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I remember those dark places into which I fell, after Remus hurt her. The hellish depths inside my head that had me feeling more animal than man. Grim and gruesome thoughts that she would’ve damned me for, maybe even made her fear me a little, if she’d been privy to them.
Brows lowered, she tips her head, undoubtedly picking up on my sudden unease. “What is it?”
I’d be inclined to share my uncertainty with her, if not for that wild glint shimmering beneath her concern. One I’m all too familiar with—a spark of adventure that can’t be dulled by fear. “If it’s the world you want to see, I’ll follow you wherever you go.”
Her eyes soften, and she leans forward for a kiss that I gladly indulge. “Doesn’t have to be tonight. We have our whole lives ahead of us.”
Staring up at her, I silently try to absorb that thought: an entire lifetime with this woman. How fucking incredible, yet at the same time, not enough. Never enough. Only a selfish prick would long for more in a world that’d sooner see a man starve to death, or worse, and I’ve not forgotten it wasn’t that long ago that having a female all to myself was physically impossible. Yet, here I lie beneath my own flesh and blood fantasy, like a king whose stolen all the riches of the land.
Hell, maybe Heaven does exist, after all.
Pressure hits my chest as she pushes off me, and I reach out to snatch her arm. “Where do you think you’re going, woman?”
“To get my shoes. Unless you changed your mind about meeting in the woods?”
Unhanding her, I can’t jump to my feet fast enough. “I’d sooner tie myself to a tree and let the lions have a go at me.”
She slips into her shoes and glances over her shoulder, wearing that perfect signature smile that’s made its appearance more often these days. “That’s an option, then? I mean, tying you to a tree?”
I snort a laugh, swiping up the blanket from the floor. “If it means the chance to get between those pretty thighs, you can do whatever you want with me.”
A disturbing fascination swirls in her eyes, and when I stride up next to her, she rises up to her tiptoes, wrapping her arms around my neck. “Then, you might want to grab some rope,” she whispers.
The foreboding visuals of being at her mercy for the next couple of hours casts a shiver down my spine. “I’m on it.”
“Good. And grab a bottle of elderberry wine while you’re at it. It’s going to be a long night, Alpha.”
* * *
White swirls of early morning fog blanket the valley below the overhanging rock of the mountain, where I sit perched. The cabin rests quietly, cloaked in darkness by the surrounding trees, while Thalia and Asher sleep.
Rubbing my hands together fails to calm my nerves, as I work through a maelstrom of thoughts. “Figured I’d come up here while Thalia’s sleeping, so she can’t hear me talking to you. Otherwise, she’d probably have my head checked by Doc Levins.”
Smiling to myself, I hike up one knee, letting the other dangle over the few hundred feet of open air below. “’Sides … your hearing was always shit. Better to be closer to the sky, where you don’t have to strain so much. Assuming that’s where you are.”
Smile fading, I frown down at the shadowy land beneath me that seems to darken with my somber thoughts. “I keep having these dreams. Where the nightshade didn’t work, and you didn’t die, when they took you. That you’re trapped down in that place. With those things. No sunlight. Nothing but darkness and pain.”
Thoughts seem to come to life, as the trees of the forest ripple with a passing breeze, the way it moves when prey scampers through the brush.
“I remember when we were young boys at Calico … you never backed down from anything. Not the guards. The mutations. The docs. Valdys. You and me, we didn’t always see eye to eye with things, but I always knew where you stood. Even the times I wanted to knock your teeth out for it.” With a snort, I thumb at my nose and sniff. “Up until the end, you always stood your ground. ‘S’how I always think of you. A fighter.”
A long pause gives me time to gather my thoughts, all the things I need to say to my lost friend. My brother. “Thalia tells me I need to let go. She says none of it was my fault. But …” Gaze fixed on my fidgeting hands, I shake my head in dismissal. “She wasn’t there. She doesn’t know that I could’ve held that gate open as easily as you. That I could’ve …”
The brief hitch of my words doesn’t erase the memory, or stop the guilt brimming to the surface. Vivid recollections of how urgently I needed to get the hell out of that place.
Clearing my throat, I scowl at the echoing remorse pummeling my conscience. “I could’ve stayed on the other side. And you wouldn’t have had to face those things alone.”
Raking my hands over my head, I stare off at the wide expanse of land and forest, where Thalia and I have made a home. “This life with Thalia. Doesn’t seem real, sometimes. Feels like I don’t deserve her. Any of this.” I screw my unpatched eye shut, the impossible words that I’ve been too fearful to say aloud now falling from my lips like an incriminating confession. “Maybe it should’ve been you here, instead.”
Opening my good eye, I can just make out the small dot in the thick of the forest, where the cabin remains still and undisturbed.
Peaceful.
“I just need to know that these dreams aren’t some fucked-up premonition. If you could just let me know, somehow, that you’re not somewhere suffering. That all this shit in my head is just guilt, or something. I can deal with the dreams and regret. But I cannot sit here and play happy, if you’re somewhere praying for a quick death, Brother.” Thoughts lost to the memory of my last dream, of being trapped in those tunnels again, the impossibility of escape and the cold breath of death on my neck, I stare off, frowning. “We went through some shit in that place. Still have blackouts, when I’ll be chopping wood or something and all of a sudden, I’m strapped to one of those beds again. Grinding my teeth over the bit in my mouth. Wishing everything would end. My hands shake sometimes.” A phantom tingling in my wrist takes me back to the most recent episode, when I spilled an entire pot of boiling water after the shakes set in. “I need to let go of it. The memories. The guilt. Everything. Just let me know that’s okay. Give me a sign, or something.”
Here, I thought unloading all this shit would make it easier, but hell if the weight on my shoulders doesn’t somehow feel heavier than before. Saying it aloud just doesn’t feel right, either. Feels like abandoning Cadmus all over again, and leaving him to carry the burden alone.
Beams of warm light hit my face, and I lift my gaze toward the horizon, where the orange and red arms of early dawn stretch over the valley, yawning with a new day.
