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My hands curled under my chin as I lay next to the dying embers of the fire.
Blinking, I came back into my body, shaking off the cool weight of restless, dreamless sleep. I rubbed my eyes to clear them of grit until I could make out the world. Blurry. Empty. It was damn empty, the fire nearly extinguished and York’s bag still propped near the log he’d been sitting on last night before...
My hands brushed through my hair hard enough to tear the strands from my scalp. I yawned, throat scratchy, and cursed myself for whatever lapse of judgment had let York bolt.
I should have known better than to tie him to a simple tree. Not with his strength. Nothing compared to mine, but formidable in its own right. Here we were in a foreign country and I’d unleashed a literal beast.
“Fuck me,” I said, letting my head drop back.
I’d searched for hours, finding no hint of him, and without any magic of my own I could do nothing to track him down. My other senses might be heightened, but a stupid, mindless shifter he was not. York knew how to cover his tracks in a way that I could not read them.
The open wound in the tree exposing its heartwood stood out as a reminder that I hadn’t been strong enough to keep him here. I’d failed in such a menial task.
I’d had one job: keep York tied down so he didn’t hurt anyone. I couldn’t even do that.
“Yeah, enough of the pity party,” I told the nasty voice in my head.
Propping myself into a seated position, pushing the hair out of my eyes when it fell in unruly waves, I took stock. Against my will, I reached out through the blood bond once again, as though responding to his absence.
I sensed nothing there.
Okay, that wasn’t anything to worry over yet. Leaning forward, I ran my palms over my forehead, eyes closed. “Dammit, York.” Where had he gone? What kind of trouble had he managed to get into? I shuddered to think. He’d never told me about accidents in his past. If there were any, any slips where he’d let the wolf take control and ended up with someone, something, hurt because of it, he’d kept mum. But there were too many unknowns in this case to feel at ease.
My boots dug grooves in the earth as I stood, forcing myself to get a grip because worry wasn’t part of my vocabulary. I’d lived too long to give in to fake emotions like fear.
Hadn’t I?
A clawing sensation gathered beneath my collar bone. Definitely not something I wanted to become accustomed to.
With a growl, I reached out for York again, determined to find him this time. The sun was rising...he’d have returned to his human form by this point. He’d need to find some kind of shelter from the sun or else risk severe burns.
Tracking him should be much easier if he was human.
Again, I saw nothing. Felt nothing. This was worse than the darkness. Worse than the confusion, the anger. This was a giant blank.
My heart began to pound, breath heaving when air refused to flow into my lungs. No, this behavior served no one. I rapped my knuckles against the side of my head. “Get a grip, V.” Just because York escaped and could be out there dead, or still in the throes of whatever murderous rage took him under when he changed, didn’t mean I had to fall apart.
What would Wonder Woman do?
She certainly wouldn’t lie down and cry, that was for damn sure. If anything, she’d use the stress to reinforce her own power, her own calm.
She might be my hero, but if I wanted to emulate her, then I still had a long way to go.
I took a step forward on wobbly legs and hissed when a sharp ping brought my attention to my ankle. I didn’t need to roll up my pants to see the wound York had caused last night. It was healing, all right, but not fast enough. Not nearly fast enough.
It should have been gone by now.
I scratched at the area and glanced around the clearing. The sun began to trek higher above the laced limbs of small grove we’d managed to find. Another hour and then I would panic, I promised myself. Instead I set about trying to use the damn bow and arrow York had given me the day before, determined to catch my breakfast. When those attempts failed with nothing but a stinging left wrist to show for it, I resorted to old faithful.
Brute force.
A slap of my hand against the earth brought all manner of breakfast to me, including a very startled snake that I roasted above the fire, once I got it going again.
One hour came, then went.
The second hour wasn’t far behind it. “I’m going to kill him,” I decided. “I’m going to kill him myself for making me worry.”
