3. Chapter Three
Chapter Three
Turner
Turner brushed down his horse again, soothing it as it nibbled on some beet pulp.
Without any plant life around for them to eat, they’d had to rely on their backup stores, but the horse didn’t seem to mind.
It also didn’t seem to mind that Turner had brushed each of them down twice already, which was lucky, because he needed to do something to buy himself some time.
Because he knew exactly what Ty and Ena were currently up to in the tent.
To be honest, he was surprised it had taken them this long to do so. Not that he didn’t appreciate their consideration of him—he knew it had been hard for them to find any time alone with him around—but he didn’t blame them for wanting to have sex.
Fuck, he missed having sex.
It had been…how long now? Months. Since before they’d kidnapped Ena, and that was right after Samhain.
He groaned internally.
Well, he could say goodbye to that dream for a while. Unless he was ready to turn to bestiality, which he decidedly was not, he wouldn’t be having sex anytime soon either.
But that was alright—he needed to be here. Not just because Ty and Ena were his friends and he wanted to help protect them, and their baby, at all costs, but also because, if he were being truly honest with himself, he had nowhere else to go.
He couldn’t stay with the Auster Coven, and he couldn’t go back to the Underworld, not after leaving without permission.
And even if he could, he didn’t want to anyway—he’d known exactly what he was doing when he burned that bridge.
He couldn’t just go back to being under his father’s thumb, or Cole’s—or be forced to do the things he’d had to do to the imperi…
He could never take some of those things back, but he could refuse to do them anymore.
And helping Ty break the bond to Iblis had not just been a noble goal—it had been selfish for him, in a way.
Because breaking Cole’s hold on the Underworld by breaking Iblis’s, had given him hope that should he ever choose to return, things could be different.
But then Ty had changed the fucking plan without telling him.
Turner felt his ire rise at the thought, so he walked away from the horses, lest his attitude spook them, and wandered over towards the dead bear carcass instead. It was already starting to freeze in the cold night air, its fur crystallizing with ice, when he heard the tent flap opening.
Looking over his shoulder, he saw Ty’s dark figure emerge.
“She’s asleep,” he said quietly, gesturing towards where Ena lay in the tent.
“I’m not surprised,” Turner said. “Sounded like quite the session you two had in there.” He waggled his eyebrows for effect.
Ty smiled in that cocky way of his. “Yeah, it was. Sorry if we tortured you a bit, brother.”
“Eh, between you and Ena, Steig and Lara, you know I’m used to it,” he replied, waving Ty off.
He’d never tell his friends how much it ate at him sometimes to be the lonely one.
Not that any of them had it any easier, what with the separation, the breakup, and literal and figurative torture from Cole coming in between them.
But still, at least they had some love to strive for…
Turner wasn’t sure it would ever happen for him at this point. But he’d accepted that.
“Are you feeling okay?” he asked, changing the subject by gesturing at Ty’s wounded shoulder.
“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Ty said, but he maintained eye contact, like he was assessing Turner for something. “Are you feeling okay?” he asked, clearly not talking about physical wounds. “We haven’t really had a chance to talk, just the two of us, since…everything.”
Turner scoffed. “I assume by everything, you mean since we regained our connection to Gaia, found out Ena was pregnant, you handfasted with her, and then reneged on our plans for the Underworld?”
“Yeah, that everything,” Ty said, crossing his arms. The man was no dummy. There was no way he’d missed Turner’s pointed silences over the last couple weeks. The way they’d purposefully avoided discussing anything having to do with their home or their people.
The ones Ty had abandoned.
He knew that was harsh to think—there was more to it than that—but still, in many ways, that’s how it felt. Like Ty had abandoned them all—everyone back home—in favor of Ena and his new child.
“Are you worried about them? Steig and Lara?” Ty asked cautiously.
“Of course I’m worried about them. I’m worried about all of them,” Turner replied a bit huffily. “Aren’t you?”
“Yeah, I am,” Ty replied stoically. The bastard didn’t give anything away.
Turner scoffed again. “That’s rich,” he said, trying and failing to keep his attitude in check. He was sure that Ty could feel his anger with his furor anyway, so it was pointless to try to keep it hidden.
“Well, don’t hold back on my account, brother,” Ty said, staring at him in a challenging way. “Say what you need to say.”
Turner met his stare, eye to eye. “How can you be okay with this, Ty? With leaving them all behind after what we did, breaking the bond?”
Ty didn’t say anything, but his lips pursed tighter.
“I didn’t think we would go back right away, but I thought we’d come up with a plan—come up with something—to try to oust Cole, but now…”
“Now what?” Ty asked, pushing him to finish his thought.
“Now you’re running away,” Turner said bluntly. “And it doesn’t seem like you have any plans of returning at all. Do you?”
Ty looked away from him then, kicking a hunk of snow at his feet—a telltale sign of his avoidance of a tough topic.
“I’ll take that as a ‘no,’” Turner said.
“What do you want from me?” Ty asked roughly, snapping his head back up. “You want me to abandon my wife and child and go risk my life to overthrow Cole? You want me to put Ena in danger again? I can’t do that, Turner. I swore to her I’d never put anyone above her again.”
“I’m not asking you to put them above her, but they need you too, Ty. You can’t just leave them forever. You’re the heir.”
“I don’t want to be the heir,” Ty said, his anger rising along with Turner’s. “And besides, once Cole dies, it’ll pass to Zak, and then to you. You can be the heir if you want.”
“That’s fucking stupid, Ty, and you know it. Even if you weren’t the heir, you’re their leader. You’re the king they deserve. They need you.”
“Ena needs me. My child needs me. I will not abandon them, Turner. I know what that’s like, and I won’t do it.” It was clear Ty was upset now, but was trying to keep his voice down so as not to wake Ena.
Turner shook his head, looking away from his cousin—from the man he’d looked up to, practically idolized, for so long.
He didn’t blame him. He knew this was a tough situation.
But there had to be something he could do.
Something besides just leaving everyone in the Underworld to whatever chaos Cole was undoubtedly putting them through.
“For the first fucking time in my life, I want to choose peace, Turner. Not chaos. Can’t you understand that?”
“Oh, I understand it, Ty. I just think you’re delusional for thinking that chaos won’t find us anyway.”
The two of them stared at each other for a moment, neither giving an inch to their impasse.
Turner folded first, and turned his back on Ty, making his way towards the tent.
It was late, and after all the events of the evening, he was tired.
Clearly, he wouldn’t be able to make the man see reason anyway.
After kicking off his boots, he made his way into the dark tent. He could hear Ena breathing deeply as he settled into the far side, leaving space for where Ty normally slept in the middle.
As he lay there, trying and failing to sleep, he worried that maybe he’d been too harsh on his friend.
He knew this was tough. And it wasn’t like he didn’t care about Ena—he’d come with them on this fool’s journey to make sure their child was safe, hadn’t he?
But still, he wanted something—anything—to show that Ty had a plan for the Underworld after all this was over.
But the man clearly had his head so far up his own ass about it, he couldn’t see daylight.
Maybe it was Gaia, maybe it was Ena, but something had changed in Ty, and he just hoped that whatever it was, it didn’t leave their friends in danger forever. Because deep down, Turner knew.
Bad things were happening in the Underworld.