30. Ash
Chapter Thirty
Ash
S he was fading fast. After the forest had run out and I hadn’t had trees to move through as fast as I had, I took my human form again and ran. I followed the road—this was the road they would have taken—and I hoped to the gods that I wouldn’t be too late.
The closer I got to her, the stronger I felt the bond between us. It was the only way I knew I was headed in the right direction.
I still couldn’t figure out exactly where she was. She was so weak, our bond was starting to fray at the edges.
She was dying.
Dammit! This was all my fault. I shouldn’t have slept with her, I shouldn’t have created this fucking bond with her. I should have kept her safe by staying away, but no, I just had to take what I wanted, didn’t I? I shouldn’t have let myself get so swept up in who she was. I shouldn’t have let her draw me in.
What was it with me and fucking humans?
I slowed to a stop after I’d run for hours. My legs screamed at me, every breath burning in and out of my chest. I could still feel her, but I didn’t know where she was. At least from what I could tell, they’d stopped moving.
How the fuck was I supposed to know where they were keeping her?
The only way I could know was if I reached out to her, if she could only reach back.
I closed my eyes and found our bond. I followed it, trying to find her. She was delirious, dreaming. I felt her floating around in a semi-unconscious state. I could use that—it was the last thing I could do to find her.
She was dreaming, so I changed her dream. I used it to speak to her, no matter where she was. As long as she was alive and our bond existed at all, I could get her to tell me where she was.
She didn’t know. Fuck, she was too out of it to know where she was, to know what to say to me to help her.
A warehouse? A factory? Asphalt, four gray walls, and a cold floor.
This was an industrial area—there were a million factories and warehouses around, a lot of them abandoned. I couldn’t work my way through all of them and hope I found her before it was too late.
It was already almost too late.
A tug at my bond jerked at me. I focused on the tug—she was using her last strength to find me, to help me. Another tug, weaker this time, but it was there.
I started running again, ignoring my body’s protests and following the bond between us, which was weakening at an alarming rate.
Ash , her voice sounded in my head, nothing but an echo. I’m here.
I’m coming! I tried to reassure her. Whatever you do, don’t give up! I’m coming.
When the bond faded to almost nothing, panic gripped my throat and squeezed my chest. I wasn’t going to let her die. Not on my watch. Not while I could do something about it.
I skidded to a halt in front of three warehouses standing in a row. Lorraine was in one of them, I just didn’t know which one. I didn’t have the time to search all three of them. I would have to guess.
I squeezed my eyes shut and picked one. Just before I headed toward the metal doors that made up the entrance, I noticed a black car in the parking lot of the second warehouse. It looked too fancy and shiny to be here. It was out of place, and out of place was exactly what I was looking for.
I changed direction and headed toward the second warehouse. She had to be here. If she wasn’t, that would be it—it would be all over.
I crept to the front door, but decided against it. If there were more of them, I would be outnumbered. I had to get to her, then get out as quickly and as quietly as I could.
A side door allowed me access to the warehouse. The large metal structure had been abandoned. The windows had all been broken, and the shards that remained, standing up in the window frames like jagged teeth, were dusty.
I crept across a large open space in the center of the warehouse, with chains and pulleys hanging from the ceiling. The back part of the warehouse had two floors of offices, with hallways that ran along the middle of the rows.
She could be in any of those offices. She could be?—
The clanging of a door to my left broke my train of thought.
“I don’t fucking know, man. What are we supposed to say to him?”
“Don’t look at me,” another voice answered. “This wasn’t a part of the plan. Should we take her to a hospital or something?”
“And tell the whole world we kidnapped her in the first place? We can’t do that. We’ll just deliver her.”
“Like that?”
The voices receded, growing softer as the men walked away.
I hurried in the direction of the voices, then hid around a corner and peeked. Two men turned out of my sight just as I looked, and the coast was clear.
These rooms weren’t like offices. They were more like living quarters, and all the doors were open but one. When I tried the door, it wasn’t locked.
Thank the gods.
When I opened the door, my heart constricted. Lorraine lay on the cot, her blond hair fanned out around her head. Her body was thin and frail, like she’d been starved for months. Her cheeks were sallow, her eyes sunken, and her skin was ghostly pale.
“Lorraine?” I asked, creeping closer.
She didn’t respond.
When I checked her pulse, I feared the worst, but I felt a flutter under my fingertips. She wasn’t dead yet.
I had to get her out of here and back to the vale if I wanted her to live. She didn’t have long.
I picked her up and carried her to the door. She weighed almost nothing. It was like picking up a dried leaf.
I opened the door with my foot and glanced down the hallway. The men were nowhere to be seen.
Carefully, I maneuvered Lorraine out the door and carried her across the warehouse floor. There was nowhere to hide. If they saw me now?—
“Hey!” a man shouted.
Shit. I started running.
“He’s taking her!” the man shouted, and footsteps sounded behind me.
I ran to the door I’d used to get in and squeezed through it into the sunlight. Lorraine’s head lolled to the side, and she let out a pained moan.
“Just hold on,” I urged her, hoping she could hear me. “We’re getting out of here. It might get hairy.”
I ran to the car. I couldn’t get her back to the vale fast enough.