I traced the familiar pathway binding us and saw nothing. Again. I’d never thought I’d be upset at the lack of connection, never thought I would actually miss the faint trace of York that stayed in the periphery of my consciousness at all times. And here I sat with my mind conjuring all manner of destructive thoughts regarding his whereabouts.
I was tracing my fingers along the gnarled bark of the tree behind my shoulder when my ears picked up a faint crash in the woods beyond. I leaped to my feet instantly, neck craning toward the sound.
Milliseconds took years to tick by. Then a shadowy figure swam into view. A figure I recognized. Only then could I finally release the tension in my shoulders and spine.
“Do you know how worried I’ve been?” I called out the moment my lungs decided to work again. They pumped slowly, muscle memory drawing air into my body when my organs had difficulty working on their own.
York staggered forward, his clothes tattered rags on a shaking figure covered in blood.
He failed to answer me, and I crept closer, the toes of my boots digging into the dirt when my feet didn’t lift entirely off the ground. Head craned to the side, I stared at him. “York?”
He lifted his head, eyes blurry and slow to swim into focus. His shoulders hunched, quaked, hair lank and stringy from his night out. Blisters had popped up along the exposed skin of his arms and neck. A red flush stood out on his cheeks and necks. A killer sunburn.
But I still couldn’t feel him.
The bond between us had gone black. Nonexistent. Part of me cried out for the lack and I wondered where along the line I’d gotten used to the extra sense beneath my skin.
“Aren’t you going to tell me where you’ve been?” I pressed.
I forced my pulse to calm, the anxieties to still, because I knew losing control of myself would not help. My eyes searched his and found a stranger wearing his face. No recognition beneath those dark orbs, wide, hungry. I reached out with my senses and tried to be as strong as York. He hadn’t left my side, not once since I had found him, except for today.
He was the guardian I hadn’t known I needed, standing at my back, protecting me when I’d always thought I had everything under control.
“Don’t make me hit you again,” I said under my breath, approaching with caution. I knew how to handle animals. I knew how to handle monsters, goblins hell-bent on attacking, Fae ready to wipe me from existence.
I had no damn clue what to do about York.
The moment held and slowed between us. I refused to break his gaze, but I saw his claws. Those lethal weapons still outstretched and ready. Focused on me.
“York, I’m not sure why you’re still tied to your wolf like this, but you need to calm down. It’s Vienna. It’s...” I trailed off, swallowed. Oh, this was gonna hurt. “It’s sexy Mr. Bean.”
I kept up the repetition of speech, my voice a soothing monotone, pushing anxiety and fear to the side. And with infinitesimal slowness, I saw him return to himself.
“Bean?”
Relief grew into a living thing inside of me, wiggling and writhing and waking up every nerve that had withered during my morning of worry. Damned if I’d let York know how distraught I’d been.
I gave in to temptation and slapped him semi-playfully across the shoulder. My hand came away smeared in red. Fresh blood? “You scared me,” I said. Trying to make sure each word held the firmness I intended. Stupid man, worrying me like this. “Where did you go?”
God love him, he’d pretended to flinch when I hit him. He knew I needed the reassurance. “I honestly couldn’t tell you.” He moved past me, slinking toward the fire and sinking to the ground, knees trembling like a baby fawn first learning to walk. “I roused enough when the sun began to burn my skin and used my nose to find a way back to you. Otherwise, it’s a big blank spot.”
“Yeah, I know the feeling.” Joining him on the ground, only then did I realize that I still had the Carlisle pressed snugly against my back. That damn magic book had been the start of our adventure. I yanked it out.
I drew comfort in the familiar heat and heft even as I cursed the hold it had on me. I set the book down in front of me next to the map Fergus had given us.
Then, nudging York with my shoulder, I jerked my head toward the bit of roasted snake I’d saved for him. “If you still have an appetite, I caught that myself. It’s not much but it should be enough to get you through the morning and steady you. How are those burns?”
York trained his eyes on the ground, shoulders heaving on a heavy inhale and his elbows balanced on his knees. “Why, V?”
I was startled at the gravelly husk of words like a whiplash in the near silence. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Yes. You do.”
