Chapter 32
Chapter Thirty-Two
Riley
It’s hours before we’re allowed to leave, but at last we’re left standing near where the Door was earlier with hundreds of orbs still swarming around me.
A few people asked why they were so fascinated with me, but I just brushed them off by saying that I must have touched the horseman and they’re drawn to the magic I borrowed.
I’m not ready to announce that I play a much bigger role in this than I ever imagined.
Will the Magical Interference Unit still trust me when they find out?
Will they believe me when I say that I don’t know anything about what’s happening?
“Let’s go home,” I say as I eye the bow Conquest left behind. While there’s been interest in it, it seems like no one has wanted to pick it up. The few who touched it quickly drew back, stating that the magic rippling through it made them uncomfortable.
Yet when I slide my shaking hand around it, it feels comfortable, like it’s right where it belongs.
“Go… home… our home?” Torin asks, sounding hopeful. I think he’s still afraid I’m going to turn away from him. The real question is why he hasn’t turned away from me. What have I done to deserve his kindness?
“If you’ll have me.”
Torin smiles as he pulls me in closer and kisses my forehead. “Of course I’ll have you.”
The soft kiss makes my aching body feel a little better. “And my souls,” I add while I look at the souls bobbing around, far too interested in me.
“Can we get a pizza first? And lobster.”
“We can get anything you want,” I tell him, pulling out my phone to order a variety of food for Torin, Mickey, and me. “I’ll have it delivered to Mickey’s house.”
“Perfect,” Torin says as we walk out to the waiting car where Joy is in the driver’s seat and Mickey is stretched out in the back. I wave Torin to the front seat before climbing into the back and sitting down on Mickey.
“No! Dammit. What the fuck? My body,” Mickey cries.
“Move your ass,” I order as the car takes off before I’m even properly in the seat. The roads are still mostly clear of anything other than emergency vehicles, so we’re making pretty good time.
“Horseman, huh?” Mickey asks while I continue to squish him. He seems to like it.
“Don’t mention it to anyone yet.”
“Where’s your horse?”
Torin looks back at me as I shiver at the thought. “I don’t want a horse.”
“You need your horse,” Torin says. “You heard what Conquest said. You’re draining yourself because you’re away from your horse. I wonder if the stains will stop once you find him. When… When the former Death died, his horse stood by his body for days… then one day he was just gone.”
“He’s in the realm the god is in,” I mumble, slumping down on Mickey. “I don’t want a horse.”
“You met him?” Torin asks curiously.
I think back to that familiar tug I’d felt while I followed those chains. And the way I desired to go with him… and that pull I felt when I left through the Door. “I don’t know… I just know he’s in there. I could hear these chains… something guided me to the other Door.”
“Your horse?” Torin asks.
“Fuck if I know. I don’t want a horse. Can’t it be like a kitten or something?”
“The four kittenmen of the apocalypse definitely doesn’t sound as cool,” Mickey says.
“Shush it, Mickey. No one wants your input,” I mutter. When we reach the house, Joy tells us she’ll bring our food through the Door when it arrives, so for now, we head through to Torin’s palace on our own.
Feeling defeated and exhausted, I set the bow down on the closest flat surface and aim for the stairs, but Torin has a strange expression on his face as he grabs my hand.
“What?”
He slides his fingers between mine, and I’m fixated on them while he tugs me toward the door that leads out to the garden.
Torin looks elated as he rushes outside and quickly runs past the fountain to where a small fence divides the garden from the world beyond it.
Feeling overwhelmed, I look out at the stretch of beautiful flowers beginning to bloom where the ground was last left in a petrified state.
I stare at them in disbelief while the hand on mine tightens.
“Does this mean your power is back?” I ask, feeling hopeful.
“Not all of it… but my strength is definitely coming back.”
“It’s beautiful,” I say as I look out past where his magic reaches and think about the wasteland beyond it—the wasteland caused by the being who once held the same power I do. It makes me feel uneasy, but Torin’s smile draws me back to the present.
“Eh,” Mickey mutters from where he’s come up behind us. “If there are plants, there’s lawn work and weeding and… not my thing.” He’s obviously not impressed as he heads off.
I raise an eyebrow while I question how anyone couldn’t find the field before us beautiful. “Pretend we don’t know him.”
“Joy brought food!” Mickey shouts.
“I would, but… it sounds like he has food,” Torin says as he eagerly points toward the palace.
I offer him a smile as I try my best to pretend that everything is the same as before. “We’ll kind of know him. Definitely strangers, though.”
Torin grins at me. “Yeah… we’re strangers with Mickey… but what are we?”
“We’re ‘Riley,’” I tease. The words he’d murmured in that alley come back to me… the way he told me he loves everything about me. It leaves me in this strange turmoil where I want to tell him what I’m feeling, but these waves of guilt keep me silent.
Torin’s expression softens while he leans down and sets his forehead against mine. “I love being ‘Riley.’”
I feel anxious that he’s going to wake up and realize that I really am the being who ruined everything.
What if I suddenly remember what happened?
What if I lose myself as my magic returns to me?
What if I destroy the first relationship I’ve ever had?
All my life, I’ve felt alone. I felt like something was missing.
And when I met Torin, he filled a hole I didn’t even know I had in my heart.
His fingers slide into my hair, his forehead still resting on mine. “We’re going to accomplish so much together.”
“Yeah,” I whisper.
“With you by my side, right?”
I nod, not trusting myself to say it. Everything is so overwhelming that it feels hard to even breathe. But the man standing before me is keeping me strong, giving me everything I need to fight for this… for us.
“I’ve never had anyone to rely on… and right now… I really need you or I’m not sure I can do this,” I say.
“Without you, I would still be wasting away in my very own paradise. We’ll get through this together. I promise.”
I slowly slide my arms around him, wondering how I could have met someone so kind, so forgiving, so willing to care about me even after he learned everything.
I know that the road ahead is going to be rocky, and I’m terrified to face what I did in my former life, but at least I know that I’ll have Torin by my side.
“Thank you,” I whisper, my fingers digging into his back.
“I don’t know what you’re thanking me for, unless it’s for the idea of eating lobster and pizza. Then you can thank me for that.”
A smile forces itself onto my face. “Hey, I paid for it.”
“I’ll work it off… with sex.”
“Ah, right,” I say as he tips my chin up.
“I know what you’re going through right now is really hard to handle. But please… don’t leave me,” he says, and I can see the anxiety he’d worn in that alley written across his face.
“I’m not… I’m not going anywhere. The moment you called me a peasant and threw me at some creature that was determined to tear my face off, you sealed your fate.”
He smiles. “Good.”
Torin pulls me in for a soft kiss, and I have to shove my guilt away while I lean into him.
His lips part, drawing me in for a deeper kiss.
I want to get lost in his touch. I want to forget everything that hurts and think only of him.
When the kiss breaks, it leaves me slightly out of breath as I tuck my head against his shoulder.
I look out on the field of flowers while the souls bob away as if they’re off to explore. We’re going to prevent this god from destroying four realms. We’re going to make sure others don’t suffer like Torin did. And we’re going to put an end to this.
We are a god and a horseman of the apocalypse, after all.
Join Riley and Torin in book two, Timeless Doors and Captured Gods!