by Hall, Linsey
“I’m in Otherworld with you. My mortal body is gone, but I’m here.” And here, she looked and felt as if she were flesh and blood. “Come on, we’ve got to get out of here.”
Cam shook his head hard and leaned up on an elbow. He looked up at her again, his eyes clear. He yanked her to him, burying her against his chest. “Fuck, Ana. How did you get here?”
“Same way I did last time.” She hugged him hard, then pulled away and held up her wrists, each now bearing two long scars. One for each time she’d come to Otherworld for him, for two vastly different reasons.
His big hands cupped the sides of her face, and he kissed her hard on the mouth and with so much gratitude that she could all but taste it. He stumbled to his feet, still weakened by his injuries.
“We’ve got to get out of here.”
She pointed west. “The closest cover is that way. A grove of oaks.”
He shook his head. “Out of Otherworld.”
Her heart plummeted. Of course. “I can’t leave Otherworld. The demigod potion didn’t work. I’m mortal. I’m stuck here.”
“You’re not mortal, Ana. At least, not entirely.”
What? Before she could speak, he wrapped his arms around her and she felt the familiar pull of the aether.
When they appeared in Esha’s flat, Ana gasped. She’d never expected to make it back to earth. When a mortal went to an afterworld, they stayed there. No exception. “How? How am I here?”
Cam kissed her hard, then pulled away from her and limped toward the bedroom, presumably looking for Esha. “The gods cannot come here, right?”
“Of course,” Ana said. “The gods hold no sway at the university.”
“Excellent. Gofannon will know that his magic chains have been broken. Soon the gods will know I’m gone.”
“But how am I here? I should be trapped in Otherworld. You can’t give life back to mortals.” She shivered. It had been the hardest part of slitting her wrists back in Druantia’s pantry, the knowledge that even as a god, he couldn’t give her back the earth. But it had been the easiest trade she’d ever made.
“You’re part Mythean, Ana. Not enough to make you immortal, since you were able to kill yourself to get into Otherworld.” He reached for her wrist and rubbed his thumb against the new scar, then met her eyes. “But enough that combined with your knowledge of the world of myth, I could treat you as any other Mythean and take you from Otherworld.”
Her brow furrowed. “Then what am I? This doesn’t make any sense.”
He pulled her over to the couch and they sat. His grip on her hands remained, his thumb slowly stroking as if to confirm for himself that she really was there. The story that followed was surreal. Her mind raced as he told her about an enormous party, every god from Otherworld in attendance—and she had been there with him in the forest.
“A Dryad?” she asked. Could she have truly lived another life? The Celts believed in reincarnation, but she’d always thought that if it had been her, she’d have remembered her past life. “But I don’t remember any of that. And I shouldn’t have a body. I killed my earthly body. Even as a Dryad, my soul should have stayed trapped in Otherworld.”
“That’s strange, and I’ve no idea how that worked. But it was you, Ana. You’re identical to the woman from my past.”
Her eyes raced over his face. He believed this. “But how did everything change? You went from feeling to unfeeling. How is that even possible?”
“Very powerful magic, in which we gods played a part. That night, I woke long after the others, farther into the forest where the magic couldn’t reach me as quickly. I witnessed the bones and blood of the Dryads form the oaks in that macabre glen. Your blood and your bones. But the spell made the memories fade until they felt unimportant. When I saw you covered in blood at Logan’s house, it looked horrifyingly familiar. I couldn’t get it out of my mind. When I was chained up on Blackmoor, I remembered.”
“Holy shit,” she breathed. She didn’t remember any of that. She’d had another life? Where she’d known Cam? “You killed me?”
Grief darkened his gaze. “I’m sorry, Ana. I couldn’t control it.”
Her mind struggled to recall anything from her past, but she could remember nothing. Flutters of panic rose in her breast, that she had a whole history with Cam that she knew nothing about.
“Ana, I’m sorry.”
She blinked and met his gaze, realizing that she’d disappeared into her mind, searching for memories. “It’s fine. Really. It was a spell, of course you couldn’t control it. And I can’t believe it was me. I don’t remember anything.”
“It was you. I’m certain of it. She looked like you and she felt like you and smelled of the forest, like you do.”
“I—I believe you. I just can’t remember. But it’s fine. I wouldn’t be here in this incarnation if you hadn’t killed me in the past. I like being me, even if my situation is currently a nightmare.”
“We’ll get out of it.”
“How? If you step foot off the university campus, the gods will get you.”
“They’ll have to find me first.”
“They will, eventually.” Then they’d be separated—presuming the gods didn’t kill her.
“Not if we can figure out a way to break the spell on Otherworld. It’s got to be one of the reasons that the gods feel so bound to the place. None of the other religions are like that.”
“True. You said before that Druantia hosted the party where the gods lost emotion?” When he nodded, she said, “I think she cast the spell. When I went to her for help to come after you, she locked me up. She hates the gods. She hates you. With the kind of hatred that lasts millennia and spawns intricate plots.”
