13. Runa
Runa
Ash pulls in his fire as we burst inside the tower. He carries me into the living room and dumps me on the chair by the fireplace. Wolves don’t sit on furniture, so I prepare to hop off.
“Stay,” he says firmly.
It’s nearly impossible for an omega to refuse an alpha male’s order, so I remain sitting, but lift my upper lip and growl at him.
“Stay until I bring you some clothes.” Ash stalks outside.
In a few minutes, he returns dressed in jeans and a black T-shirt.
His boots are unlaced. He tosses me a pair of gray sweatpants and a black T-shirt.
“That’s my last T-shirt,” he says. “I’m missing the shirt I wore when Peter died.
Can’t find it anywhere. Check if it got lost in the laundry, would you? ”
I pick up the clothes between my teeth and leap off the chair.
“Did I say you could leave?” Ash sits on the bigger of the two chesterfields that face each other and laces up his boots.
Fine. I shift back into human and dress in his clothes as fast as possible, then sit back down on the reading chair. “My clothes are in the kitchen.”
“Okay. You can grab them on your way out.” Clearly agitated, he yanks at his laces.
I cross my arms over my chest. “What is your problem?”
“Do you even have to ask? You are resistant to my element. It means I can’t kill you.”
Ash says this as if he’s telling me what he ate for breakfast this morning.
He won’t say it, so I do. “Duh.”
“Exactly.”
I shake my head. “Um, no, not cool. First of all, I thought you willed the fire not to burn me. And second, why would you want to kill me?”
He lifts one finger. “No, I was in the middle of a purge when you slid into the cave and snapped me out of it. When the fire exploded, I tried to pull it back, but it was too late.” He lifts a second finger, the middle one.
“Because you’re a Stormcrest wolf who is resistant to my element.
” Ash rests his elbows on his thighs and leans in, eyes narrowing.
“You’d better tell me how you’re able to do what you did. ”
“I wore my fireproof jammies.”
“I’m not amused.”
“Maybe it’s your cooties.” I show him the burn on my hand.
Ash frowns. “You haven’t healed that yet? Are you sick?”
“I don’t think so.”
Ash scrubs his face, rubs his jaw. “I have a confession.”
“Uh-oh.”
He chuckles. It’s a troubling sound because I find it sexy.
He lifts his hand and shows me a pearly glow on the heel of his palm. “I don’t know what this is, but it’s been here from the night we signed the treaty.”
“No,” I correct him. “You signed the treaty. I was the conduit.”
Blade busts into the room and walks straight to the fireplace. Chunks of ice fall off his fur coat, and his fingers are blue from the cold. “Thaw me,” he orders, teeth chattering.
In the fireplace, the fire roars, and Blade crouches near it, a puddle of melted ice forming around him.
“I’ll grab you some clothes,” I say.
“Blade has legs.”
“He’s freezing.”
“That’s what happens when you go out for a run in the middle of a blizzard.”
“They went looking for you,” I argue back.
“Seriously?” Ash looks at Blade as if the man turned into a goat.
Blade nods.
“But you knew I was purging.”
“You took too long.”
“Because I’m burning like I’m in hell.” Ash runs a hand through his hair. “Fuck.”
Fire licks up Blade’s palm, and he jumps back, examining his blistered hand. “What did you do that for?”
“I had to be sure,” Ash says, then approaches Blade, who’s already healing. The bubbles stop simmering, but the red skin stays. “I’ll check on your burns tomorrow.”
Blade stares at him, then takes off his coat and flings it at Ash. “You have some explaining to do.”
Ash folds the coat over the couch. “She is immune to my fire.”
Blade stays next to the fireplace to keep warm. “Explain.”
Ash narrates the events, and Blade’s eyebrows rise so much that I think they might hit the ceiling.
“This is why I burned you,” Ash says. “I need proof that the fire burns, that it’s not been tampered with by the alchemy I’ve been consuming from Peter. I had to be sure her resistance comes from her.”
