Chapter 6
CHAPTER SIX
EVEREST
“Hiding in here won’t stop it from happening.”
I sighed and lifted my head from between my knees, letting it rest on the vines of the Seelie tunnel. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I lied.
Thorne strolled over to me, then lowered to sit beside me. “She is going to die again.”
My heart twisted so sharply I gripped my chest and leaned my forehead against my knee.
“Whether you’re sitting here in these tunnels or anywhere on Earth, you’re going to feel it all the same,” he said softly, touching the back of my hand with one finger. “You’re going to see it.”
“We don’t know that for sure,” I said before I could stop myself, then slammed my mouth shut.
He took a deep breath and then let it out. “I’ve only known Myrtle was my soulmate for a few months and I . . . God, Everest, I don’t know how you’ve survived eight centuries.”
I scrubbed my face with my hands. There weren’t words to answer that.
“I do not think you should be alone when it happens.” His voice was soft and light.
“I do not want witnesses when it happens . . . again,” I said and winced as my voice broke.
“She saw you through the first time, she’ll be here this time. She’ll be back—”
“How do we know?” My throat was burning with emotion I was trying to hold in.
“Because I remember Celina.” He let out a soft chuckle. “The Angel of Tides was one of our father’s number one targets. He hated her. He used to rant to Sage and I about what a menace she was.”
That made me smile.
“Even when Father’s spell had its hooks in us, Sage and I loved to watch her work.
We used to trick Father into situations just so we could watch her.
” He laughed in earnest. “God, I suppose that was the truth of our souls trying to break free. That’s how powerful her rage was, Everest. There was no escaping her tide when she unleashed it upon you. ”
My eyes watered so I closed them to try and rein my emotions in. “What if she doesn’t—”
“She will—”
“But—”
“But what, Everest?” He let out a grunt.
“Despite death, distance, and centuries of time, she has returned to you. Despite her lack of memory of your past together, she has refused to be away from you since the moment you pulled her from the frat house. Do you really think she would not demand to return to you?”
“Does not mean she would be allowed.”
He snorted. “Lucifer wants her return, and Lucifer always gets what he wants.”
I chuckled. “He’s made damn sure of that this time around.”
“So then why doubt him now? Either of them?”
“Because I’m afraid,” I said softly. “I won’t survive losing her again.”
“Fear is not an emotion you’ve let behind the wheel all the years of your long life. Please do not let it consume you now. Your mother won’t hesitate—”
“I’m trying.”
“I know. Just hang on a little longer.”
“How long does it take?”
“Time does not work the same in Heaven. It’s not .
. . it’s not something I can explain.” He put his hand on my shoulder and squeezed.
“My brother, they need you down there. There’s a house full of soulmates all on the edge of suffering the fate you did—but worse, because there won’t be any reincarnation for them.
If there’s nothing else to motivate you, let that be enough. ”
I took a deep breath, then exhaled. “Damn you.”
He chuckled and then jumped to his feet and clapped his hands. “Okay, time to go little brother.”
“Thorne—”
The floor opened up beneath me and I dropped.
Anyone else would’ve been nervous or startled at being thrown out of the Seelie tunnel like that, but I was a Seelie royal.
Despite the lack of wings, I did not fear the fall.
My mother had gifted me darkness, and I could use it at my will, so I merely let it scoop me out of the sky and drop me right into Coven Headquarters in Eden .
. . which looked more like a battlefield triage than a living room.
There were trails of red blood from the front door going in every other direction, clearly showing where my allies had gone when they got home from whatever battle I’d just missed.
Except on the stairs. Not a single drop of blood headed up.
They were either too tired or knew there was no point—or both.
I glanced around since none of them had noticed my arrival yet, which didn’t offend me since I literally stepped out of the shadows in the corner.
Tennessee sat at his seat at the head of the table with his forehead on the table and his wide shoulders slouched.
A light snore rumbled through the chaos that could almost be called his hair, save for all the blood caked in it.
Mona, his soon-to-be stepmother, was equally as asleep in the seat next to him, except her face was using an open book as a pillow.
Timothy and Katherine were in the kitchen cooking several things with haunted eyes.
Hunter, Devon, Bentley, and Cooper were sitting side-by-side on the big couch, leaving maybe half an inch between their bodies, and they were all sound asleep. Bloodied but asleep.