The car was unlocked, but there was no key in the ignition. I looked for a key in the sun visor, then under the seat. Finding nothing, I jumped out and checked on top of the tires.
Nothing.
“Fuck!” I cried out.
Two men ran toward me. One had a gun.
“Shit,” I said, ducking into the car again as shots rained down on me. Bullets wouldn’t kill me, but they could fuck up the car, and then I couldn’t get out of here. They could kill Lorraine, too.
I slammed my hand down onto the steering wheel and pushed all the power I had into the damn car. I didn’t know if it would work—my magic didn’t have much to do with modern technology—but the car growled to life.
Yes!
I stared at the dials and gauges. I’d never learned how to drive—never had the need to.
When I slammed the gas pedal to the floor, the car shot forward. I wanted to go backward, but that wasn’t an option. I didn’t know how to make this godforsaken piece of shit do that.
Nearly hitting the building in front of me, I yanked the steering wheel around. The car barely missed the building, scraping against its side. I had a feeling I’d done some ugly damage to it, but the thing still moved, and that was all I wanted.
The men ran toward me, firing more shots. I struggled to straighten the car as it went faster and faster. I didn’t have time to wonder why.
I pointed the car at the shooter instead.
When he realized I wasn’t going to stop, his eyes widened and he leaped to the side, throwing himself away from the car.
I headed toward the road, taking out a wooden post that held up a sign. The sign crashed into the road behind me.
I righted the car, overcompensating and nearly flying off the road on the other side. The speed at which we traveled was dangerous—the smallest movement nearly threw the car off the road, but I gradually figured it out. I straightened the car out, and we raced back to the forest.
“Just hang in there, Lorraine,” I muttered. “We’ll be home in no time.”
I wasn’t sure how we would stop when we got there, but right now, all I cared about was closing the distance.
I grabbed Lorraine’s limp hand. Her fingers were cold. I pressed her hand against my lips, kissing her knuckles.
“We’re almost there. Don’t you dare let go.”
Finally, the forest popped up, the trees rising on either side. Just a little bit further, and the wave of magic that rippled over my skin told me we were back in the vale, back where my magic ruled.
I looked at Lorraine and swallowed hard. She should be getting better now. She should regain her strength. Unless she’d died…
Her eyes fluttered open, and she frowned. She still looked like death warmed over.
She turned her eyes to me, and her frown deepened.
“Ash?” she said.
“Hey,” I said, and I couldn’t help but grin. I was so fucking relieved she was alive. “There you are.”
“Where are we?”
“We’re on our way home.”
Her eyes widened. “Why are you going so fast?”
“To save your life,” I said. “And I don’t know how to drive.”
“Ash!” Lorraine cried out, and I nearly hit a car coming from the front. I swerved to miss it, and we nearly ran off the road.
“Slower,” Lorraine urged. “God, you’re going to get us killed. Lift your foot!”
The moment I did, the death trap slowed down.
“You’re lucky this is an automatic,” Lorraine said.
I didn’t know what that meant. Slowly, eventually, the car rolled to a stop. I hopped out and opened the door for Lorraine. I lifted her out of the car.
“I can walk,” she said. “I’m okay.”
But I wasn’t taking any chances, so I carried her into the trees.
“Ash, put me down,” Lorraine said. “Really, I’m okay. Just let me walk.”
I studied her. Her face had filled out again, and her cheeks had pinkened. She didn’t look so pale anymore.
I lowered her to the ground, and she stood on her own two feet. She pressed her hand against her forehead.
“I had the weirdest dreams. Or…” She frowned and looked over my shoulder toward the road we’d come from. “It wasn’t a dream, was it?”
I shook my head.
“You came for me,” she said.
I nodded. “I’ll always come for you.”
“Ash…”
I shook my head again. “Whatever you want to say, save it. We have to get to the cabin where there’s more magic to get you better. This isn’t over yet. They want you, badly, and they know where to find you. They’re going to come back for you.”
“Shouldn’t we go somewhere else, then?”
“No.”
I turned toward the cabin and started walking. Lorraine fell into step beside me. She had no idea how fucking good I felt to see her alive and well. I’d really thought I’d lost her at one point.
“Why not?” she asked. “If they know where to find me, we should go somewhere else.”
“We’re going to let them come to us,” I said. “We’re on home turf now, and the power here belongs to me. I want to finish this once and for all. You don’t deserve a life where you need to run and hide forever. You want to go home, eventually, and they’re stopping you from doing that.”
Lorraine’s face filled with all kinds of emotions I didn’t understand, but right now, I didn’t care.
I had to make sure she was safe. I had to keep her alive and well until All Hallows’ Eve so I could get her back home in one piece. I’d started it, and fuck if I wasn’t going to see it through.
It was time to end this so that I could carry on with my life and she could go back to hers.
The idea of her leaving shot a pang into my chest, but it was better this way. I wasn’t good for her, she didn’t belong here, and I was on my way out of here anyway. If I hadn’t bound myself to her and had to look after her until the end of the month, I would have taken her home a long time ago so I could have left.
This had to end, and I was drawing a line now.
Fuck them for taking what was mine, and fuck them for screwing with me. It was time to set things right.