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Chapter One
CHRIS
I’d been walking up and sliding down an endless sea of sand dunes. At the top of each one, I hoped to see something on the horizon. One hundred and twenty-six dunes later, my hope had evaporated. I needed a destination. A clue to what the hell I was doing here. An answer to why Eli ditched me in the middle of what had to be the Sahara, with only one command. Head east.
My breath came out in hot, heaving gasps, and I’d murder someone for a drop of water. I raised my hands in the air when I hit the top of the latest dune, trying to force more air into my lungs, but the air was too scorching, too dry, too miserable to fill my lungs.
“Shit. This sucks.” I used my hand to block the sun as I looked over the horizon.
Nothing. I turned west. Nothing. North. More nothing. Just dunes and heat and wind whipping sand in my face. No battles to fight. No demons to kill. No distractions from my regrets about last night and the heated fight I’d had with Cosette. It was just me and my well-deserved misery.
A drop of sweat trickled down my face, carving a path through the sand stuck to my cheek. No matter where I looked, I saw mirages of lakes and seas and oceans. But there wasn’t any water and I was so damned thirsty. If I ever found my way out of here, I’d spend forever washing the sand out of every crevice of my body. After I murdered Eli.
An answering growl rose up inside of me. My wolf and I were in agreement for once, but there was nothing I could do about Eli’s stupid games. Right now, I had bigger problems, like hunger and dehydration. I bit off one of the buttons on my shirt to suck on. It helped stimulate saliva, but that wasn’t going to be enough. Not long-term. I needed water. I needed it now. And more than that, I needed to go home.
I started down a dune, keeping my eye on the next one. The first hour here I’d been in awe. I’d never been anywhere like this, and the heat had been a shock coming from the Texas winter. I’d pulled off my hoodie and tied the sleeves around my forehead to keep my eyes clear and my head covered. But then the heat had risen, and the exhaustion of climbing up the dunes, gaining an inch for every three steps, had stolen the last of my patience. I wanted the fuck out of here.
“Damn it, Eli. What the hell am I doing here?” I blew out a harsh breath. I didn’t know who I was more pissed off at—Eli for dropping me in the middle of the desert or myself for being stupid enough to willingly go with him. If there was one thing I knew now, it was to not trust the archon.
More than an angel, Eli had the power and ability to do whatever he wanted. His only quest was to keep the world going. To keep the balance between good and evil. And he had free rein to do that however he saw fit. Over the last week, that meant helping me and my friends. Today, who knew what side Eli was on?
I didn’t think he wanted me to die, but I wasn’t certain that he really cared either.
Christ. Why did I agree to come with him? Nothing good came from a desperate move. But I had been stupidly desperate for an escape.
The last few months had been utter chaos. I’d fought caves full of vampires, slayed a horde of demons spilling out of a portal from hell, and sealed off the mortal realm from Satan’s second-in-command with my friends. In the process, I’d bound myself to twelve other supernaturals—some I didn’t even know—and I wasn’t sure what that meant.
I should’ve stayed at St. Ailbe’s to find out, but Cosette had been there, sitting next to me, so freaking tempting. The high from the magic we’d used the night before made me jittery. I could feel my wolf making a demand to grab her—to hold her and fix what was between us—to make her mine—and I…I couldn’t let myself do that.
Wanting what I couldn’t have was nothing new for me—I’d had long, hard years of that growing up—but wanting Cosette as anything more than a friend? That was a whole other level of torture. There was no way I could be with a fey from the Lunar Court, especially not a princess. The fey in her court controlled the moon, and I was a werewolf, tied to the moon. I’d be a slave, unable to even know if the things I did and felt and thought were my own. But I still couldn’t stop myself from wanting her, even if having her was suicide.
But then—as I was about to start saying the words that would tie us together—Eli had popped in out of nowhere. He offered me a distraction, and it felt like an answered prayer, or fate, or maybe just an easy out. One I probably didn’t deserve. But I’d jumped at the chance before I could think about it. Before I could claim Cosette in front of all our friends. Before I could destroy both of us in one dumbass move.
Damn it. “What the hell am I doing here?” I screamed up at the sky again. I wasn’t sure where Eli had gone, but I was sure he was laughing at me. “Get back here, you asshole!”
I sat in the sand, unable to keep going without some explanation and a gallon or two of water. “You wanted help, so here I am. But I’m not playing your game.”
The desert was definitely not my thing. I liked cold. I liked the woods and the hill country around St. Ailbe’s. I liked green, and life seeping from the ground under my feet. All I could smell here was sand and heat and my own sweat. Everything in this desert was dead, and if I didn’t get somewhere soon, it wouldn’t be long before I would be dead, too.
Eli appeared in front of me, wearing his usual faded jeans and white shirt, looking perfectly refreshed. His long blond hair was tied back. When standing, I was easily a few inches taller than him and more muscular, but looks often lied in the supernatural world. Subtle clues were the only way to guess at someone’s power. His ponytail was perfectly still as the wind moved around him, keeping the sand away from his face.
/> I clenched my jaw, and the fine grit in my teeth crunched. A subtle but effective reminder of who was more powerful.
The girls seemed to think Eli was handsome, but all I saw when I looked at him was a whole bunch of danger I didn’t need.