He cursed, vile and low. Then nodded. “Fucking idiot. I was so damned arrogant back then, I never realized. The last time I saw her before that terrible night was after a battle. She’d taken tributes that were meant for me. Now, I don’t give a damn about them. But back then I was enraged. I was obsessed with myself and what I thought she’d taken from me. I threw her into the mud. Humiliated her in front of her followers.”
“But you’re not like that now.”
“No. I think having my emotion taken from me changed part of the way I think. I couldn’t care about anything enough—even myself—to dredge up arrogance. Once you gave me back some of my ability to feel, I think I wised up some.”
“But she still hates you.”
“And she’s determined to have her pound of flesh. My pride didn’t allow me to see what she was capable of. What she took from us. All emotion. Locking us in Otherworld.”
“No longer. You have it back.”
“Because of you.” He reached for her, drew her face up to his. “Thank you, Ana.”
He gave her the sweetest kiss of her life, all soft lips and grazing touch. Eventually, when she was breathless, he drew away and looked down at her.
He ran his thumb across her cheek and said, “I don’t think I have the full capacity for emotion that I once did, but everything good that I feel is wrapped up in you. I couldn’t kill you all those years ago when I found you in the forest because I recognized you. Not my eyes or my mind, but my heart.”
Something in her chest cracked open. She almost felt like she should speak words of love. They simmered within her, ready to boil free, but the gaping hole in her memory and their past kept her silent.
What she felt already was enough to give this situation an edge of fear. Their odds of getting out of this free and together were so slim that she couldn’t speak those words.
He grasped her wrists and raised them to his lips, pressed a kiss to one, and though she tried to jerk away, he pressed a kiss to the other as well.
“No,” she whispered. “They’re my failure.”
Her failure to extricate herself from the mess she’d made so many years ago, her failure to live the life she was meant to. At least, that’s how she’d always thought of them.
“And they’re m
y savior,” he said against her wrist. “You came to Otherworld for me. You wanted to escape, but you killed yourself and came back, thinking you’d be stuck there for good. How can I not love these scars for what they did for me?”
“Honestly, I didn’t even think about it. I just had to get to you. And you’re the one who saved me from godhood. Thanks for shooting me with my own arrow.” She smiled wryly.
“It was my place all along. Even if it wasn’t, I’d have done it for you. I could never let you suffer like that.”
She kissed him, delighting when he reached out and pulled her toward him.
“Will Esha come back soon?” he asked against her lips.
“No. She said something about a vacation with her sister. I think she’s gone.”
“Good.” He stood and swept her up into his arms.
“Wait, your injuries.”
“I’ve healed. Enough.”
She still had so many questions and so much worry about how they would keep the gods from hunting them, but they flew from her mind when Cam started for the bedroom.
Tomorrow. They would deal with them tomorrow.
He strode into the dimly lit room and set her on her feet near the bed. With a gentle hand, he lifted her chin so that she could meet his eyes.
“This means something, Ana. This is about what’s between us. No more lying to ourselves about what’s really happening. No matter what tomorrow brings, we’ll have this.”
Ana’s heart leapt and she nodded. Everything they’d had until now had been hard and fast and full of fear, running from what could be and lying to each other about what there really was. The mess of their past and the fear of their future had put them on either side of a chasm.
She didn’t want to run anymore, no matter how terrifying this was. Whatever came tomorrow, she’d have tonight.
He smiled and lifted her up, laid her upon the bed. He was so strong she felt weightless in his arms. She reached up to welcome him down to her, and he sank between her thighs with a groan.
His mouth found hers, lips seeking and tongue sinking deep. She moaned and opened for him, wanting to be as close as possible to this man who’d come to mean so much to her.
“I want you naked,” he muttered, and stripped off her clothes until she lay in nothing but cotton underwear.
Every time before this, they’d removed just enough clothes to finish the job. Now she wanted to see all of him. The glorious hard muscles and lean strength. She tugged at his shirt, her hands trembling, and he obliged, yanking it over his head. In seconds, the rest followed.
She grabbed for his shoulders, but he slipped lower, kissing his way down her body, first to the scars on her wrists that he so loved, then to her thighs, which tightened when he neared their juncture. He nuzzled the fabric and she quivered.
“You are what I want,” he murmured.
She shuddered and parted her thighs.
“That’s it,” he growled, and pulled aside her underwear to stroke his tongue along her pussy.
She jumped, keening low in her throat, and then reached for him. Her hands sank into his soft hair. “I want to see your face.”
He relented, but not before he yanked her panties down and threw them across the room. She suddenly felt vulnerable, completely naked before him with her heart opening in a terrifying way.
He loomed above her, huge and hard with his warrior’s face tight with concentration. Pale moonlight shone through the windows, highlighting the harsh planes of his face. He looked as if he never wanted to look away from her. The openness of this moment, of him staring down at her, was more intimate than anything they’d done before. Saying that this was something. Suddenly she was aware of how exposed she was.
She’d laid everything on the line for him. Her life. Her future. As he’d done for her.
She pulled him down for a kiss, sighing as his lips, the only soft part of him, pressed against hers. The rest of him was hot and hard, all smooth skin and firm muscle.
His big hand gripped her hip and she shifted, parting her legs so that his cock fit tightly to her pussy. She moaned, arching beneath him.
