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Amora
We’re toodeep in the wilderness to have a hope of finding any ritzy cabins, which means a night of roughing it in the elements. Luckily, we find a small cave near the base of a steep incline that doesn’t appear to be occupied by anything more deadly than bats.
Nobody speaks as we set up camp. Frost and Kian spearhead building a campfire near the mouth of the cave, while Malix and I gather as much dry brush as we can to make nests to keep us warm while we sleep. After we have a raging fire lighting up the night, Frost sticks around to make sure it doesn’t turn into a forest hazard while the rest of us go hunting for dinner. We catch several wild hares, all of us still chillingly silent, then return to the cave to eat.
My appetite is low, and my stress is high. I manage a few bites while pointedly ignoring the sight of Kian gnawing on bones. But after a while, I just can't take the quiet anymore. I stand and stretch, then head for the mouth of the cave.
Nobody asks me through mind speak where I’m going, and I don’t offer up the information.
The sickly sweet smell of burning pine fills my nose as I pass our campfire into a dark night beneath a cloudless sky. On the bright side, I don’t sense any impending snow, which is nice considering I feel like the cold has nestled into my bones by this point. At least this deep in the valley, there’s hardly any snow on the ground, although that doesn’t keep it from being cold as fuck.
As I cross an open clearing toward the mountain stream we passed on our search for a cave, I huff out a frosty breath, missing the warmth of the New Mexico desert. Not only the warmth, but the calm, almost boring existence I had before running into Kian and ending up with Frost in my motel room. Things were simpler before the men barreled into my life like black smoke. I mean, sure—my whole goal in life was to find them and end this once and for all, so at some point, our paths were bound to collide.
But now, it feels like the goalposts have changed.
I consider taking a dip in my wolf form because it would be warmer, but my wolf isn’t the one who needs a bath. I splash into the shallows of the creek and let magic ripple over me, contorting my bones, stretching my skin, unfolding me back into my familiar human body.
The frigid water sloshes over my knees and steals the breath from my lungs. I suck in some of the cold air and hold it as I wade deeper, waiting for my skin to adjust to the temperature.
So much has happened in such a short time frame that I’m having trouble keeping up with it all. One moment, I was rolling into Oscura, New Mexico, expecting another lame weekend eating fried food and watching football with a bunch of small-town drunks in the bar. The next minute, my entire life was turned upside down.
At the deepest point of the stream, I sink to my knees and duck my head beneath the surface. The water closes over me, blocking out everything but my own churning thoughts. My toes sink into the silt, and the water rushes around my kneeling body like I’m not even here. And the cold grounds me, making me feel a little more level-headed.
I can’t keep up with my own goddamn feelings. I don’t know how to feel about anything that’s happened… or how to feel about the men. I swing wildly from loathing them and wanting to kill them for more reasons than a possible apocalypse, to wanting nothing more than to touch them, hold them, spend the rest of my life chasing them around the countryside.
They’re much more complex than I thought at first. Not monsters, but not angels, either. Just broken, maybe.
I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. Honestly, the same could probably be said about me.
Emerging from the cold cocoon of the water, I take a deep, almost painful breath of freezing air and rebalance myself on my knees against the current. My breath puffs out in delicate clouds in front of me. The water isn’t even high enough to cover my tits unless I go down on my butt, so every inch of wet skin above the surface stings from the breeze. I splash water under my arms and in the creases of my joints, trying to wash away the dirt and grime from our race down the mountainside.
The water behind me sloshes as someone wades into it. I don’t need to look to know who it is. I smell him on the wind, his sunshine fresh scent chasing away some of the cold. My body responds to his presence, even as I’m irritated that he followed me.
“What do you want?” I snap, then splash water on my face to scrub it clean.
“What, I’m not allowed to bathe?” Malix teases me as he draws near and crouches to join me. The stream displaces around his muscular torso, sending little waves lapping at my abdomen.
