Chapter 22
ON THE brINK OF DARKNESS
“Come with us.” I reach a hand up to cup his jaw. “Please. We are so close.” Pressed against my husband’s chest, the change in him is more daunting in its proximity. The blaring silver of his eyes stretches through veins beyond, under his skin… It’s hauntingly mesmerising.
Everything about him is overpowering, animalistic. Even the circling scent of leather and spice is more pronounced. Static zaps off his skin, touching every inch of mine. It makes me want to fold further into him.
I plead silently with him not to take me back to Halo. We could be together as a family. I need him to see that. And maybe I want him to covet Sunny and me enough to leave everything for us.
“Mama!” Sunny screams beyond the tunnel entrance, piercing through the toughened muscle that is my heart. I desperately want to go to him. Instead, my vision is overtaken by the snarl of my husband’s plush lip shooting upwards, his arms caging me in, keeping me firmly against him.
I’m thankful our son won’t see us leave without him if Melek takes me away.
He’ll be safe. Trust isn’t something I give away freely, but the pink fae has an aura about her that says salvation.
There’s no way this works out where Sunny isn’t safe, even if that means I have to sacrifice myself for him.
This can’t be for naught.
“You are mine, Storm. They cannot have you.” Fingers dig into my skin tighter, pinching, not yet to the point of pain, enough that he has me, that I am indeed his.
I don’t fight that notion any longer. The way our souls collide is irrevocable.
We are entwined. I want an us, even if it’s madness.
However, more than anything, I want our children to grow up without brutality, and therein lies our problem.
Our need. Our lust. Our mingling of proximity isn’t enough. Love—if that’s what this is—can’t take precedence between us. We have children to protect.
I might be lost, but they aren’t yet. Sunny and baby Phoenix have long lives ahead of them. And I want those lives to be free of the trials I’ve faced. Of the hunger. The manipulation. The greed. The evil.
“So don’t leave me, then.” His deepening, glowing silver orbs bore into mine.
He takes a step forward, and hope blossoms in my chest.
Can I convince him of this? The hard part is done.
We are free of Halo. The fae are on our side.
One can hope. Now, we have to cross the tree line into the Fairy Lands.
The magical haven from my brother’s stories that represents our freedom, safety, and joy.
All the things we grappled with finding in Halo territory.
“NO.” Shaking his head, Melek blinks rapidly. “I will keep you safe in Halo, just like I planned.” His feet begin to move backwards.
“There’s no us in Halo, Melek.” Stilling, his jerky movements cease.
A yawning growl begins to vibrate from within his heated chest. This is the moment I notice what other people see when they look at him: the terrifying commander.
The man who doesn’t take no for an answer.
And it’s being accentuated by this new cast to his appearance, the strangeness of metal in the shimmering of his eyes and veins.
Could it be from the fae solence? It is reminiscent of the colour that seeps out of their bodies. Regardless, it showcases the danger we are all in. The sight of him howls it with ferocity.
This is not my husband. Not my Melek.
This man is something else—other.
How he got this way, I’m unsure.
“Mine.” The whisper of a curse on a tainted tongue draws me into him until I realise it’s not my body getting close, but me sinking, falling into him, joining with him, becoming one, the veins spread around his eyes, mouth, and out to his hairline, down his bulging neck.
My vision becomes blurry, weightlessness taking over—almost like when I lost solence, but this time, I know I’m not bleeding. This time, it’s him. I’m consumed with Melek, our souls melting into one.
In the background, shuffling catches my attention—someone speaking, a feminine lilt. I can’t make out what the woman is saying until it’s right next to my ear, and I recognise her voice–the pink fae.
“You’re killing her. STOP. Mate, stop. You’re KILLING her.”
Other hands are on me now, ruining the connection, polluting it, making me shrink away.
“Give her up. I can heal her.”
I focus on him. Only him. My husband. My commander.
He’s all I want.
“NOW.”
I’m ripped away.
The connection ends.
My soul aches for him.
I want my—
“She’s fading. I’ll need to do it here.”
“Fucking do it already, Sera. The vines I cast are weak to his mate bond.”