“It’s not from me,” I say. “You malfunctioned.” Obviously. Nobody is fireproof.
“I could fry your pack and see if they burn,” Ash suggests.
I think he might be serious. “You wouldn’t.”
An eyebrow lifts.
He would.
“It has to be you, Runa,” Blade says.
“It’s his cooties.” I point at the red mark on the top of my hand.
Blade walks over and holds out his hand. I place my hand in his.
Ash growls.
Blade ignores him and examines my wound.
Ash’s growl deepens and becomes louder.
“You’re scaring me,” I tell him.
Blade drops my hand and regards Ash. “Your behavior is very odd, my friend. I suggest you fuck off, because Runa and I have plans.”
Rings of fire slither around Ash’s forearms like snakes. “Cancel them.”
Blade puts his hands on his hips. “What is your problem?”
“I don’t have a problem,” Ash says.
Blade returns to stand by the fireplace so Ash will calm down.
Silence falls like a dead deer.
“Peter was a good Regulator,” Ash says. “I miss him.”
“Awww,” I say, feeling bad that I gave him a hard time. He’s grieving, and anger is a part of the grieving process. “Do you not have any alchemy reserves left over from him?”
“Drank them all. I have none left.” Ash leans back and expels a breath that makes me think he’s tired.
Sven appears in the doorway. He looks around the room. “Can I come in?”
Ash nods, and Sven approaches the fire. “I can’t feel my fingers or toes.”
Blade claps him on the back. “One more reason to move into Fireborn territory and escape the cold.”
“What did the Peace Bbroker have to say after the incident?” Ash asks. “It was a live feed, so I assume they saw that a wolf survived my fire.”
Sven glances at me. “He wants to know which wolf joined the purge. But of course, I can’t tell one wolf from the next, so I told him I’d investigate.”
“Good man,” Ash says.
“It won’t last,” Blade says. “She will be found out.”
“Can you explain it away?” I ask Sven.
He shakes his head. “If it were Soren, we could say he’s a water carrier and was able to resurrect his armor before the fire engulfed him, but that’s not what happened.
After the explosion of flames, you stood there, untouched, as if the inferno didn’t exist. Fascinating, I must say.
But there’s a target on your back now. Nothing that we know of can survive elemental fire of that magnitude.
Even Soren would melt. It should’ve melted your bones. ”
“Like won’t hurt like,” I say. “That’s the explanation. Once I heal the burn on my hand, I’ll lose immunity.”
Sven frowns. “That implies that Ash’s burn is like a vaccine. It provides immunity, even if only temporarily. That theory can be studied.”
“I’m sure—”
“You’ve said enough.” Ash cuts me off, then snaps his head to the right a moment before my sister barges into the room in her white nightgown, messy hair, and tear-stained face.
“Thank the Moon you’re okay!” She throws herself at Sven, kisses his cheek, neck, shoulder. She’s drunk and medicated. We’re so fucked. SO FUCKED.
Sven stares at Ash like a deer caught in headlights. He might be a dead deer soon.
There is no saving this situation.
Even if the fire can’t hurt me, Ash will slice me open with his claws. In any case, we’re all dead.
Ash watches the couple, or rather, Maren climbing Sven like a damn tree. Sven tries to peel my sister off him, but she’s clinging for dear life, crying into the crook of his neck.
“Maren,” I say, “your betrothed is here.”
That seems to reach my drunk sister’s brain, and she lifts her head from Sven’s shoulder. Glassy eyes look over at me before she steps down and turns toward Ash.
Maren tucks her hair behind her ears and folds her hands in front of her. “I didn’t mean for you to see that.” Embarrassed now, she swallows and drops her gaze to the floor.
“If your fire comes near my sister,” I tell Ash, “I’ll kill you in your sleep.”
Was that me? Did I really say that out loud? Judging by the way Ash Fireborn is staring at me, I just threatened his life.