He wanted to know how I’d let him escape. “I...I wasn’t fast enough, I guess.” The admission had me wincing. I swallowed hard. “I tried to get the chain through the tree and I failed.”
His arm came around my shoulder and drew me close in a sharp, jerky movement. The scent of blood was overwhelming. “You didn’t fail. I wanted you to admit that I got the better of you.”
I snorted. “I will never admit it. Maybe some part of me wanted to let you loose to terrorize the local wildlife.”
York fell silent, shifting his gaze down to his hand and the dried flakes of blood beneath his fingernails. “I could have hurt someone. I might have. I’m not sure.” He shook his head. “I woke up when the sun started to burn me, and I was covered. No memory. That’s never happened to me before.”
I didn’t have the magic to reach out and determine what kind of blood adorned him like ornaments on a Christmas tree. No extra senses to help in any way other than my extraordinary strength and difficulty to kill. Instead, I took hold of his finger and let my tongue flick along his knuckle, tasting, testing.
“A sheep. Nothing worse,” I said, tossing his arm off my shoulder. “You’re out of the woods.”
“Not quite,” York murmured. His mind was likely racing a million miles an hour on solutions. Ways for him to keep control during his change. “There are still another two nights of this. And according to your magical map, we are only about a five-hour walk from the entrance to the Underworld.”
“Bullshit. You haven’t looked at the map since we started walking.”
“I didn’t need to. I have an excellent memory. I just don’t think it’s safe to barge into Hades’ realm with a rabid monster on your hands.”
My fingers slipped toward the Carlisle and I ached to flip through every blank page. Trail my fingers along the spine to see if I could find any more of its hidden secrets. With resignation that I’d just have to be patient on that score, I stowed it away in the back waistband of my pants. The map I tucked into a pocket of my jacket. Maybe he didn’t need to look at it, but I wanted it handy.
“I think we should wait a few days before pushing ahead,” York said.
“This is your caution talking.” A familiar tingle thrilled through me. A tingle demanding action. Movement. I stood abruptly and shook out my arms to combat the feeling.
“Yes, you’re right. Because I charged headfirst into a situation where I wasn’t fully prepared and I didn’t know the outcome.” His hand drifted to point listlessly at his teeth. “I did this to myself.”
A sudden hiss from him brought my attention to a beam of sunlight sifting through the trees. Without a word, I crossed to his bag and drew his hat from the recesses, placing it on top of his head.
“We can both see what happened,” he finished, sighing in gratitude. “I would feel better if we waited.”
“I’m not sure we have the time to wait,” I admitted.
It had started last night after he ran off, a pressing weight like an anvil dropped on my head. A god-sized anvil, because regular steel wouldn’t do anything more than give me a five-second headache. I shifted next to him, his heat causing sweat to break out. Or maybe it was just me.
“I want to give you the time. I do. I’m just not—goddamn it, York, give that back!” I launched forward when he reached behind me and took hold of the Carlisle.
He danced away on remarkably light feet, holding the book out of my reach. We both knew, if it came down to a fight, I would win. I only let him think he had the best of me when I reached for it.
“You shouldn’t have brought this.” His voice went hard. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m keeping it where I can see it. Now if you please...”
Brows drawing together, he tightened his grip. “This is a priceless artifact.”
“This is a piece of my mother we’re talking about. This is everything she left for me. Like I’m going to leave it behind? Someone could break past our wards and steal it, send it off to the black-market magic dealers where it somehow ends up in my grandmother’s hands. No thanks.”
“You are going to draw them to us like a damn beacon! Use your head.” York jabbed the index finger of his free hand at his temple. “I thought you were crazy enough wanting to burst into the strongest prison ever built without backup. Bringing this along is ludicrous. It’s suicide, V.” He glanced around the clearing. “I’m surprised no one has made a move yet.”
A chill settled in my stomach at the thought of Xanthe getting her hands on that book. Retrieving it was the last job she’d wanted me to do for her. Retrieve the book, a legend in dark circles. No questions asked.