Darkness once again consumes me, and this time, I am met with a white-haired goddess surrounded by flames of blue.
“Human.” The sizzling whisper lingers along my temple.
“Argh.” I tingle all over, heat and the chill of the air washing over me, my body unable to keep a steady temperature. Opening my eyes, green orbs take me in.
“Oh. Sorry to say, not my finest work, but it was my first time dealing with Diviner magic.” The pink fae—the very same who took Sunny—sits back on her heels, the dark entrance to the tunnel framing her, a halo of light showering her from above.
“But I think you look rather fetching.” Every sentence that leaves her pouty, dark pink lips is beyond bewildering.
“What happened?” I ask. My prone form lies slightly achy on the rocky ground. Sunlight streaming overhead, I squint. We made it out. Stretching slightly, I find my back pain completely gone. Small miracles.
“It seems your mate is more than Renfir bargained for. It just so happens that I’m an excellent healer.” She twirls her golden braid around her finger, her smile turned up to megawatt.
“Renfir? Mate?” I must have fallen over and bumped my head. What is she talking about?
“Yes, silly. Your mate. The big guy with the sexy silver eyes.” What? Everything feels foggy. I try to sit up. Sights around me go in and out of focus, shapes taking and losing form.
“Whoa, human, take it easy. You’re recovering.” Ignoring her, I push up regardless. “Fine. Don’t listen to me,” she adds, crossing her arms over her chest.
Her sassy attitude cures whatever hangover I’ve acquired, making me smile. “I don’t understand. What happened?”
Finally, the bump before me illustrates the reality of the situation. “Is she okay?” Nothing else matters. Oh, god, and Sunny. Where is he? Did she leave him alone?
She notices my panicked expression, reaching out to touch my shoulder until a rumbling growl travels towards us, and her fingers instantly retreat.
“Everyone is well. The babe in your stomach is strong. So is Sunny. And your mate who is tethered to the kelpie, seething at me, is especially capable of taking care of himself.” She leans in close as if imparting a secret.
“Girl, he’s packing.” She winks wickedly. Who is this woman?
A delicate flick of her wrist points my attention to the object of my heartbreak.
Melek’s soul-spearing glare is on me, while he is roped together, arms tied at his back with what looks to be some sort of interlocking green harness stretched between four furred, onyx beasts in the middle of the barren land between the mountains we’ve exited and the Fairy Lands’ tree line far off in the distance.
Each animal stomps four bulky legs under stocky bodies, four times the size of the colourful fae surrounding them.
Thick, wavy black manes stretch from the tops of each of their heads, dusting the ground below, with a tail at the end stretching just as long.
There’s nothing I can compare them to, and I’m utterly awestruck.
They’re beautiful in their shimmering rawness under the sun’s rays.
“Are you well, human?” Suddenly, Adam is towering over me, blocking my view of the majestic beasts I’ve been enchanted by. A whoosh of limbs soon follows, landing on my legs, trying to squeeze against my rounded abdomen.
“Mama, Mama! Papa is being mean to the fairies. He keeps going like this.” Sunny shows me his milky white teeth and snaps. When he stops and stares, his mouth drops open. “Whoa, what happened to your eyes, Mama?”
“Umm.” I touch fingers to my face, and the pink fae answers.
“A side effect of the fifth element.”
“Fifth element,” I murmur under my breath.
Finding Adam, I glower. “Someone better tell me what’s going on now.
” There’s a sternness to my voice that usually only comes out when I’m fighting with my husband.
Everything is coming at me so fast. I can’t make heads or tails of what is happening anymore.
Crouching before me, the green and pink fae are what my dreams are made of.
This particular dream has a lot more flaws than I expected.
My chained husband with silver eyes is the most pressing of all my issues, now that I know we are all well-ish.
My mental capacity to take any more surprises today is filling up thick and fast.
“My name is not Adam. It’s Ren. I changed it when I infiltrated Halo as a keeper. Melek is not who you think he is. He carries what you call fae solence in him.”
Hazel eyes stare intently at me, Ren’s emerald skin melding into a thick head of cascading brunette hair, fine, point-tipped ears parting through the tendrils.
