Chapter 28
T he lake is a mirror reflecting the starlit sky and heavy full moon. Serath stands silhouetted against the backdrop, a powerful figure inked in silver and shadow. He turns his head as I approach.
“I’m not sure how you did it,” he says. “I’m not sure how I’m still here.”
I’m not one hundred percent sure either. “I think this has something to do with my fae blood.”
There’s so much I want to tell him, about the elite training, about Melanie, about my nature, and about the fever and what happened with Curi.
Yes, especially the last part, because I need him to absolve me, to tell me it’s all right, that I’m forgiven for giving in to the needing.
Me. That will be for me. Not for him. No.
Knowing won’t serve him. It won’t help him at all.
It will leave him trapped here, torn up, conflicted, and helpless.
I won’t do that to him.
The confession, the truth of what I’ll have to do going forward will wait until he’s free of the graynites and back with us. It will wait until he can stand before me in the flesh and tell me how he really feels.
But I can tell him about my ability to bind him to me. “Mirrowind says my fae blood allowed me to bind you to me. I think that connection might be helping you anchor yourself here.”
“Yes…” He looks up at the moon then back down at me. “I think you may be right. If this works, then it will buy me time.” He winces, his brow furrowing in discomfort.
I cup his jaw, reveling in the real sensation of stubble against my fingers. “What is it?”
“I can feel them chipping away at me, feel…something else. Cold and alien pushing against my senses.”
“You can’t let it in.” I push up on my tiptoes and press my lips to his, wanting to inject my power, my fortitude into him. “We won’t let it in.”
He sighs against my mouth, a ragged, weary sound. “I’m so tired, Cameron. So fucking tired.”
My eyes heat. “I know, but just a little while longer. The elite trial is in a few days, and Orix says they have a way to punch a hole in the graynite wards. I’m coming for you. I promise I’ll find you and Romi, and I will bring you home.”
A little hope bleeds into his eyes. “All this time we’ve been waiting for the alpha to emerge so we can take him down, but now…
now we can finally take the fight to him.
” He grips my shoulders. “Cameron, the focus must be on the alpha. Eliminating him must come first. Before Romi…before me.” My conflict must have shown on my face because his grip on me tightened. “Promise me. Swear it.”
Dammit. “Fine. Alpha first.”
His grip relaxes, and he reaches up to caress my face, but darkness creeps over his features, stealing him from me and pulling me away. Away from our shared haven and into the tumult of regular mundane dreams.
For the next four days, I lived for dreaming. Woke, ate, trained, and then hurried to bed, wanting nothing more than to be with Serath once more. Our shared anchor became my world, and the real world felt like a dream.
Yarrow and Mirrowind made good on their word and provided me with a tincture to stave off the worst of the needing, but the nights were still fevered and yearning.
Luckily, the tincture made it so that I was able to satisfy myself and calm the waves of intense desire, which I attempted to do as silently as possible.
The elite trial was tomorrow, and I still hadn’t managed to resolve my mind walk issues, finding myself trapped by doubt and insecurities over and over again as my darkest fears won.
“Penny for your thoughts?” Palia asked from across the dining table. She was an early riser for a goyle, up by eleven and usually on her second cup of coffee before we all joined her, but the last two days, I’d been up early enough to join her for breakfast.
I dropped the crumpet I was holding, cold now that I’d been staring blankly at it for the past five minutes. “I was thinking about the trial.”
“You’ll do great. You’ve worked hard.”
“I’m not so sure. Levi said I need to believe in myself, and I think I do, but when I’m in the mind walk, I feel so weak and useless. I feel…vulnerable.”
“Don’t we all? Deep down, I mean? Isn’t that normal?
I mean, if we felt invincible, truly invincible all the time, then the world would be filled with egomaniacs with superiority complexes and no fear.
Doubts keep us on our toes, they make us think and question before making decisions. They keep us safe…surely?”
She made sense, but…but what Levi had said contradicted her words. I was so confused.
The stairwell opened, and Orix entered, trailed by Taz. The elite was dressed in a sleep tee and baggy joggers, his go-to bedtime attire and the only time he wasn’t in lastonflex. “Message came for you just before dawn,” he said to me. “Yarrow said Melanie was ready.”
I sat up straighter. “What? Why didn’t you tell me right away?”
“And interrupt your dream time?” He arched a brow, and my cheeks colored.
