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We stare at each other, two broken beings who once loved each other more than life.

My heart skips a beat as his eyes harden, filling with violence, and he lunges through the air. My eyes close, preparing for pain, but then he soars past me, my hair moving with the force. Spinning, I open my eyes and find him on top of what looks to be a partially turned werewolf, ripping him to shreds.

Blood covers him as he looks at me, his chest heaving and head jerking ever so slightly. He’s telling me to go.

I don’t understand, but then there is a hand in mine, yanking me to the van. When the door slams shut, I realise he saved us.

Why?

Glancing into the rearview mirror, I watch as more wolves materialize on the road, and he roars as he tackles them, giving us time to escape. Snapping my head forward, I refuse to feel sorry for him or soften, but every eye is on me.

“He didn’t kill you,” Bram murmurs.

“No, he was saying goodbye. Whatever was left of the man I once loved stopped him from ending it. It won’t happen again.” It slips out before I can stop myself, and I feel shock fill the air.

“What was he doing—with your—” Raiden stops, his eyes jerking to me and rounding in horror. No doubt they all know about my conversation with Emrys, when I mentioned my child, and they are putting pieces together.

“That—that god was the father of your child?” Kitt asks.

Grinding my teeth, I look dead in his eyes, refusing to back down. “That man was someone I loved, and we prepared to spend a life with the child we were bringing into the world . . . until he got both me and that child killed. So yes, he’ll kill me next time, just like I will try to kill him. I locked him away and tortured him for years. They say gods are immortal, but I intend to prove them wrong.”

I close my eyes once more, refusing to see their expressions.

There are many minor gods in the world, and he was one of them, sent to Gehenna after doing things he would never share. I was young and lost, and he was solid ground, something good to cling to. I never meant to get pregnant, but I couldn’t deny the love I felt for my unborn child.

When he betrayed me to those who came in exchange for his freedom and they killed me, I lost my baby, and I lost that love. You see, as a phoenix, I could survive rebirth, but my child could not.

I lost everything I was that day, and any humanity with it.

CHAPTER

SEVENTEEN

She’s quiet and her eyes are closed, but I know she’s not asleep. She’s hiding from us, and I don’t blame her. She lost a child, and that man was responsible. That’s a lot to swallow, especially with having to face him again. Everything is getting a lot more complicated, and I can’t help but feel sad for her. She’s clearly had a very hard, traumatic life and is doing her best to survive. In another world, we might not be enemies. I wish we weren’t. Part of me wishes I got to keep this bond, the one that’s growing stronger every day.

They are in my head, have been since the collector’s experiments to create a hive mind, but she is in my soul, and I worry yanking her out might cause irrevocable damage, just like losing one of them would. They hate it and think I’m softer than them, but the bitter truth none of them want to admit is that they feel it too. This bond tightens around us and her, making it harder and harder to tell which way is up.

I don’t know how to comfort her, and even if I did, there is nothing that will make this better, so I do the only thing I can—I fill the silence and give them something to escape into that doesn’t include memories or pain. It’s something in the present to cling to when the tidal waves become too large.

I sing.

The low, soft song of foreign words has always been part of my soul. I do not understand the lyrics, as they are bigger than me and this place. They flow from my lips, wrapping around us and offering solace, at least for a little while. I have no control over the lyrics or the melody, and when it’s finally through, I slump in my seat. It leaves me exhausted, though I never know why, and I find my eyes slipping closed just as Ferol looks at me with tears in her own.

It’s not a dream. I know that instantly as a strangely familiar place forms around me. It’s my gift as a scorpion, a guardian of time and space. My powers have always been . . . twitchy. With no one to teach me, and after everything the collector did to me, I have very little control over when and how it will appear.

I am here, yet I am not. I am a speck of time, particles of this world, but I have the power to change it all. I did once, and it was not something I could ever undo. It cost us all.

I am in Gehenna, or at least it looks like the places we passed through when we were there—dark rock and formidable heat. The cavern is empty until they move into my vision.

Ferol is on her knees, being dragged. She’s younger and her hair is longer. Her stomach is round, and she’s curled protectively around it as faceless men throw her to the ground and start to beat her. I step forward without meaning to, wishing I could alter this, but if I do, I’ll alter the future. Her eyes lift as if she can see me, and I read so much agony and fear in her gaze, it chokes me, and then it’s gone. I’m at the entrance to Gehenna, and as I watch, she is pushed off the edge, her scream filling my ears. I reach for her with a yell, but I’m thrown further back.

She stands before a frozen lake, so very young, with long blonde hair, yet she looks desolate and lost, and when she turns, there is anger etched on her features.

“I know what you did.”

With a gasp, I jerk upright, and Kitt looks at me worriedly, no doubt feeling my power. “You didn’t,” he demands.

“I didn’t,” I promise, but I wanted to. I wanted to change her fate, but doing so would mean she would never meet us. It would alter the entire universe, the consequences unimaginable. That’s something I didn’t understand before. Like dropping a rock into a lake, you don’t know how far the ripples will go.