CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Ifind Bastian waiting exactly where he said he would. He’s casually leaning up against a tree at the edge of the forest, rucksack dangling from his fingers, looking to anyone that he hasn’t a care in the world. It’s almost enough to make me laugh. I wish I could look even the smallest bit as carefree as he appears, but there are too many thoughts and revelations rattling around in my mind for me to ever feel carefree again. Although, for all he looks carefree, I can see a muscle in his jaw flutter as it tenses and his eyes quickly skim my form, assessing that I’m unharmed.
“Tell me,staellara. What’s your plan?” he asks with a smirk that feels false for the tension I know is flowing through him.
I take a fortifying breath before I present him with my plan. “I want to find my parents,” I announce with conviction. “I feel like they’ll be able to answer more questions. About my heritage, my powers. Everything, really.” He nods but doesn’t seem at all surprised by my choice. I tilt my head, assessing him, hands on my hips. “You knew that was what I was going to want to do, didn’t you?”
He smirks. “I wouldn’t say Iknewit was what you wanted. It was certainly a safe bet.”
I roll my eyes at him. He acts as if he’s known me for years, not less than a week.
“Shall we get going?” he asks, softly. “I don’t want to rush you in case there’s more you wish to do before we head off. Anyone else you wish to see.” I almost think I hear an edge of violence lacing his words with that sentence but when he continues speaking it’s gone, leaving me thinking I’ve imagined it. “But we should head out soon, before we lose the light.”
“Yes, of course.” My mind jumps to Tom for a brief moment.Should I find him to apologize for the way we left things?I immediately shake that thought off and push my shoulders back. “I have nothing else I need to do. We can go.”
His eyes narrow for a moment before offering a quick nod and striding back in the direction of the portal, back to Grimhallow. I have to practically jog to keep up with his brisk steps.
After a few minutes of trying to keep pace, I’ve had enough. I slow down to a casual walk, panting as I catch my breath. “Mind slowing to a lowly human pace?” I tease.
He laughs as he turns around to look at me, continuing to walk backwards. “You’re Fae, Liv. You shouldn't need me to walk at alowly human pace, as you put it.”
I huff out a breath. “Yeah? Well, how about you walk at a pace that a Fae whose powers are bound can keep up with.”
His foot trips over a root and he nearly crashes to the ground. He recovers and stops so abruptly that I nearly walk straight into him. He grasps my upper arms, steadying me.
“Your magic iswhat?” he asks, a stricken look on his face.
“Bound, apparently,” I answer as I toe the dirt. “Fleur did it to keep me from accidentally manifesting them as a child.”
His jaw clenches, eyes turning downright murderous. “She shouldn’t have done that.”
“Yes, well, we’re way past the point of being able to change that. My new plan is to continue trying to tap into the powers to unbind them, since apparently the only way to do that hinges on me being able to unlock them myself.”
He closes his eyes and shakes his head. “She’s not wrong. It’s just a… drastic measure for her to have taken is all.” After a few beats of silence, he opens his eyes again and the rage there has faded. “Let’s keep going. We can add cracking the binding to our priority list.” He turns and continues to stalk towards the portal, but at a much more reasonable pace for me to keep up.
After another few minutes, he stops abruptly again, cocking his head to the side. I step up beside him and peer at his face. His brows are furrowed, nostrils flaring.
“Do you hear something?”
“I’m not sure…. I thought so. It sounded like footsteps, but they’ve fallen silent. But I’m also catching a scent on the breeze.”
“Is it an animal?” We are in the middle of the forest so I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s picking up on some small creature.
“I don’t think so. This smells… different. Almost familiar in a way. Like a scent I know but it isn’t readily clicking with my memories.” The furrows of his brows deepen as he tries to place it.
I spin in a circle, trying to see if I can spy another being in the woods with us.
Nothing. It’s all quiet.
“We should keep moving,” he says tersely.
I offer a small nod before tentatively starting off, my body as tense and on edge as his.
We’ve barely made it a few steps before he whips around and narrows his eyes into the trees behind us.
“Run, Liv,” he orders, voice deathly quiet.
My panic rises at his tone. “What? Why?”
