She shook her head. “Maybe I can teleport, like Ezra?”
I shook my head. Teleporting was complicated; it required runes and massive amounts of power, often from multiple people. Commander Ezra could shadow walk, move from shadow to shadow. Likeme, like all of us, his skills were driven by will. I needed to help Quinn find her will.
“What was the last thing on your mind before you blacked out?” I asked.
Quinn bit her bottom lip and shook her head.
I pushed off her kitchen counter. “Quinn, you need to open up. I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me.”
Quinn crawled to her ladder, her ass stuck up in the air, and I quickly turned my back, doing math equations in my head to keep my blood from rushing downward.
“My last thought was how badly I wanted to make it to the market.” Quinn jumped off the bottom rung; her too-long shirt swished above her knees. She looked adorable. “But I ended up here. So, I’m not sure what we can learn from that.”
“And in your blackouts before?” I asked.
“Well, the most recent were vague.” Quinn rubbed the sleep out of her eyes. “I knew I didn’t want to be where I was. My subconscious probably focused on home. But magic can’t take me somewhere that doesn’t exist.”
My heart broke for her. I knew whatever she experienced wasn’t the same as what I had, but losing my daughter... I left my family. And now that I understood what they were, I could never go back. I wrapped her in my arms and pulled her close. “Home doesn’t have to be a place.” My life at my family’s compound was over, finished. I would never think of it as home again. “It can be a feeling.”
Quinn wiggled to wrap her arms around me as well. She squeezed me hard. “Thank you.”
She leaned back and reached up, brushing away my tears before they could fall, and then did the same for herself, our sadness mixing on her finger.
A weight lifted off my shoulders. I was suddenly very aware of her body pressed against my front. My gaze dropped to her perfect, kissable lips. My blood heated, and time froze. Every fiber of my being begged me to taste her and kiss away her unhappy emotions.
It was more than a physical response or a command from my Prophet. I wanted this tiny, idiotic woman to be happy. The sudden thought was so foreign it snapped me back to reality.
Instead of kissing her, I stepped back.
Quinn’s half-lidded eyes snapped open. She dropped her gaze to the floor and rubbed one of her biceps. “Right. Magic. I’ve got a handle on the Majekah part, sorta, I think. But I feel like I learned to run before I could walk.”
I swallowed, desperate to recapture our moment and equally desperate to ensure it never happened again. I was wrong. I could not make her happy. I didn’t know how to make anyone happy. I didn’t know who I was.
“So yeah, ah,” Quinn stammered when I still didn’t speak or move. “There’s a bit of a pattern… ah, if you don’t count these last few. My last thought is often my new reality, so to speak.”
I needed to say something. Anything.
“Patterns are good.” I latched on to what I understood. “My runes are sets of patterns I layer to manipulate energy.”
Quinn stopped studying the floor and looked up at me with her big, hopeful eyes.
“Passing on knowledge is essential to shining in the Prophet’s light.” I hated the words the moment they left my lips, but I’d spent my life repeating our scripture.
Quinn nodded. “I don’t know who your Prophet is, but I want to learn.”
An image of her spread out under me as we learned every sensitive part of her body together flashed into my head, and my blood raced.
“Cayden, are you ok?” Quinn reached out but didn’t touch me.
She’d never hesitated to touch me before, and I hated myself for making her feel insecure. Not all touch was sexual. I could compartmentalize this.
I snagged her hand. “I’m struggling here. The world’s not what I thought it was.”
Quinn laced our fingers together. “Me too.”
Once again, I found myself drawing on this slip of a woman’s strength. We needed each other. She needed me. I couldn’t fall apart.
“Patterns are the perfect place to start.” I smiled and squeezed her hand. “Breakfast at Wicked Wich?” The castle’s little bakery would do fine. “We can spend the morning together.”
