Kael.
The sight of him in danger had me exploding. I jerked away from the woman’s hold and wheeled toward her. There was no hesitation as I raised my hand and sent a volley of magic straight at her chest.
She was dead before she hit the ground.
The last man standing backed away. Tobias let out a sudden yelp. The man glanced at his leader, then back to me. His jaw clenched, then he shifted into a wolf. I planted my feet and braced myself for the attack. The wolf dodged past me, and I pivoted to find his long strides carrying him quickly away.
Coward.
I raised my hand, the ancient, ruthless part of me ready to end him before he took another step. But instead, I pulled in a deep breath and lowered my hand. Hitting someone in the back was not something I would do, no matter how much the magic inside of me wanted it.
Behind me, the forest grew silent, and I turned, half-afraid of what I would find.
Kael had Tobias in his jaws. He dropped the black wolf, who then fell limply to the ground. Kael loped over, his yellow eyes looking me up and down. He tilted his head.
“I’m all right,” I said.
It wasn’t an exact truth. Blood from the wolf’s bite was soaking the sleeve of my jacket, and my head was ringing.
Kael strode to my bag and nudged it. I took the hint and pulled out the spare set of clothes we’d bought a couple days ago. I turned around while he shifted and got dressed.
“Livvie, I don’t care.”
My brow furrowed. “What?”
Kael stepped in front of me. “About what Tobias told you. I don’t care that you’re a magic-wielder.”
That made me way happier than it should have. I shouldn’t care what Kael thought of me one way or another, but I did.
The shifter pulled some bandaging out of my bag and pushed up the sleeve of my jacket. He started winding the bandage around my arm, and I barely held back a wince.
“You’re a good fighter,” he said as he finished.
“I wasn’t trying to be. I didn’t want to hurt anyone.”
Much less kill three people.
I shoved the thought back. I wouldn’t think about it.
Kael nodded. “I know you didn’t.” His gaze swept over my face. “You got a cut on your cheek.”
I hadn’t even realized. It must have happened while I was struggling against the shifters. Kael reached up to touch the cut under my eye. His hand lingered on my cheek, his rough, warm fingertips sending a heated flash down my body.
Then his hand jerked back, and I gasped.
The ground shook, and the fingers of a sudden chill traced across my skin. Dark magic rippled through the air. It tugged at the key and beckoned me forward like a confident, sneering villain. I grabbed my bag and knife and started through the forest, leaving the bodies of the wolf shifters in our wake.
Silently, we stepped around the dark, damp trunks of the trees. Fog billowed in, wrapping around our ankles and cloaking our way. My skin pebbled with the growing cold. After a while, Kael paused and squinted at the fog. I peered around as well, and my gaze fell on an unusual tree.
The trunk was contorted into the shape of an old man, the face and beard formed with twisted, ancient bark. Two warped knots formed eyes that appeared to be staring at me. I pulled my gaze from the unnerving tree as Kael started forward again.
At first, the key led my way through the trees, but as the fog thickened, everything began to look the same. Trees and fog and silent, bare branches. I tried to lead the way, but after an hour, I found myself facing the old man tree again. I led the way again, confident that this time I would get us closer to the mage. My heart sank when, once again, I was facing the familiar tree.
There was no denying it. We were lost.
“Let me give it a try,” Kael said.
I followed his wide back through the forest. How would he know where to go? Could he sense the dark magic permeating the air, too? Could he smell it?
We wove through the trees and thick mist. Suddenly, Kael let out a sharp sigh.
We were facing the warped tree again, the knotted eyes fixed mockingly upon us. I grabbed the key around my neck and, willing it to work, headed off into the forest. Kael grumbled under his breath behind me.
“I’m trying,” I snapped, throwing a glare at him over my shoulder. Couldn’t he see that? It wasn’t like he did much better.
“Well, why isn’t the key working?”
“How am I supposed to know? Wearing the key around my neck didn’t suddenly make me an expert on ancient, magical relics!”
Kael scowled. “You don’t have to yell.”
“I’m not yelling!”
Okay, that time I was. A little.
The air grew thicker, the fog pressing in closer. Within my clenched fists, my nails bit into my palms.
The shifter came closer to me as the ringing in my ears grew louder. “Why would you bring us here only to get us lost?”
I wanted to pull my arm back and send it smashing into his face.
Wait. No, I didn’t.
I unclenched my grinding teeth and looked down at my fists. What was I doing?
I closed my eyes and shook my head in an attempt to dispel the ringing in my skull. When I glanced back up at Kael, his scowl turned into a confused frown. He had come to the same conclusion.
Something was trying to turn us against each other.
