“Stop!” Sam shouted across the shadows.
She didn’t.
She ran, swerving between trees and ducking beneath branches, leaping from rock to rock as she climbed, higher and higher, to the spot where the woods thinned and the world was little more than air and boulder.
“Stop, please,” he tried again, reaching out his hand.
She blew through him, her man made of mist, and kept staring straight ahead at the peak growing larger by the second, pushing harder and harder the closer she traveled.
“Pandora,” he murmured, desperate and pained.
But it wasn’t that voice that stopped her cold, that made her dig her feet into the dirt and fall over, slamming her head into the ground as her entire body froze.
It was the steep cliff.
It was the threat of a one-hundred-foot fall that might not kill her, but would definitely hurt like hell.
And if she was being honest, it was the enclave. Because when she stretched her arm forward and grasped the edge of the stone, then pulled herself over the rocks, there it was. Tucked into the heart of the valley, surrounded on all sides by towering mountains and thick forest, was the titan base where she’d grown up. Home, if she could even call it that.
Her heart squeezed painfully tight.
Pandora closed her eyes, hating the weakness, hating the ache. She’d been gone for four years, but all of that time disappeared in an instant. For a moment, she was still a little girl, still an outcast, still a failure. Because really, what had changed?
She still had no family.
No friends.
No future.
She’d spent four years convincing herself she’d grown into a powerful, fearless woman, and yet here she was, huddled and hiding, unable to open her eyes because of the memories that threatened to crash through all the carefully constructed walls she’d built. So many lonely hours in that empty house. So many tears. So much confusion. So much wondering why none of the other girls wanted to come over and play, why no one would help her train outside of class, why all the adults stared as she walked by. So much rejection. A lifetime of it. Except for one person, one boy who’d opened up the door to his heart.
Only to slam it in my face.
“Pandora,” Sam whispered, voice soothing.
His finger brushed over her neck. She flinched—not from him, but from the fact that she so obviously needed comfort, needed help.
“Don’t let them own you,” Sam said. “Don’t let them affect you.”
Pandora took a deep breath, forcing her emotions back inside and demanding they lie still, demanding they go dormant in the winter cold of her heart. And then she swallowed and sat up, slowly opening her eyes.
“What don’t you want me to know, Sam?”
He didn’t answer.
Pandora turned, looking up to where he stood over her, silhouetted by the sun and by their ever-present shadows. “Why did you tell me to stop? What are you afraid of?”
His shoulders dropped, subtle but noticeable as he turned his head away, turned toward the enclave a few hundred feet below. “I’m afraid of losing you again.”
Pandora followed his gaze, then clenched her muscles as her eyes took in the grounds below—the homes, the buildings, the practice fields, the school, and the wall that had never done a very good job of keeping her in, but instead just made her ache to get out.
Her focus returned to the stoic man beside her. “Why didn’t you tell me I used to die willingly?”
“Because it’s not important.” He clenched his jaw, and the muscle in his cheek ticked. “Because that was a thousand years ago in a different world, before they stole your memories away, before they decided to keep you ignorant and weak, like a cow gorging on food before being led to the slaughter. Maybe you should ask yourself what changed? Why they stopped giving you a choice?”
A choice? she thought, returning back to the fading nightmare, to the girl with the beads and the garb walking freely to her death. It hadn’t seemed like a choice, but a duty, a terrible, terrible obligation.
“Why are they killing me, Sam?” she asked softly, confused and conflicted. “Over and over again.”
“That’s not the right question,” he said with a heavy sigh, kneeling to wrap his fingers around her hand before tugging her to her feet. “The question is why are you still letting them?”
Am I? she silently asked herself. She’d run away. She’d left to protect herself. She’d escaped their prison. She’d outsmarted them, outpowered them, outmaneuvered them.
And yet, here she was.
Possibly falling right back into their trap.
Sam sensed her hesitation. “Can I try something?”
“What?” She shrugged, fight seeping out more and more with each passing second.
“Something to make you remember, really remember for yourself, so you’re not relying on the lies other people will tell you.”
She didn’t answer, but she didn’t have to. He could read her. He understood every thought that ran through her mind, every wayward emotion stirring in her heart, every weakness and every strength. It was unfair, really, how well he knew her when she felt that with him she was grasping at air.
Sam stepped closer and pressed his chest into her back. She melted into his touch. Even now, at a time like this, so urgent, when she was so close to her goal, he had a way of making her forget, of making everything besides them feel less important, less pressing…just less.
He brushed his fingers over her shoulders like fluttering wings before drifting them down her arms to wrap around her hands, steady and strong while hers trembled. He leaned down so that his chin rested beside her neck, and his cheek ever so softly touched hers, hair a velvet curtain between them. And then he lifted her arms, held them aloft so they fanned to either side, and dropped his palms to her waist, where he gripped her hip bones, shooting a warm tingle down her thighs.
“Step forward,” he murmured, voice an elixir, too potent to deny.
But there was nowhere to go. They were at the edge of a cliff, suspended a hundred feet in the air.
“Trust me,” he urged.
So she inched out, listening to the silent command of his strong hands pressing her forward, until her toes stretched beyond the last bit of rock, and her body wavered, balanced on the edge. Sam’s warm, wispy touch became her anchor to the world as her heart thudded, fear and exhilaration mixing into a thrill that made her body buzz with anticipation.
