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“So why the hell are we just standing here? Let’s zap ourselves away.”
“The bullet is silver. With it still in my flesh, I am prevented from doing anything more than short jumps into the gray fields.”
“Then let’s get the fucking thing out.” I hesitated, and frowned. “Wait—they used silver?”
That didn’t make sense. The Razan had aimed for my head, but the Raziq needed me alive. But it also meant that Azriel had saved my life by stepping in front of me and taking the bullet.
“I suspect the bullet was meant for me all along,” he said. “The Raziq would have felt my presence the first time I rescued you. They’d know I’d do so again should you be captured a second time. By shooting me with silver, they are giving themselves extra time to find us.”
“Then let me shift the two of us so we can get the hell out of here.” The only problem was, I’d only ever shifted to Aedh form with another person in my arms once, and only then because we’d had no other option. But I knew Tao almost as well as I knew myself, and I’d been lucky. I suspected that would not be the case with Azriel. Hell, I didn’t even know if I could reassemble the damn book after a shift.
“Which is why we cannot take that option,” he said softly. “We cannot risk the book, and you cannot disassemble or reassemble me as you did Tao. I am an energy being, and my makeup is unlike anything you could ever imagine.”
And yet, here he was, bleeding like a regular person. “Then let’s damn well run! Anything is better than standing here.”
He ignored my outburst, his expression as calm as ever. “You cannot go home. That is the first place they will look.”
“Then where will we go?”
“Not we. You.”
I frowned at him. “I’m not leaving without you—”
“You must,” he said. “The Raziq have arrived back in the tunnels. They will be here soon. Go, before they find us.”
“But they can track me, can’t they?”
“If you remain here, yes they can. If you flee, if you get as far away from this tunnel as you can and don’t go back to your apartment, you will be safe.”
I eyed him doubtfully, torn between not wanting to get caught by the Aedh again and not wanting to leave the man who’d just saved my life. “But if I remove the bullet—”
“We do not have the time. There is a small manhole above us. Use that to escape.”
“Fuck it, I can’t—”
Anger surged—a brief flare of energy that stung my skin and rushed through my mind. Then it was gone, and he released my hand, pushing me back from him. “Go. I will be fine.”
I swore again, then shoved the book at him and said, “You’d better be, reaper.”
I slid a hand into my pocket and wrapped my fingers around my keys and wallet, then reached into that place inside that wasn’t wolf, that was something far more powerful and dangerous. My Aedh half surged to life and flared through my body—a blaze of heat and energy that numbed pain and dulled sensation as it invaded every muscle, every cell, breaking them down and tearing them apart, until my flesh no longer existed and I became one with the shadows, one with the air. Until I held no substance, no form, and could not be seen or heard or felt by anyone or anything.
Except reapers and undoubtedly the Aedh, if they were close enough.
I glanced at Azriel, but he’d already gone, zapped away to God knew where. I swirled upward, found the manhole, and slipped through the small opening in the center of the cover.
And found myself in the middle of Swanston Street. A tram rattled by inches from my smoky form, stirring rubbish and sending a breeze through my particles.
Don’t go home, Azriel had said. So where the hell should I go? I couldn’t go to Stane’s, simply because I didn’t want to place him in danger. Azriel might suspect that the Raziq couldn’t find me unless I was close, but until we knew that for certain, I was better off keeping well away from those I cared about.
It also meant I’d better get the hell away from this manhole. I fled, swirling randomly through the city streets, the chill night air seeming to seep into my particles, making them feel heavy, as if ice had settled somewhere deep inside. I flowed out of the city and followed the Tullamarine Freeway into the suburbs—more out of habit than necessity, because in Aedh form I wasn’t restricted to using regular roads and pathways.
I ended up at the airport. I had to meet Lucian here later, anyway, and it was certainly the last place anyone would think to look for me.
I re-formed in a dark corner within the parking lot, releasing my grip on my phone and wallet as I dropped inelegantly to the concrete floor. My body shook and my head spun, and for several minutes I could do nothing more than simply lie there, my lungs burning as I dragged in thick, ragged breaths.
Becoming Aedh had its price for those of us who weren’t full-blooded—and for me it meant a complete inability to do anything other than battle for breath for several minutes after re-formation.
When the debilitation finally started to ease, I pushed upright and cautiously rocked back on my heels. Several more minutes passed, and the stabbing pain in my head settled to a more durable ache behind my left eye. An ache that matched the one in my leg.
