that I had the breath to make them. All I could manage was the occasionally satisfied whimper, but he didn't seem to mind.
When it was all over I got pretty emotional, I cried a bit. Not because I regretted it or anything, but because he was right; sex had always seemed like a big deal to me and it was overwhelming to have lost my virginity, never mind the circumstances under which I'd lost it.
Though it didn't really feel like losing.
Tristan was really understanding, pulling me close to him and wrapping his arms around me, murmuring soothing sounds and stroking my hair until I calmed down and, feeling inexplicably loved, drifted off to sleep.