“I want you,” she begged. She wanted to forget about what was coming and their terrible odds of success.
She felt his fist against the insides of her thighs as he gripped his shaft, and her muscles tightened in anticipation. She gasped as he pressed inside her, spreading her thighs to take more of him. He sank into her, hot and hard and oh so right. The feel of him blasted her defenses.
He shuddered on top of her, then met her gaze with his as he began to thrust. Chills broke out along her skin, from the pleasure and the realization that this was real and so were they. Together. Whatever happened tomorrow, they had tonight.
She cried out when his thrusts picked up momentum, dragging her along with him toward a finish line she was desperate to reach. The flutters of an orgasm started low in her belly. Desperate craving followed.
Cam fucked her like he might never have a chance to again. As his hips lost their grace, pleasure crashed over her, sucking all conscious thought from her mind.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Cam woke for the first time in centuries with a woman in his arms. His woman. He tugged her close and looked down at her. A chasm of fear opened within his chest.
She was mortal. There was no way to turn her immortal.
He shook his head to make the thought disappear. There was too much riding on today to be pulled under by such thoughts. Instead, he pressed a kiss to her forehead and rose to shower.
When he got out, he tugged on jeans and walked into the kitchen. Ana leaned against the counter, looking like the best thing he’d ever seen, swamped in his shirt and smiling. She handed him a cup of coffee.
“Thanks,” he said.
“Tell me you’ve got a way out of this mess,” she said.
“I do. But first, how did you get me out of those chains?” He’d been thinking about it in the shower. There was no way she could have broken through Gofannon’s shackles.
“It was the strangest thing.” Her brow furrowed. “I was running toward the tor, and suddenly a black falcon flew down and joined me. It had black eyes, a black beak. It didn’t look like a real bird. When it pecked at your chains, they broke.”
Cam frowned. “That sounds familiar. But I don’t know why. There are no black falcons in Otherworld.”
“I know. It’s crazy. It flew off after it broke your chains, like its job was done.”
“Damn. We could use help like that with what’s coming. As it is, I think we should go to the University Council. And I’d like to call Esha back from her vacation.”
“Good,” she said. “I don’t like the idea of the gods finding me, nor do I want you ending up on the run again. Or worse, chained to that tor.”
“That part of my life is over. No more running.” The idea felt as foreign to him now as emotion once had.
“I’ll call Esha now. She can aetherwalk and be here within minutes.”
“Could she pick up someone else?” They’d need all the help they could get, and Harp was good in a battle.
“Sure, I suppose. As long as you’re willing to give her some of your power to refuel. A long trip really takes it out of her, and she’ll need all the power she can get if this is going to be a fight.”
“It’s going to be a fight. She can refuel off me.” He wouldn’t like it, but it was the least he could do if the soulceress was helping him. He’d go get his phone and call Harp— “Shit. We need a phone. My charger was in my bag at Logan’s. Does Esha have a landline?”
“Yes.” Her brow furrowed. “By the way, do you know which god Logan was?”
“Is. Logan is the god Loki.”
Ana’s jaw dropped. “You’re joking. He’s one of the most famous in the world. He’s been hiding and no one recognizes him?”
“He’s a shapeshifter. I haven’t heard from him in nearly a thousand years, not since he was Loki, but I’d guess he’s been
holding that form as Logan all this time, avoiding discovery for whatever reason. Whatever he’s working toward, it’s probably big. He was never subtle.”
“But you could see through it back at his rental place.”
“Yeah. Because of our blood vow, his illusions don’t work on me. I can see him. But I also can’t harm him, by word or by deed. And neither can you.”
“I wouldn’t.”
“I know, else I wouldn’t have been able to tell you his identity. It’s a clever vow.”
Ana showed him to an old phone on the wall near the refrigerator. He called Harp first and determined that his friend could come—along with the fact that he had located the origin of the Rosa McManus sample.
“Esha will meet us in the historian Lea’s office in twenty minutes. With her sister Aurora,” Ana said when she hung up the phone.
“Excellent.” Two soulceresses would be better than one.
They knocked on the door to Lea’s office twenty minutes later.
“Come in!” The voice echoed through the door and Cam and Ana stepped into a very Dumbledorian office. Cavernous and filled with bookshelves and statuary and furniture, it looked well lived in.
“Andrasta. Camulos.” A translucent female gestured them inside.
Before entering the office, Ana had told him that Lea insisted that she absolutely was not a ghost. But he had no idea what she was.
She didn’t come close enough to shake their hands. He wasn’t even sure if she could touch others.
“Thanks for meeting here.” Lea smiled warmly. She led them through her huge office to the group sitting around a table in the corner. Bookshelves towered around them, giving the illusion of a separate meeting room.
“Thank you for coming,” Cam said as he and Ana sat at the head of the large rectangular table. He stiffened when he caught sight of the blond woman watching him from the other end.
Aerten. Celtic goddess of fate, and the one who’d been at Blackmoor when he’d been chained to the tor. She’d watched curiously then, a strange expression on her face, as she did now. Her head bobbed in acknowledgment, and his shoulders relaxed infinitesimally.