“Let’s just get out of here.” Kael’s own fists loosened as he turned and headed into the trees.
I hurried after Kael before the fog could swallow him, but paused. Something was urging me to go in all directions, some invisible force tugging me this way and that. I spun in a circle, and magic unfurled in my hands. What was pulling at me?
Whispers sifted through the fog, and goosebumps crawled across my skin.
The mage, the voices said.
My heart jumped. I peered around through the thick mist, only vaguely processing that Kael was no longer in sight.
More whispers brushed my ears. The key has found the mage.
My breath quickened as I searched and searched, afraid the dark mage would snatch me from the shadows at any second. Then, all at once, the tugging sensation stopped. I stood still in the quiet and the mist.
The mage is found.
My scalp prickled, and my heart thrummed faster. The whispers couldn’t mean me, could they?
I reached up to grab a hold of the key, and my lips parted in surprise. I glanced down to find not one, but two keys.
I swallowed. How had I gotten the first key back?
I squinted at it. The gold was stained with dark red. I dropped the key in surprise. My hands were covered in blood.
No.
What was going on?
Crackling echoed behind me, and I spun around to find the forest on fire. Flames licked up the trunks of trees and chased away the thick blanket of fog.
Several feet in front of me, Kael lay on the ground, his blood quickly soaking into the damp earth. Bile burned up my throat as I hurried forward and knelt beside him. His eyes were wide, and he stared at me as if…as if he were afraid of me.
“Why did you have to sacrifice me?” he asked. A trail of blood bubbled from his mouth.
“I…I didn’t. Kael, what happened?” I grabbed his shoulder, but as soon as I touched him, he burst into ash.
I shrieked and rocked back on my heels.
“Hey! What are you doing? Hurry up!”
I blinked. The scent of blood and smoke dissipated. Kael peered at me over his shoulder a few yards away.
It had been a vision. Just a vision.
My knees shook as I got to my feet. I hurriedly checked but found only the key from the ruins in Scotland. I rubbed my temples as I trekked toward Kael.
Was the vision from myself, or the mage?
I quickened my pace in an attempt to catch up to Kael’s retreating back. Impatient man. He was moving much too quickly. He disappeared around a large tree, but when I got to it, I could no longer see him.
“Kael?” I called out. My voice was swallowed in the fog. There was no answer. In the distance, I caught the muffled snapping of twigs, and I hurried toward the sound. “Kael, wait!” Branches whipped at me as I ran, unease sinking into my stomach as I thought about what could happen if we were to get separated. “Kael!”
“Over here.”
I let out a breath as I found him beside a tree. I threw him a scowl as I caught up to him, but he didn’t seem to notice. He merely turned and walked briskly away.
“I think I know where we are going now.”
“How?”
He didn’t answer; he merely let his long strides lead our way through the forest. Though everything looked the same, a sense of familiarity tickled at me. We had been in this part of the forest before. Kael was doing nothing but leading us right back to where we had started.
“Kael, I don’t think this is the way.”
He didn’t respond. He didn’t look back or say anything.
“Hey, did you hear me?”
Nothing.
“Kael, stop.” I jogged to get beside him. “I said, stop.”
Kael finally halted and looked up. He wasn’t looking at me, exactly...more over my shoulder. “This is the way.”
His gaze seemed to glide past me, as if he were afraid to make eye contact.
Curious, I peered behind me to see if there was something he was more interested in looking at. It was the tree again, with the old man’s face. The magic inside of me was twisting, uneasy. The tree seemed different, almost warped, as if it was trying to move and reshape as I stared at it. I stepped closer to the trunk. Slowly, I reached my hand up. Inches away from the twisted bark, my palm tingled.
“There’s no time.” Kael grabbed my shoulder. “We have to hurry.”
As he started to leave again, I tore my stare from the tree and took a few quick steps to catch up with Kael. I grabbed his arm to stop him. His skin was icy, and something in me knew that was wrong.
Shifters didn’t get cold; he’d told me so himself.
I pinned my gaze on his face, but he still wouldn’t make eye contact with me. My stomach squirmed, and I let go of his arm.
“Who are you?” My voice was firm, showing more conviction than I felt. “You’re not Kael.”
“Of course I am. Stop being so ridiculous. We don’t have time for this.”
I shook my head. “Tell me now. Who are you?”
He edged closer, leaving barely a few inches between us. His chilly fingers slid under my chin and lifted my face up. He finally looked at me. His eyes were rimmed in red.
“It’s me. You know it’s me.”
I retreated back a step and pulled out my knife.
The man laughed. “What, are you going to stab me, Olivia?”
Olivia.
Kael had taken to calling me Livvie.
This was definitely not Kael.