“It’s a long stream. Maybe there’s room somewhere south. Like in Mexico.” I steal a look at him, because I just can’t fucking help myself.
His violet eyes glint in the low, ambient light from the sky. The darkness turns him to ebony, like a precious stone carved into the closest approximation possible to a god. I hate him for being so beautiful. So powerful.
I hate him for making me want him still, even after everything.
Malix flashes a wolfish smile. “Listen, if you want a Mexican vacay, I’ll take you there, kitty. We just gotta survive this first. Then it’s all-inclusive, all you can drink.”
I roll my eyes. There’s no way I’m going to let him charm me with his one-liners and easygoing personality. I have to learn my lesson sometime, right?
“Again,” I say, my voice cool, “what do you want?”
Malix splashes water up on his neck, his gaze raking the thick black night around us. When he turns back to me, his expression is serious. “Kian doesn’t mean to be a dick.”
I laugh, a little more hysterically than I probably should. “Could have fooled me.”
“He carries a lot on his shoulders,” Malix goes on, skating right past my sarcastic comment. “He blames himself for us being made into monsters. Hell, he blames himself for Frost and me even existing.”
“Yeah, I gathered,” I say with a shrug. “That doesn’t excuse the fact that you’ve all been lying to me.”
He arches an eyebrow. “You’re telling me you don’t keep secrets?”
“No, I was pretty upfront with all of you about my mission to kill you.”
He chuckles. “Fair enough. I just want you to give Kian the benefit of the doubt. He’s more protective than you realize. Not just of us—me and Frost—but of you, too. That’s why we did the…” He trails off. It’s almost too dark to see his facial expression, but I think I hear a hint of regret in his voice. After another heartbeat, he clears his throat, then continues. “We’ve been through a lot. All three of us have seen our fair share of tragedy and senseless loss. We don’t have dads. Our mothers died—”
“I don’t have living parents either,” I cut in, my tone going colder than the water. “They died before I even got a chance to know them. I’ve had to live with that my entire life, and it sucks, but I found a way to fucking cope. Senseless loss isn’t an open invitation to become a rampaging monster hell bent on destroying the world. Of all people, the three of you should know the difference between right and wrong because of the tragedies you’ve faced.”
“That’s easier said than done.”
“No. It’s not,” I say flatly. “Every morning when you wake up, you make the conscious choice to be who you are. You can choose to do good—to be a functioning member of society who cares for others and lives to be a part of the common good. Or you can choose to let your burdens define you and take your anger and fear out on others through poor choices and bad decisions.”
At some point in the past few moments, Malix has drifted closer to me. As I finish my tirade, I realize he’s only inches away. His scent mingles with the crisp scent of the water, reminding me of drinking water from the garden hose on a sunny day. The warring temperatures of the sun beating down and the icy water on my lips. Those unfettered days before life crept in and turned my heart to stone.
In an attempt to ignore his proximity, I go on. “I know life hasn’t been kind to you. To any of you. I’m not trying to downplay your grief. But surely you have to understand that if you bring the shadow realm to Earth, you’ll be inflicting that same pain on billions of other people. You’ll be making them hurt just like you’ve been hurt. Do you really want to do that?”
Malix sighs. It takes him so long to answer that I’m sure he’s going to say yes. Then he shakes his head, chuckling softly.
“At one point, I probably would have said I don’t give a shit. But now…” He trails off and lifts a hand from the water. His fingertips are achingly soft and his touch gentle as he tucks a lock of my wet hair behind my ear. “Now, I’m not so sure, kitty.”
He doesn’t remove his hand. His fingertips pause on my jawline, his skin searing against mine. A flush heats up my exposed flesh, and suddenly, I’m vividly aware that we’re too close and too naked. Malix’s presence is a drug, and the closeness of his body speeds up my heart rate, sends a thrill up my spine, and tosses me off course. I sway toward him unconsciously, thrown off by the sudden need unfurling inside me.