The look on my face must have convinced him at last because he reluctantly handed it back, and I hastily returned it to its hiding place. I had the book in my possession, and I knew why my name was written on the first page.
“I can take care of myself. And you!”
He came closer and stood in front of me. It was easy to ignore the blood spatters like a Rorschach test across his face. Beneath them, I saw the same York who held me at night when the nightmares became too much to bear. “Stop telling me I didn’t sign up for this and listen to me for one second. I know you’re nervous about where we’re going, what’s going to happen. You’re nervous about seeing your father.”
I nodded. “Yes, I am. I don’t know what’s going on anymore. I’ve always been so sure of myself and now I’m doubting my every move.”
This was another part of the whole vulnerability deal, and I flashed back to that night in Ireland, with a horde of Unseelie warriors attempting to wipe us out. Xanthe, like a tiny golden toy general, begging me to throw down the book as I fought like hell to let go of whatever I needed to let go of to succeed.
I’d been betrayed.
Everything I knew to be true became a beautiful lie. My entire life I’d been chained to a cart and led in the direction Xanthe wanted, my grandmother guiding me because I had no one else. No family other than her, no allegiance to anyone except Xanthe. No clarity.
It had been the biggest fight of my life to be free instead of what she wanted me to be. And I still fought, to know the mother who died because she’d chosen to love. To find the father I wasn’t sure would want me. Would he be happy to see me, glad for the rescue? Or angry with the fabled wrath of his kind? Angry because I was a physical reminder of the reason for his imprisonment?
“You’ll figure it out. I have complete faith. But if you tell me to leave one more time, I’ll do to you what I did to that sheep.”
That drew a smile. “Do you think I’m afraid of your little threats?”
He grabbed me and pulled me forward in a hug, his arms hard around me. “I can’t offer you pretty words,” he muttered against my ear. “But I can offer myself. Dirty, depraved, and dark. I’ll always come back to you.”
My hands rode along his spine, tracing the muscles of his shoulders beneath the tatters of his clothes, memorizing him. “Even if it’s my fault you run?”
“Even so. Now, if you aren’t going to take my advice and wait a few days before trekking, then let’s find some clean water, get some granola in my gut, and storm the Underworld.”
“Who knows?” I said, breaking the hug. “Maybe you’ll be my secret weapon. No one will be expecting you to beast-mode out, Wolfie.”
This would be so much easier if I could teleport. To snap from one plane of existence to the next. The one time I’d done it had been with my grandmother’s help, where she’d promptly attacked me the second we made it to the Shadow Kingdom.
I turned around to retrieve my bag and the attack came out of nowhere. A silver-and-black blur bounced through the trees and straight at my stomach. Knocked back a pace, breath left me and my vision went dark around the edges.
“What the hell?” The murmur came through gritted teeth.
My hearing seemed muffled, like someone had stuffed a wad of cotton so far down into my ears it touched my brain. I could feel my fingers digging into fertile soil in an attempt to right myself. It felt as though hours passed before I jumped to my feet again.
And stood staring into the yellow-and-gold eyes of a black-haired lamia.
“Snake woman. Cute.” I wiped my mouth clear of dirt and blood. “Did Hades send you?” We were close enough to the hungry mouth of his lair that I wouldn’t be surprised if this was our welcoming party.
Instead of answering, the lamia cried out, a pink forked tongue slipping through her lips and tasting the air. Her right arm came at me and the air slowed around us. I bent, ducking, and her fist fell above my ear, the blow hard as iron.
Me? Too slow?
Or some kind of sickly intervention on a divine level?
Either way, it wasn’t to my benefit. I rolled onto my shoulder, legs coming up in the air in an attempt to get her to trip. The lamia jumped in the air to avoid the kick. She came down hard and pushed out at me with a yell.
A blast of magic sent me toward a tree trunk. The rough bark scratched my cheek when I met it face first.
Her arms went wide, and she said in a slight accent, “Your enemies send their greetings, Mistake.”