CHAPTER FIVE || HUNTER #2
Daniel glanced up at me, seeming almost caught off guard that I was talking to him like a person. “Well, as far as we know, the devil doesn’t exist. Though, who really knows? But there’s plenty of other stuff out there that does. Mostly it’s really powerful faeries and Otherworld spirits.”
“Which type are you?” Lee asked.
“I’m the third kind. I’m what most people call a bloodline witch.
Or, I guess, a bloodline warlock.” The attention we were giving him might’ve been too much because he blushed beet red and straightened back up, putting distance between him and Lee.
“Anyway. Some of the more powerful witches and warlocks out there have special gifts. They’re usually inherited through their family, but there are certain types of rituals that allow someone to come face to face with the old powers in the Otherworld and gain a special ability that way.
” He paused again. “I’ve heard that’s what the Seattle coven does when its members come of age. ”
“That’s great and all,” I cut in, fascinated despite my best intentions and vaguely annoyed with myself for it. My body kept trying to relax in Daniel’s presence when I’d rather have stayed tense. “But what does it mean to ‘balance life’?”
The warlock shrugged. “I don’t know too much about it. It’s really powerful for healing, if it’s used that way, but the downside is that the healer takes on a portion of the illness or injury for a little while.”
“Great,” I replied. “And this helps us how, exactly?”
Lee was still reading, his expression scrunched up in concentration.
Then his eyes widened and he grinned, tapping the page triumphantly.
“But what’s actually important here is that the sympathetic manifestations—the power boost the rest of the coven got—were all individual to each witch or warlock.
They were kind of like a magical fingerprint.
They didn’t all get a healing gift.” He paused, his eyes skimming the page again.
“One of the witches gained the ability to discern the history of an object by touching it. Another of the coven manifested the power of farsight, whatever that means.”
“The ability to see something that’s happening somewhere else.
It’s sometimes called scrying or remote viewing, depending on who you’re talking to,” Daniel explained, getting more animated.
“Okay, yeah. This is good. This would explain why my magic is expressing itself through everyone in the pack differently. Maybe it’s based on temperament or something?
” He glanced at Lee. “Your perceptiveness became foresight, maybe? And Oliver obviously holds a lot inside, which apparently equals moving stuff without touching it. And Hunter’s—”
He stopped, apparently realizing he’d been about to analyze me to my face.
“Protectiveness,” I supplied flatly.
“Or defensiveness,” Lee said, smirking at me.
I ignored him, my gaze still on Daniel. “It became a magical shield. Yeah, I got there on my own. Thanks.”
Daniel flushed and I felt an immediate stab of guilt. “Right,” he said. “Sorry.”
Lee shot me a glare, then broke the silence that fell between us with, “The question is, did these sympathetic manifestations stabilize on their own, or did someone else have to intervene to make them stop?”
Daniel returned his attention to the page. “It doesn’t say. The entry just ends. Either the author got bored or—”
“Or the situation resolved itself,” Lee finished.
“Or it got worse and they had way bigger problems,” I cut in. “Problems that prevented them from journaling about it.”
Daniel swallowed hard. “I really hope not.”
Lee’s expression darkened and he shot me another glare. Rare for him. Anger was usually more my thing.
“Yeah, that’s probably not it,” I said sweetly. “I’m sure everything was totally rainbows and unicorns. Let’s keep looking.”
Neither of them looked reassured. Can’t imagine why. But with that, we went back to work.
I watched them both without meaning to. There was an ease developing between Lee and Daniel that hadn’t been there yesterday. Evidenced when Lee would ask a question and Daniel would answer, and then the silence that followed would be ever so slightly warmer than the one before it.
I couldn’t stop the surge of heat that burst through me each time it happened.
I tried to tell myself, over and over again, that it was a feeling of betrayal and anger toward Lee. The assignment was to protect Daniel, not warm up to him.
As the afternoon progressed into evening, Lee even brought Daniel a mug of coffee without being asked. It was almost sweet.
I glared over at them. Neither of them seemed to notice.
Daniel took the mug with a surprised, “thanks.”
They smiled at each other. Their fingers brushed. And neither of them flinched.
Something twisted deep in my gut.
It’s just irritation, I told myself. That’s all this was.
I was angry at Lee for breaking ranks. And for making it look so damn easy.
For being able to set aside two years of anger and hurt to just be present in a way that I couldn’t be.
And at Daniel, too, for the way his expression softened when Lee spoke to him.
And for the cautious hope that kept surfacing in his dark eyes before he managed to stamp it back down.
And most of all, at myself, for wanting so badly to be able to do the same thing as Lee, even while being completely, pathetically, incapable of it.
Lee could feel echoes of what I was feeling, too. I knew he could, the same way I could feel his naked longing for Daniel. The bond between all of us meant my emotions bled into his awareness, just like his bled into mine. But he seemed content to ignore it.
The hard part—the part I couldn’t stand—was that it looked so right. Lee called Daniel over twice to help him decipher a tricky passage. And when Daniel leaned in, the two of them working side by side, bent and squinting over old books, it looked like two puzzle pieces sliding into place.
They belonged together. And I was the piece that didn’t fit. The one that was still way too sharp-edged and bristling, refusing to be slotted in.
I struggled to control my breathing, even though it felt like I was inhaling shards of jagged, twisted metal. I stared down at the words on the page before me—I was barely even reading them anymore—until my vision blurred and turned glassy. I blinked away the stinging wetness.
Thankfully, neither of them noticed.
* * *
By sunset, I was going out of my mind. I’d been sitting on this damn couch for the entire day, reading journal entries written by long-winded witches that ranged from useless to incomprehensible, stealing glances at Daniel that I hated myself for, and pretending I couldn’t see—or worse, feel—the warmth building between Lee and the warlock like the glow of a fire I wasn’t allowed to sit near.
I needed air. I stood up, intending to step outside for a few minutes, and that’s when Daniel suddenly said, “Thank you. For this morning. You saved my life, Lee.”
Lee was quiet for a long moment. Then he said, “You don’t need to thank me for that.”
“I do, though. You didn’t have to—”
“Daniel.” The gravity in Lee’s voice stopped the warlock mid-sentence. “We still want you safe. That much hasn’t changed. It’ll never change. No matter how complicated things are between us. That part will always be true.”
I stood there, my back to them. Lee was right. He was always right. I did still want Daniel safe.
Hell, it was the reason I’d gotten injured by the Algea. I’d thrown myself in front of the warlock, putting myself in harm’s way for him without even thinking about it. My only thought had been not him.
But wanting someone safe and trusting them weren’t the same thing. And yeah, I still loved him. I wasn’t sure how not to.
But Daniel had lied to us for twelve years. I could want Daniel alive and maybe even happy, but the last time I’d trusted Daniel Henbane, he had destroyed me.
Yet, standing in his cabin, surrounded by his things, breathing his scent, the bond between us was humming so loudly I could barely think, all I really wanted, deep down, was to find a way back to him again.
“I need some air,” I said abruptly. Then, before either of them could reply, I opened the door and fled outside.
* * *
I sat on the porch steps for a long time.
The commune was quiet. Reed had sent word around that the pack should stay in their cabins until further notice, so the usual evening activity—wolves drifting between cabins, gathering at the fire pit, the comfortable background noise of us all settling in for the night—was absent.
It felt like the whole place was holding its breath.
Lee came out eventually and sat down beside me on the steps, close enough that our shoulders almost touched. We didn’t say anything for a good long while.
“You spoke for both of us,” I said, breaking first.