If it weren’t for the green skin and pointed ears, he’d almost pass as human, in his black keeper wear.
Both he and the woman next to him are ethereal.
Colour seems to stretch around them, follow them.
Fae solence. Does he mean he drinks it or… “Are you saying my husband is one of you?” My gaze casts back towards the irate man roped between four beasts, now noticing four varying shades of rainbow fae on top of each, holding the black manes to steady the legs of the animals beneath them.
“But he’s on the council?” My voice is low as I linger on the strange sight before me. None of this makes sense. He can’t be fae. Adam—no, Ren. My words. It’s going to take me a while to get used to calling him that.
“Yes, that’s true. I’m unsure of when his family line was crossbred.
From what I’ve seen, it is unlikely anyone else within Halo is fae.
My best guess is that he’s been keeping it a secret, or he barely knows himself, since the land Halo sits upon has all but been deserted by the mother.
Magic is dimmed within that place, and it takes a very powerful fae to continually pull energy from the defiled atmosphere that is Halo. ”
Holding Sunny close, a question comes to mind that I’m both afraid and somewhat eager to speak aloud. “Does that mean Sunny is fae?” I block his ears so he doesn’t hear, and my boy squirms.
“Mama, I want to hear.” He bats at my hands.
This time, it’s the pink fae who speaks. “He is half and half. His power has been diminished, living in Halo for so long. It may take him some years within our lands to heal.”
“And what of my husband? Will he return to normal?”
“We only know of mates going crazed like this when they are separated, or they suspect their partner is in danger. It has happened a few times to the fae who have been taken by Halo when their mates have stayed within our borders.” She looks over at Melek.
“Your mate.” That word again. I’m guessing it means the same word as husband.
“He’s different. His powers should be suppressed after living within Halo, yet because of losing you, he went feral, and that looks to have, in turn, pushed his powers to the forefront.
It is something we’ve not seen in centuries. A power unbound by the goddesses.”
“What power?” I ask. Sunny and I are both held in place by the tone of her alluring voice.
“Diviner magic. An ability so strong it can take and give life with a touch. If Ren and the others hadn’t used what little magic they could on your mate, he would have killed you.”
“No.” I pull Sunny impossibly closer.
“Mama, too tight,” he mumbles. I release him.
Melek wouldn’t kill me, and he wouldn’t hurt his child. It had to be an accident.
“Once we return to the Willow, and Melek sees we are no threat to you, he’ll be back to normal, and his powers will most likely recede,” Ren adds.
“Back to normal.” There’s no normal anymore. Not when I’ve found out my husband has enough magic to kill with a touch, and that our children might follow in his fate.
“There’s really no need to worry your pretty little grey eyes about it. Things will be well in the Willow. We protect our own and humans wishing to seek refuge.” Pink-tipped fingers come to push a strand of white hair away from my face.
“My hair is white?! And you said grey eyes? What is going on?” Alarm bells ring. My heart beating out of rhythm, I screech at the woman before me.
“Oh, really, nothing to fret about. It’s just a stripe of white hair.
I couldn’t get it to go black again like the rest. See?
Look.” She holds chunks of hair from both the left and right sides out for me to see, black and white, as she’d described, all the tint gone from a particular strip at the front.
“And unlike your hair, I was only able to save a sliver of blue in your iris, so now your eyes match Sunny’s.
A fine shade of grey.” I can tell she’s trying to hype this up for the kid sitting on my numb legs because I know my face is ten shades of mortified.
“Like I said, nothing to worry about. The Diviner magic just stripped some pigment, and I replaced what I could.”
She doesn’t realise the depth of her words. How they change everything I once thought of myself.
Grey. The one thing that made me different from them is gone.
Who am I now, but a dirty hollow murderer, like the rest?
Sunny takes his small hands and places them on either side of my cheeks, watching me intentionally. “I like them, Mama. We match.”
Soulful, warm grey irises stare back at me, and it reminds me that not only the hollow wear this colour. My child does as well. The one person in this world who has my whole heart.
“You’re right, baby. Now, we are the same.” Hugging him that much closer, I let my grief turn into happiness for my sun.