The wolf shuddered before he rose to his feet, padded closer to the fire—to me—and lay down again.
With my hand resting on the wolf’s shoulder, I pressed against the wiry pelt, the iron muscles, the impossible bands beneath my palm. But a thread of energy trickled when I syphoned, offered an easing. And after an hour, his breathing relaxed.
I laid down close to the wolf’s back with my arm across his ribcage, under the forelegs. During the night, I woke to movement. Grayson was sleeping beside me, not the wolf. Carefully, I slipped away, found a blanket and covered us both, my arm around him once again. I counted each time his chest rose and fell. Counted each beat of his heart while tears ran down my cheeks.
Hours later, I woke alone on the floor, my body too stiff to move. Searching for anything except why I was alone, I pushed upright. Took time to refold the blanket. We were in the house of memories, but beyond it was the private wrinkle the King of the Forest created for Grayson decades ago. All I had to do was walk through the bathroom. Cross the simple threshold no one else knew was there. Only Grayson and I… We knew…
Perhaps he was already waiting.
Frowning, I walked down the hall, but the memory of what hid on the other side of that magic doorway halted me beside the bathtub that was bone dry.
Did I want to trespass? Go through, stand in Grayson’s other house, the one Fee built? Remember those long days, secretive nights when we’d lived another life? The warmth from those hours in his arms still lingered. A whisper in the night. Like the laughter, when we ran through the summer grass, turning to shrieks when he threw me naked into a pool with a waterfall.
But no memory hit harder than when we finally understood the strength in the mating bond. When the denial collapsed, stripping every emotion bare except the truth.
I can’t breathe without you…
We’d been the perfect lovers… but we became mythic. Driven by passion, by rage, we became the ancient pair, capable of devastation. The Dread Lord and the Faille. Written about in history books, foretold in fading legends. I would burn down the world for him. And I’d done it… because of Julien. I’d tried to burn Brin, certainly burned Amal’s creatures. Knowing he would never forgive me.
Not for the burning.
For Julien… and the prophecy I’d proved was right, just as I’d proved my own vision to be wrong. When I stood on that blackened hill, I hadn’t just watched. I’d challenged Amal… changed the vision she’d shown me on the cave walls. I’d torn down that hill to fight, and my arrogance cost Julien his life.
Don’t think, Noa… Don’t sink down in that dark oil of guilt, where I’d been no different from Grayson. Hadn’t wanted to come back. Been so unaware, the healers tied me to the bed, added drugs to insure the oblivion.
“I considered it,” Grayson said from somewhere behind me. “Going through that door to oblivion. Never coming out.”
He looked utterly shattered. How long had he been listening in on my thoughts? It had been so long since he’d done that, I’d almost forgotten that he could.
But I was unable to look at him. He was speaking out loud, not through our mental bond, and I tried not to shudder beneath the lack of intimacy.
Finally, I managed, “You weren’t… I believed you might…”
“Fee’s pocket is a refuge I don’t want.”
Blood pounded through my head, my throat. The last words I’d said to him were about Amal, and Azul, burning.
The last words I’d said to his wolf were a promise of protection. As if I was closing the circle with that pledge. His sigil for mine. Sealing the magic, or the curse, or whatever the hell it was to repay all those reputed sins. The disillusionment, hatred, rivalries. I jolted as if an unseen fist crashed into my heart, stealing my breath.
You’re my mate, Bedisa. A star burning in my heart.
His mental voice was richer, deeper, so soft in my mind. I turned to study his face, sort through each emotion flitting through his eyes—green with shards of blue—then the tightening of his mouth. Was that anger? But his energy told a different story with a thrumming, steady power.
Thank you for coming, he said.
I closed my eyes, rocked with the answers I needed to give him.
“Mace came,” I said, my voice croaky. “Anson gave permission. I would have come on my own if…”
His inhale was unsteady. I swallowed before I asked, “Do you know what day it is?”
A faint smile tipped his mouth. “Christmas morning.”
“Where were you? When I woke up, and you weren’t here…”
He held out his hand. “Come and I’ll show you.”
I wrapped my fingers around his, and his lips twitched. “You might want boots.” He stared at my bare toes. The rumpled clothes I’d slept in. “A coat, too,” he said, laughing when I glared.
