Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Nick
November at the North Pole is what mortals would call controlled chaos. Except there's nothing particularly controlled about it.
The workshops blaze with light around the clock, the whole place humming with the kind of noise that seeps into your bones.
Machines grinding, voices barking orders, the occasional crash that means someone dropped something important.
Coordinators dart past, clutching tablets and clipboards like their lives depend on it, faces pinched and pale.
The air is thick with pine, cinnamon, and that sharp, electric tang that only shows up when we're all running on nerves and magic.
I should be out there, double-checking distribution charts, poking my head into the workshops, pretending I can keep all the plates spinning.
Instead, I'm stuck at my study window, heart feeling like someone scooped it out and left an echo behind, watching the aurora paint the sky and trying to remember what it was like to actually give a damn.
Six months. That's how long it's been since I left Caraway Cove, and the ache hasn't faded. If anything, it's worse, like someone jammed a fishhook behind my ribs and keeps yanking, just to see if I'll flinch. Some days, I swear I can feel it buzzing in my bones.
I rake a hand through my hair and make myself turn away from the window. There's always work. If I keep moving, keep my head buried in the endless to-do list, maybe I can outrun the ache that's set up shop in my chest.
The door to my study swings open without a knock. Only one person would dare.
"The Scandinavian protocols need your approval," Everett says, crossing the room to drop a folder on my desk. His silver eyes rake over me with an intensity that makes me want to squirm. "And you look terrible."
"Thanks. You're a real confidence booster."
"I'm serious." He plants his hands on the desk and leans forward. "When's the last time you slept?"
I pretend to consider this. "What day is it?"
"Nick."
"I'm fine."
"You're not fine." His voice drops lower, taking on an edge I don't like. "You haven't been fine for months. And I think we both know why."
A chill creeps down my back. I meet his eyes, trying to figure out what he's holding back. There's worry, sure, but underneath it, something sharper. Like he knows more than he's letting on.
"Do we?" I ask carefully.
He straightens, and for a moment I think he's going to tell me. Whatever thoughts he's been carrying, whatever information he's been holding back, he'll finally lay it out in the open. But then his jaw tightens and he shakes his head.
"Just take care of yourself. That's all I'm saying."
He leaves before I can press him on it, the door closing with a soft click that feels too final.
I drop into my chair and glare at the folder. Scandinavian protocols. Because that's what really matters. Charts, schedules, making sure the magic lands where it's supposed to. Like any of it means a damn thing right now.
It's not the woman I can't stop thinking about. Not the way her skin felt under my hands, or the sound of her laugh, or the look she gave me when I touched her like she was the only thing in the world that mattered.
I flip open the folder and try to read, but the words blur and slide around, refusing to make sense. My mind keeps wandering back to a bakery that smells like cinnamon and home, to a voice I can still hear if I close my eyes.
By the time I finally drag myself to bed, it's way past midnight. The aurora is out in full force, green and purple streaks twisting across the sky like they're showing off. I lie on top of the covers, too tired to bother with anything else, and just watch.
Eventually, sleep drags me under, rough and fast, like getting pulled out by a riptide.
And then I'm dreaming.
Except it doesn't feel like a dream. It's too sharp, too real, like I've stumbled sideways into something that's waiting for me whether I'm awake or not.
Samantha.
She's sitting on the floor, her back pressed against a door, and she's crying.
Not the gentle tears of sadness but the kind of sobbing that tears through a person, that shakes them apart from the inside out.
Her hands are wrapped around her stomach, protective and desperate, and I can feel her fear like it's my own.
Something's wrong. Not just wrong, but off in a way that makes my skin crawl.
I reach for her, but my hands go right through. I'm just a ghost, stuck watching while she rocks back and forth, whispering things I can't make out.
The scene jerks, and now she's in the bakery. There's a man with her. Too perfect, too smooth, moving with a kind of precision that makes my blood run cold. He reaches for her, for her stomach, and the wrongness coming off him is almost enough to choke on.
No. No, no, no.
Another lurch, and there's an old woman at a table, staring at Samantha's belly with eyes that look straight through skin and bone. The air feels heavy, dark, like something rotten is hiding just out of sight. Even in the dream, it makes my skin crawl.
Samantha's terrified. I can feel it pouring off her, raw and visceral. She's in danger, and I'm not there, and she's so afraid.
I jerk awake, heart hammering so hard it hurts.
The room is dark, except for the aurora bleeding in through the window. I lie there, sucking in air, telling myself it was just a nightmare. Stress, guilt, too many months missing someone I shouldn't even be thinking about. That's all it is. Or so I try to believe.
But the feeling won't let go. Deep down, I know it wasn't just my brain working out old regrets. It was real. Or close enough to real that it doesn't matter.
Samantha's in trouble.
I'm up and moving before I even realize it, crossing the room in three quick steps. The mirror waits in the corner, still hidden under the cloth I threw over it months ago. My hand hovers for a second, then I yank the cover off.
The glass catches the dim light, looking plain and harmless, until I say her name.
