I owed Emil. I owed all three of them.
Taking a deep breath, I let it out slowly, listening for any sounds coming from the chamber. Kieran had left a bit ago to check on things. And Poppy…
She still slept.
A surge of energy fueled by desperation and anger flooded my veins and hit the air around me, cooling the bathing chamber. I knew what the power was.
Primal essence.
I’d always felt it on some level. All Atlantians—especially Elemental Atlantians and wolven—did. But never like this.
I could feel where the eather was entrenched deep in my bones and fused with my muscles. I could feel it coursing through my veins, creating a steady hum in my blood. Opening my eyes, I lifted my head.
I saw it in my reflection.
Where the aura behind my pupils had always been a faint silver, it was now a bright glow. If I looked closely enough, I could see fine threads radiating out from the orbs of eather, piercing the golden hue of my eyes. I’d seen the same in Kieran’s, though with his already vivid, cerulean gaze, it wasn’t as noticeable. Still, what I was staring at right now, and what I’d seen when I looked at Kieran, was impossible.
At least it should have been.
Kieran and I had a pretty good idea what had made this possible. The thing that’d allowed me to not only heal from beingstabbed in the heart with a blade that probably should’ve killed me but also shift into a cave cat. The same reason I knew exactly how worried Emil was when I woke, tasting the emotion in the back of my throat—thick like heavy cream.
The Joining.
It was the only explanation we could come up with. It made sense, but neither of us expected the Joining to do more than ensure our lives were tied to Poppy’s.
I knew in my bones that I wasn’t only an Elemental Atlantian anymore. And Kieran wasn’t just a wolven. We had become…something else.
What had that Rev called me? A false Primal? The bigger, badder version of a demis? I’d never heard of such a thing. Then again, apparently, there was a lot of shit I hadn’t heard of.
But I didn’t think that was what we were. I couldn’t say exactly why I felt that way, but it probably had something to do with the essence I could feel moving around in me. It was too powerful to be a false god’s or even a false Primal’s. It was cold and infinite.
Ancient.
Just like the Primal mist—the essence taking form—I’d seen churning around Kieran and me before we decided to take our power naps.
Concentrating on the hum of eather, I willed it forward. It pulsed behind my pupils and expanded until the strands churned through my irises, no longer just silver. My skin cooled and hardened, then thinned until I saw the essence gliding beneath it. My fingers slid against the counter as I tracked the swirls of eather. It wasn’t like the Primal mist I’d seen surrounding Kieran. His had been gold and silver. Mine was silver and crimson.
I watched crimson-streaked shadows flow over my bare shoulders and willed the eather to settle. It responded at once.My skin warmed as the shadows slowed and then disappeared. The chill left the air, and the glow of the eather in my eyes dimmed. There was no denying what I saw and felt.
The essence that had transferred from Poppy to us wasn’t the same. Somehow, the two she had within her had split between us.
Life.
Death.
And I had no idea what that made us. Or what it meant for the future.
I’d just finished bathing and changing Poppy when I became aware of Kieran drawing close. My fingers halted around the delicate clasp of the necklace that held my ring.
Because of our bond as an Elemental Atlantian and a wolven, we’d always been able to sense each other’s proximity. When Poppy began her Ascension, and the Primalnotamkicked in, that had stopped.
But it had changed yet again.
Sensing where Kieran was didn’t happen immediately after we woke up. I couldn’t say exactlywhenI’d started to pick up on his whereabouts again over the last two days, but I had. And it wasn’t the only thing that was new.
Hearing the sound of a second set of footsteps and claws rapping off the stone floor, I leaned over and placed the necklace on the bedside table. Kieran wasn’t alone, which explained the quiet knock.
“Come in,” I called, running my thumb over Poppy’s cool knuckles.