“Have I been that bad?”
“It’s understandable,” Orix said. “He’s your mate, you want to be with him, and if sleep is the only time that you can do that, then…” He shrugged and poured coffee into his favorite mug, one that was large enough to be a bowl, then added three heaped spoons of sugar before taking a sip.
“I’m just glad you believe me, that he’s alive…”
He turned to face us, leaning back against the counter.
“I won’t believe it for certain until I see him, same with Romi, but I can concede that what you’re telling us is possible.
That what you’re experiencing is more than regular dreams. And I can promise you we will do everything in our power to get him and Romi out once we’ve taken down the alpha.
” His gaze was probing as he waited for my assent.
I’d had time to think about this. To talk to Serath about it in the snatches of time we’d had in our anchor place.
As much as I hated it, Orix was right. If we only got one shot at punching through the wards, then the alpha had to be our focus.
The needs of the many had to take priority, and Serath had made it clear that’s what he expected of me, and Romi… I knew he’d want the same.
“Don’t worry, Serath already made me give him my word. Alpha first.”
Orix relaxed. “More reason to believe he’s alive.”
Shar, Ginia, and Curi entered the kitchen, bleary-eyed and all aiming for the coffee machine, which Orix quickly vacated with a chuckle.
Curi raked his hair back and threw me a glance and a smile.
Things were easier between us now, but not the same as before.
We didn’t hang out as much, and maybe that was for the best. If what Mirrowind said about my fae blood was true, and it did attract males, then it was best to keep my distance from him.
But it did leave me with the question of whether his interest had been due to the allure of my hidden nature or because of me.
Just me. Had muting the needing muted my nature too?
Was that why he wasn’t spending time with me anymore?
And why did it bother me?
Derek materialized at the table and Levi entered via the lift a moment later dressed in lastonflex, looking fresh and as if he’d been up for a while.
“I want you all to take the day off,” Levi said. “Rest your bodies and your minds before the trial tomorrow. We leave campus at dawn to avoid the pheromone flare.”
Pheromone…Oh shit, the omega moon coincided with the sidhe moon, which meant that the air would be thick with their heat tomorrow. Goyle males would be driven crazy with the primal need to rut, and the forest would be a playground of sexual activity.
Once again, I’d been so focused on my own needing that I’d neglected to think about the others, Levi, Curi, and Touron.
“I’m locking the doors and staying inside,” Touron said stiffly.
“You can’t deny your nature,” Orix said.
He raised his chin, defiant. “I can, and I will. I’m not…I don’t want to be with anyone else.”
“The pheromones don’t affect me,” Levi said. “Perks of being a halfblood.”
But they’d affect Curi…they’d affect him, and he was being forced to miss out and last time…Last time he’d missed out because he’d wasted his time protecting me from all the pheromone-crazed males in the forest.
I tried to catch his eye, but he kept his gaze on the contents of his coffee mug, even though I was sure he could feel me watching him.
He obviously didn’t want to engage.
“Make sure you’re up with the sun,” Levi said. “The council has prepared a port for us, but it’s time sensitive.”
“The port will take us to a secure location,” Orix said. “There you’ll activate an orb to take you into the trials.”
“And this orb is safe?” Palia asked. “Willowman is gone, so who prepared it?”
“It’s a standard orb used by the council for the elite trials,” Orix said. “It leads to one location and is set so it cannot be tampered with.”
“What about switched?” Touron asked. “Like the last orb?”
“He’s right,” Palia said. “We can’t ignore the fact that every time Cam has left campus, she’s been attacked. Someone wants her out of the equation, and the best time to do it is outside the campus wards.”
Orix nodded. “That’s true, and it’s also why Lionel took charge of the port and the transport of the orb. He refuses to take any risks where Cameron is concerned.”
“There is another possibility,” Shar said. “Maybe they think we’re no longer a threat. Newbies with no experience against graynites. Or they could be too caught up in their own war, graynite against graynite.”
“Either way, we’re not taking any risks,” Orix said.
My gut tightened. I’d done my best not to dwell on what was to come the last few days, and sleep had been my salvation, but now there was no avoiding it. Tomorrow would decide Serath’s and Romi’s fate because if I failed, there would be no elite team.
If I failed, there would be no way to take down the alpha, no mission to punch through the wards. Nothing.
If I died.
They died.