Emersyn remained in her new permanent spot, sitting like a statue on the ledge in front of the hearth, keeping the fire burning strong.
Except now she ran her fingers over the pages of the Book of Shadows as if there were brail when I could see there wasn’t.
I narrowed my eyes just as she lifted her fingers and moved to the next page and little rainbow swirls billowed beneath her fingertips.
I smiled. Tegan was the single most impressive mortal I’d ever seen.
It was an honor to share a timeline with her.
Wait, where is she? I frowned and scanned the other bodies. Everyone else who wasn’t taken down by Unseelie magic was in this room in similar states of fatigue and weariness. But not Tegan. Her aura was not one I could miss even if I wanted to.
I cleared my throat, which won me a few freshly awoken glances. “Where’s Tegan?”
Tenn’s head snapped up from the table, but his eyes were still half-dazed.
His skin was flushed and the lines of the wooden table had marked his skin.
He did nothing to conceal the little puddles of drool on the table and his chin.
In the blink of an eye, his vision turned laser-sharp.
He glanced left and right, then jumped up so fast he slammed his legs into the table, thus waking the five other people sitting at it.
His face paled. That soulmate glyph on his chest turned emerald green. “BABE!” he shouted.
The other five Bishops were already alert and beginning to panic.
Rainbow magic flickered in the bay window behind Tenn.
Tegan appeared like she’d always been there, lying there like an upside-down cat.
But she was crying—No, wait. She was laughing hysterically, laughing so hard tears were sliding down her flushed cheeks.
She held her hands to her stomach as her whole body jiggled.
Tenn growled but he dropped back into his seat, which slid halfway toward her just from the force of him. “I am not strong enough for your jokes right now, Tegan.”
Everyone mumbled in agreement.
Tegan was still laughing but now she was waving her hands in the air.
She snorted and then covered her mouth. Tenn flicked his wrist and a little gust of wind lifted her upright.
Hunter grimaced as he threw his arm over the back of the couch and blasted her with his golden magic.
It took a few seconds for his magic to break through whatever had just happened.
Once she was able to catch her breath, she wiped the tears from her eyes and cursed. “Sorry, y’all. I was not laughing at you. I promise.”
“Babe,” Tenn growled.
She waved her hands in the air. “I found a hidden spell from Althea in the Book of Shadows saying she’d discovered the last Aether Witch had been able to conceal her aura, so I wanted to practice it.”
My breath left me in a rush. “You were in that window this whole time?”
She nodded and looked to me with a wild sparkle in those pale eyes. “You didn’t sense me?”
I shook my head. “You’re terrifying. Don’t stop.”
“Don’t encourage her,” Cooper said with a sigh.
“I was already laughing before Everest asked for me. I swear I wasn’t testing you. Y’all were just knocked the fuck out.” She swiped her hand in the air toward Tenn and the drool on his face vanished.
“I’m going to regret asking this, I fear,” Tim said as he leaned against the doorframe to the kitchen, “but what was so funny?”
She sighed and leaned against the window. “So, I was chatting with Sam—”
“Chatting?” I growled, my muscles already tightening to panic.
“In here, my dude.” She tapped on her temple. “Sam has inherited a very convenient gift from your mother—one you’re quite familiar with, are you not?”
I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. “Telepathy is Mother’s sweet spot. I do not like the idea of Sam using it so frequently while Mother is so close.”
“Oh you’re about to feel very differently about that statement.” She snort-laughed and scrubbed her face with her hands. “Sam got us his name.”
WHAT? My breath caught in my throat. My whole body turned ice-cold. “Tegan, whose name did Sam get?” I said telepathically to the whole room because my jaw was clenched tight.
The grin she gave me made my pulse skip. It was that wicked. “HIS.”
Bentley jumped to his feet and turned toward her. “No. She didn’t . . . Did she?”
“She did.”
“The Unseelie Prince?” Even my telepathic voice was a whisper.
Tegan nodded, her grin still in place.
I swayed. “Sam learned the Unseelie Prince’s name? How?”
Tegan giggled and shrugged her shoulders. “Apparently . . . she fucked it out of him.”
The room burst into laughter at that. Even I let out a little chuckle. Royce was laughing so hard his face was turning purple. Every woman in the room was nodding her head in approval.