The treesmoved.
Not the three giants, but those all around it. They grew before our eyes, their branches and roots intertwining and expanding. Until we were surrounded as far as I could see into the dense foliage.
It wasn’t just the trees. The plants that relied and grew upon them expanded too, until the ferns had fronds taller than me. Everywhere you looked, birds, insects, and animals flew, buzzed, and leaped through the leaves. We were engulfed in life.
I sensed the moment Nikolai finished channeling the power and started wrestling it back into the earth. It didn’t want to go, but Cara helped him return it. Until finally, it lay quiet again. For now.
Fang shook against my neck, and my jaw hung open. Nikolai took a deep breath and lowered his arms. I’d never sensed anything like that before, and I never wanted to again. Suddenly, I understood why no one should ever unleash this guy. He was fucking dangerous, and coming from me, that said a lot.
“This way,” Cara said. The others followed her amid the massive trees. I trailed along behind.
The Watcher led us between two giant buttress roots, and where they met the central spire of the trunk, there was an opening.
Only then did I realize that the trunk wasn’t solid. The buttress roots supported upright trunks running straight and true for a few hundred feet before they sent branches and leaves to the sky. They leaned and interwove with each other to frame a large, hollow center.
Other roots had been grown to create stairs that took us between the levels. Flattened living wood formed the floors. What we’d seen from the outside was only the surface of what Nikolai had done—he’d grown Cara a multi-level home.From living fucking trees.
As we took the stairs, I saw that each level had a slightly different purpose. The second and third were lined with shelves of books, and Nikolai placed the skull on the third-level table.
Vali was rapt. “These look old,” she said.
“They are,” Cara affirmed. “Very old. We’ve pooled a lot of resources at the new academy library, but I held these back. Each is one of a kind, and very valuable.” She walked to the shelves along the far wall and gestured to them. “These are the references I thought you could look into. Don’t bother with the books on the topmost shelf, those focus on animals long extinct. And the ones with red dots on them have copies at the academy, so don’t worry about those, either. The ones on the middle shelf are exclusive copies and ancient, I’d start there.”
Vali’s eyes lit right up, and we left her standing before the books, her fingers twitching as though she didn’t know which to select first.
I’d rescued a bloody book nerd. No wonder Ace had liked her.
Maybe Fate had known what she was doing with Ace and Vali. If so, she’d been cruel to put them together and then rip them apart.
But then, I’d always believed that about the Fate bitch.
Cara led the rest of us up to the fourth level that had been outfitted as a kitchen. I stared at the oven, fridge, and freezer combination in shock.
I wasn’t the only one. “Do those work?” the Satyr asked.
Cara pointed to the wires that disappeared between the ridged walls. “Solar panels linked to crystals,” she said, and led us through an archway.
Nikolai had woven branches together to form a balcony, and others to form a walkway to the next cluster of trunks framing yet another living house. “The guest bedrooms are over there,” she said.
Guest bedrooms? She expected to haveguests? Well, this was one guest that wasn’t staying.
“Are we going after the Jumper, or not?” I knew she had a name, but I just couldn’t bring myself to use it.
“Have you fixed this place in your mind?” she asked. “Because the best plan is for her to Jump here.”
“If she can,” I growled.
“If she can,” Cara agreed. “And if you give her the image, she will try. Which means you will need to evaluate if she is ready for it before you send it.” She fixed me with a hard stare. “So do not send it without determining that.”
Great. Based on what I’d sensed from the Dreambitch, I would be part of this circus for longer than I wanted to be.
“If she cannot recover quickly,” Cara said, “You will have to get her out of that volcanic dead zone on your own power.”
“You aren’t coming?” Kiko asked.
The Watcher shook her head. “Nikolai and I will stay here.”
“I don’t need a babysitter.” Nikolai looked at his mate. “Aria and I can stay here alone.”
