11
Soleil
I can’t tell if Finn is happy or horrified that we apparently both signed ourselves up for this little outing into the demon realm.
His face is blank, anything he might be feeling hidden behind an expression I can’t read at all.
It’s a jarring change from the last time I saw him, when every single emotion he had seemed to be written all over his face.
His clothes are different, too.
He was wearing a loosely fitted tunic the last time I saw him, open and breezy and relaxed.
Now he’s got on some kind of armor. Leather, like the other guards milling around, but in a slightly different design.
It looks… good on him.
Unfortunately good, actually.
I’m glad I’m wearing sunglasses, because there’s no way he’d be able to miss the way my eyes trace over every inch of that armor, following the tightly fitted lines of it all the way to the crest on his chestplate designed with a moon and stars.
Vayla steps up and says something to another of the guards, and he nods before calling an order for everyone to gather.
It makes me want to run in the other direction.
I shouldn’t go on this field expedition.
I should beg off and get my ass back to Vayla’s workshop, tuck myself away, and spend the next few days poring over Ariana’s grimoire like I planned to.
But what the hell would that fix?
What would it do but give me more time to stew over all the thoughts I can’t escape, everything that’s haunting me even in a whole other realm?
I also can’t run away from another thought that’s been hounding me since the moment I woke up from my nap yesterday.
I may have… overreacted. To the whole mate thing.
Granted, I wasn’t in the most stable emotional state at the time, but running away without even saying a word to Finn was a little unhinged, even for me.
That, combined with the fact that I can’t read him right now, that it’s impossible to tell if he hates me or not, makes me want to shrink into a little ball and disappear.
I never had to deal with stuff like this back at the coven hall.
I never had to deal with all these feelings, with anything other than the next assignment, the next test, the next rung on the ladder toward Ascension.
Maybe all those years of emotional avoidance have broken me.
“Alright,” the demon guard who seems to be in charge says, pulling me out of that spiral. “Looks like everyone’s here. And Vayla? You brought a guest?”
“Soleil,” she says, giving me a small bump with her shoulder. “An envoy from the Crescent Coven and one of the finest healers I’ve ever met. She’ll be helping with the flowers. Soleil, this is Glenson, the First Lieutenant of the court guard.”
My face flushes a bit with her praise, and I give Glenson a nod.
He looks at me for a moment, considering. “We’ll need someone who can portal Soleil.”
“Will have to be one of you lot,” Vayla says to the armored demons beside him. “I’ve got supplies to transport.”
At least three of those demon guards look my way eagerly.
But none of them even make it a single step toward me before a tall, blond demon elbows his way through the fray.
“I can portal you.”
Finn looks down at me, and even through my sunglasses, the spark of magic when our eyes meet is undeniable.
“You alright with that?” Vayla asks quietly.
“Uh, yeah,” I say, entirely unable to comprehend what my mouth is doing, being put on the spot like this. “That’s uh, that’s fine.”
“Alright,” Glenson claps his hands together. “Let’s get things moving, then.”
He calls more orders to other members of the guard.
Vayla walks off to inspect the supplies she packed, everyone else gets into their assigned spots, and for a moment I want to call after her and let her know that oh, no, I’m not going after all, that this whole idea was cursed, that I have no business being—
“It’s alright if you’d like to travel with someone else,” Finn says quietly. “My apologies, I didn’t mean to… I should have thought for a moment before I said something.”
Maybe I should take him up on that offer. Being as close as I’ll need to be to him to step through a portal certainly won’t help things. It won’t help this unruly magick still going haywire now that he’s so close. It won’t help all my racing thoughts and the nerves squeezing tight in my chest.
It won’t help anything at all.
But I make myself remember.
Overreacted. I overreacted.
I was unforgivably rude to him yesterday—downright cruel to him yesterday—and even if I really, really can’t handle having a demon mate right now, it doesn’t mean I have to be a jerk.
“It’s okay,” I tell him, just as softly. “I don’t… I don’t mind.”
I don’t mind doesn’t seem to be quite the answer he wanted to hear, but he accepts it with a nod.
I hold out my hand, feeling foolish. “And also, I know Seren told you who I am, but I should probably introduce myself. Officially. I’m Soleil.”