A strong wind thrust against them, pushing her body back into Sam’s as the breeze wrapped around her arms, her clothes, sending her hair flying in every different direction. She dropped her head back against his chest as the wind grew stronger, swifter, an invisible river rushing over them. Sam leaned forward into the pressure, more and more, until they were suspended, nearly flying, barely touching solid ground.
“Close your eyes. Clear your mind,” Sam murmured, gently rubbing against the bare skin above the waistline of her pants, his fingers drifting higher. “We spent so many hours like this, soaring, flying. I think it’s what I missed the most, the feel of you in my arms and the wind at our backs, utterly free, so happy I thought I might burst on the spot. This was our real dance, drifting and plummeting and climbing and free-falling, spiraling down together, testing who would break first. Usually me, because you’ve always been stubborn and brave. And there were other times too when we were lazy and slow and greedily savoring each moment, watching the sky turn lavender, watching the stars come to life, fighting off the rising sun.”
The more he spoke, the more her chest began to tingle. Colors danced before her closed eyes, swirls of light and life, not memories, more like emotions drifting from her heart to mind, trying to make her remember. Her body grew lighter, weights being lifted one by one, drifting away until for a moment she really thought she began to float, to rise. The hard shell around her core melted away, shooting layers of warmth down her arms, all the way to her toes. A smile rose on her lips.
And suddenly, she could feel it.
Feel them.
His hand in hers. The wind racing by.
She was there.
She was back.
She couldn’t see the memory, but she felt it blossoming to life within her.
A perfect moment.
Pure happiness, pure joy, pure belonging.
Fireworks exploded in her chest, bright sparks that lingered and glittered, one after the other, until she was giddy in the afterglow, in the lingering burn that was slow and steady and building. And she could sense Sam, not with her eyes but with her entire being, as though they were one person woven together from two souls, an awareness so acute she gasped at not having noticed it before. Their hearts beat in tune. Their skin buzzed as though they were two magnets, charged and trembling and aching to close the gap. They moved as one, dipping and diving, not speaking, just anticipating and trusting. Pandora had never felt anything like it before—to be so carefree, so confident, so sure. To know exactly who she was and what she was, to know she was exactly where she was supposed to be—by his side. There were no questions, no doubts. There was only Sam. And her. And how everything seemed better when they were together, how her whole world seemed brighter.
They were invincible.
Unbreakable.
“It can be like this again,” Sam whispered, pressing his lips to the bare skin of her neck. A shiver raced through her. “We can be like this again. All you have to do is trust your feelings, trust in us. Leave your doubts behind. Let the wind carry them away, and stay here with me, in our endless midnight.”
Pandora opened her eyes.
The world was painted in ebony. It wasn’t the wind pressing against them, but endless smoke, swirls and swirls of inky tendrils rushing past them like a flood of black night. Boundless power. And it was theirs.
Pandora spun in Sam’s arms and stared into his deep sapphire eyes. They were silently pleading, silently begging. She leaned up, pressing into her toes to lift her body higher, to close the gap. Everything happened in slow motion. His face brightened. He smiled. The darkness spun like a tornado around them. She clutched his shoulders. He wrapped his arms around her waist. Their mouths moved closer. Their bodies molded together. Their lips touched.
The world stopped.
Heat flared like an explosion within her.
Because his skin was on her skin.
He was solid. A man. Hungry and passionate and real.
Not wispy. Not a phantom. Not made of shadow.
But not enough.
She wanted him with every fiber of her being, but that wasn’t enough. Because while the woman she once was loved him beyond a doubt, in this life, she was still broken. Still shattered. Still the girl who didn’t know how to fly, who didn’t know how to take such a trusting leap of faith. And to be honest, she didn’t think that was a bad thing.
She was smart.
She was independent.
And she was capable of making the decision for herself, when all the facts were laid bare, when all the choices were clear.
She refused to be the pawn any longer—not for the titans, not for Jax, and not for Sam. A thousand lifetimes ago, maybe she needed a man to define her. But she didn’t anymore. And that was just fine with her.
“I’m sorry,” Pandora murmured against his lips, finally voicing her answer to the question he wouldn’t stop asking.
Sam froze.
The shadows froze.
Then, just as quickly, all the power spinning around them closed in like a vortex.
“I’m not the woman you think I am,” she continued softly, as the darkness wedged its way between them, dragging him away. “Not anymore.”
Before he could say anything, Sam was gone.
The shadows were sucked away in the vacuum of his absence, leaving only a thin mist behind, enough to keep her hidden, but not enough to keep her weightless, to keep her floating in the void. She returned to earth, heavy and empty at the same time.
And then her stomach leapt into her throat.
Because her toes were stretched over the edge of the cliff, the wind had died down, and her body wobbled over the precipice, unsteady and unsure.
Pandora had a split second to think, to decide.
And she jumped.
Sinking through air.
Falling. Spinning.
Head over heels, racing past rock.
The ground shot up.
The sky drew back.
But she wasn’t afraid, because she’d made a leap of faith, only this time it was for herself. She was calm as she slid her eyes closed, drawing her power closer, imagining the spot she needed to be, no longer afraid to face it.
And when she opened her eyes, she was there.
Standing at the edge of her backyard, looking at the barren house that had somehow taught her to be strong, surprised to find her father staring back.