"Samantha Baylor."
The mirror ripples, surface warping until I'm staring into a room that I recognize from that fateful night. Her apartment above the bakery.
And there she is.
Pregnant.
The word slams into me. She's on the couch, one hand on her stomach, and even through the glass I can see the fear carved into her face.
Her friend Ella's there, talking a mile a minute, trying to keep her steady, but Samantha's not really hearing her.
She's crying, shoulders shaking, lips moving in words I can't catch.
The scene in the mirror shifts, showing me what happened earlier. The man from my dream, reaching for her with that too-perfect smile. Ella stepping between them, fierce and protective. Samantha's panic attack, her gasping for breath while her hands clutch at her stomach.
Our child. The thought hits me so hard I almost stagger. She's carrying my child.
The mirror keeps going. Shadows gather at the bakery's edges, things I know too well. A demon, skin hanging wrong on its bones. A rogue angel, cold and sharp, barely holding its real shape. They're circling her, hunting, drawn to the power inside her.
A child made of magic and flesh. Stuck between two worlds, not really belonging to either. The kind of power that makes monsters hungry.
And I left her to face it alone.
The guilt crashes over me, so intense I have to grip the edge of the mirror to stay upright.
I left her pregnant and alone, dealing with a pregnancy she can't possibly understand, carrying a child that's drawing every dark thing in creation straight to her door.
I did this. I walked away because I was afraid of what staying might mean, and in doing so, I abandoned her to face consequences I should have been there to explain.
She's terrified. She's alone. And it's my fault.
"Never again," I say to the mirror, to myself, to whatever cosmic forces might be listening. "No one touches her. No one touches our child. Not while I'm still breathing."
The rules don't matter. The boundaries, the old lines I spent centuries keeping. None of it means a thing now. Not when I can still see Samantha crying on that couch, hands wrapped around a child she doesn't know how to protect.
I was wrong. So stupidly, completely wrong. I thought leaving would keep her safe. All I did was leave her exposed, alone with something precious and dangerous and no one to help her.
That ends now.
I throw on clothes, not caring what I grab. My mind's already racing, plotting the fastest way back to Caraway Cove, the quickest route from here to there without losing time I don't have.
The courtyard is still buzzing, even though it's late. Or maybe early. Time here is more suggestion than rule. I'm halfway across the square when Everett appears at my side, keeping up with that easy, inhuman grace all elves seem to have.
"What are you doing?" he asks, though the tone of his voice suggests he already knows.
"Doing what I should have done months ago."
"Nick." His hand closes around my arm, stopping me. "Think about this. If you go back, bring her here, reveal yourself, or whatever it is you're planning, there will be consequences. You know that."
I turn to face him, and whatever he sees in my eyes must convince him I'm done listening, because he lets go and steps back.
"I don't care about consequences. They're already after her.
After our child. Demons and rogue angels and who knows what else, all drawn to power they want to corrupt or control or destroy.
She's alone, Everett. Pregnant and terrified and alone, and I did that to her.
So yes, there will be consequences. But I'll deal with those after I make sure she's safe. "
He studies me for a long moment, silver eyes searching my face for something. Then he nods, once, sharp and decisive.
"The Threshold is fastest," he says quietly. "North end of the village, past the last workshop. It'll put you out near the coast. You'll have to cover the rest of the distance yourself."
The Threshold. A rip between worlds, usually locked down for emergencies. Using it without permission is supposed to be a big deal, but I stopped caring about rules about five minutes ago.
"Thank you."
"Don't thank me yet." His mouth twists into something that's not quite a smile. "When this is over, we're going to have a very long conversation that you're probably not going to like."
I manage a laugh somehow. Dry, but still a laugh. "You act like I've liked any of our conversations, Everett."
I squeeze his shoulder, then head for the north end of the village. The workshops fade into open snow, white stretching forever. And there it is, shimmering in the aurora, a slice in the world, like someone left a glitch in the scenery.
The Threshold hums as I get close, the kind of sound you feel in your teeth. It knows me, the edges rippling like water.
I stop at the edge, one foot already over the line. Everett's still watching from the square, just a shadow against the lights. I look back, meeting his eyes across the snow.
"I trust you can take care of things for me for a while," I call out. "Don't wait up."
Then I step through. Reality folds in, the North Pole vanishing in a rush of cold air and magic.
Crossing feels like falling and flying at the same time, like being yanked apart and shoved back together in a single breath. Colors smear past, sounds collapse into one long note, and for a second, I'm everywhere and nowhere at once.
Then my feet hit solid ground.
I land on a clifftop, cold Atlantic wind clawing at my clothes. Far off, the lights of Caraway Cove flicker, a little town tucked into the coast.
Somewhere in that mess of buildings is a bakery. And above it, a woman carrying my child. She's waited months for answers I should have given her. She's facing things she can't even name, all because I ran.
I start walking. Then I'm running. Every step brings me closer.
I'm coming, Samantha. Hold on just a little longer.
I'm coming home.