A flash of surprise breaks across his face.
But he doesn’t say anything.
It’s only a few seconds, but each one is agony, stretching out long and impossibly awkward between us.
Oh, goddess, this is terrible.
I should just step back, put my hand down and—
“I’m Finn.” He reaches out and grasps my forearm instead of my hand, firm grip so large that his fingers reach all the way around. I do the same, awkwardly trying to copy the gesture.
He frowns, though there’s something a bit exaggerated and playful about it. “That’s not right, is it? I feel like I’ve seen humans do this differently.”
An unlikely smile tugs at my lips, and I shake my head. “It’s more like…”
I slide my hand down his arm until I can grasp his in a handshake.
Unfortunately, the moment I do—the moment our skin touches—magick tugs hard and insistent in the center of my chest.
It feels almost… pleased.
Like this bond is a living creature that needs and wants, like it’s happy about this.
Weird.
So, so damn weird.
I’ve encountered a lot of different types of witch and wielder and demon magick, but none like this.
Finn inhales a sharp breath through his nose, apparently just as aware as I am about that magick. He laughs as he draws his hand back, though it comes out a little shaky.
“Well, that’s… potent.”
“That’s one way to put it,” I mumble, and he laughs again, warmer this time.
“So,” he says, watching as the first of the guards portals away, carrying a chest of supplies on his back. The first guard is followed by a second, then a third, as everyone moves out on Glenson’s orders. “Are you ready?”
“How does this… how does this… work, exactly? I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”
I am really not looking forward to portalling again, is what I want to say. Especially considering how unbalanced and nauseous coming here with Allie made me.
But I signed up for this, and I knew portalling would be part of the deal.
“I’ll open a portal and take you along with me. Giving me your hand should work,” Finn says evenly, extending one to me.
The magick in my chest nearly purrs at the opportunity to touch him again, but I make myself focus.
“Should?”
We’re about to go bouncing around this realm on a bit of demon magick and a prayer. I don’t like the sound of should.
“Putting my arms around you would be better.”
My demon mate is a flirt.
A shameless flirt, as he holds his arms wide like he expects me to step into them.
“One arm,” I allow, holding my own out so he can loop his through it.
“I’ll take what I can get,” he murmurs, and steps closer.
He smells… incredible.
Like mountain air and pines, fresh snow on a crisp winter morning.
And just being here, next to him, smelling him, does something to me.
Damn it.
“We’ll take the journey in a couple of stages,” he explains, and a rush of magick surrounds us as he opens a portal when Glenson gives us the signal. “That will make it a little easier. Does that sound good?”
Overtaken by a wave of nerves, I just give him a single, curt nod.
And then we step through.
It’s so much worse than it was with Allie.
Still not as bad as the Veil, but we must be traveling a lot further than she took me, because it feels like I’ve been thrown onto one of those awful spinny rides at the county fair.
One that’s diabolically designed for maximum nausea.
I’ve barely got my feet under me when we make it to the first spot. Others land beside and around us, pausing for a moment before more portals open and they disappear.
In the distance, more mountains, but the forest is thinner here on the leeward side. The sloping terrain leads into a broad plain, but I barely have my head on straight enough to get a good look at it before Finn squeezes my arm.
“Ready for the next one?”
“Yeah,” I breathe. “Sure.”
He opens another portal.
This one spits us out in the middle of a huge, grassy plain that stretches nearly from horizon to horizon. There’s another mountain range in the far distance, but I really have no idea if it’s the same one we just left, or a new one entirely.
“Just one more,” Finn says with another squeeze of my arm.
I open my mouth—to ask him to stop, slow down, something—but immediately snap it shut when I feel a terrible lurch in my stomach.
Not good.
Very not good.
Mercifully, we only have one more jump before we reach our destination.
We arrive in a wide-open meadow circled by incredible mountain peaks. Like the most ideal, picture-perfect postcard of an alpine paradise I’ve ever seen.
Not that I’m in much of a state to enjoy it as I stumble forward and only barely catch myself before I go sprawling into the beautiful wildflowers and swaying grass that cover the meadow.
“Sorry.”
It’s all I’m able to mutter before I double over and hurl.