by Elle Lincoln
Aeden’s violet eyes darken, just as the area around us deepens with shadows and smoke. The land coming alive to aid Aeden. Nerves race up my back and my stomach sours.
“I would not do that if I were you, demon,” Aeden replies.
Balor’s answering sneer is nothing short of terrifying. “Know this, elf. Casseus is one of mine, if you threaten him, you threaten all of us. Your help is desired but not necessary.”
“I am no elf.” Well, that seems to only anger Aeden.
“I am no demon.”
Aeden snorts at that. “You are more demon than you realize.” Balor squeezes his neck tighter, his words coming out garbled. “You, of all creatures, were born of the darkest parts of the world.”
Balor throws Aeden to the ground, turning around to walk away. “We are done here.”
Casseus claps his hands. “Sucks for you, elf.”
I close my eyes. Are we really going to just walk away?
“Wait,” Aeden pleads, for the first time allowing us a glimpse of his desperation. “They were in the forest, close to my home, where the forest reports back to me.”
“I swear to the moon, if you watched us, I will find a way to kill you,” Logan growls, his eyes lighting from within, his beast angered.
Balor places a calm hand on his chest, before turning to look at Aeden, who finally rises from the ground. Then he casts his sights on me, a brow raised in question.
“We didn’t know where his hidey-hole was.” I shrug. “When ya gotta fuck, ya gotta fuck.”
It’s like they are surprised I made a joke. I’d be offended, but I’m not. Even as they all blink at me like I’ve lost my damn mind.
“So, hypothetically,” Casseus begins, before Patrick smacks him in the back of the head. “Fine! I won’t ask about a forest orgy.” Now Balor smacks him upside the head.
Talk about it later, I send to Cas through our link, which gets me that pirate smile I love so much.
“Love, huh?” he states out loud, making my face drop. “We can talk about that later.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose, a habit I’m more aware of right now than ever. I turn to Aeden. “Let’s just do this.”
Balor literally growls at me, but I only hold my hand up to stop him from saying anything else. I turn back to Aeden, raising a brow.
“Follow me.” He turns with a flutter, and I realize then he’s wearing a robe and silently hope he has clothes on under it.
He leads us to the side where a clearing sits open to the sky. I don’t hear or see Ember, but she can’t possibly be too far off. Every now and again, I hear the rustle of small creatures leaving the area in a rush. In the center of the clearing, Aeden laid down two meditation pillows. He gestures for me to take one, while he folds his tall frame onto the other, sitting cross-legged.
I look over my shoulder, rolling my eyes right alongside Casseus. Oddly, this reminds me of when I first met Balor and I had to forget who I was to escape that hellish pocket. I shudder at the memory. Why in the world would the Fae willingly seclude themselves in a pocket?
I sit across from Aeden and wait. He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes, his hands folded gently in his lap. I look around at the guys, but they all just shrug. I’m not sure what to do, so I look around at the clearing, the pretty emerald grass, and the purple bark trees, which are my personal favorite. And I swear I see a pterodactyl in the distance. I wonder if Ember would eat him.
“Bette, you must focus,” Aeden drawls with annoyance threading his tone.
“Right, so what am I concentrating on?”
He practically groans at me while the guys spread themselves out.
“Close your eyes.” He pauses, and I guess this is where I’m supposed to close my eyes. “Good, now inhale and exhale deeply. Connect with the earth.”
“Umm, how?” I place my hands in the grass.
“No, hands in your lap,” he orders with mild annoyance, but I swear I hear a hint of amusement there. “Try this. Close your eyes and focus on the Sluagh.”
I focus on the Sluagh but a thought pops into my head. “Why isn’t Casseus helping?” Now that I think about it, it makes perfect sense.
Said pirate whispers in my ear from behind. “Yes, milady?” He sits behind me, wrapping his hands around my hips.
“Because you have more control over the Sluagh.” Aeden eyes Casseus’s hands with a frown—too bad, old man.
“Cas has more experience.” I shrug and close my eyes, ending the argument. I link with Casseus, resting my head on his shoulder, listening to his heartbeat, his breath whooshing in and out of his lungs. Together, we seek out the Sluagh who answer with welcome.
“Good. Now strengthen them.” We funnel power into the Sluagh. If I opened my eyes now, I have no doubt I’d see nothing but a dense, deadly fog. “Without killing anyone, send them out in a circular radius.”
“What am I looking for?” I know I’m looking for the sidhe and the Fae, but what exactly? “Cas, you look for the Fae pockets while I’ll concentrate on the sidhe.”
“For a signature like mine. Go ahead and get a feel for me.” I send my dark magic into Aeden, even though his words sound ridiculous. I seek out his soul, caress it to see how it feels beneath my magical fingertips, how he resonates like a smooth harp, and how he smells of the earth, dirt and clay. I take that and with Casseus, we see through the Sluagh.
At first, everything is disorientating. Like seeing through someone else’s eyes, and then again through binoculars. I open my eyes once to a frowning Aeden and quickly close them. I feel the Sluagh’s ethereal bodies, the souls still alive and seeking out a life to thrive in, which for them is basically murder, but that’s a thought for another day.
I feel the signature of the earth below and the sky above. I listen to the songs of the forest, how she sings and where. But nothing comes close to what Aeden feels like. I spread out farther, seeking and searching, leaving no stone unturned. Still, I find nothing. Thinner now, I move past this state and into others. Behind me, Casseus tenses, finding the Fae. I tune him out and take the Sluagh farther and farther. Thinner and thinner. My head feels dizzy and my body sways until Casseus wraps his arms around me, drawing me close.
I don’t stop now that I know what I’m capable of, until I reach a small town surrounded by desert. There, deep in the earth, the signature chimes. We look around, searching for any indication of where we are.
Arizona.
But I can’t stop, this power intrigues me and I need to know how far it goes. I pull the Sluagh to the West, shaping them like a boomerang to skim the land, the sea. Farther we go, bypassing islands, glaciers, and boats lost at sea. There.
Russia.
My body slumps in Casseus’s arms, and in the distance I hear them calling my name, but it is nothing more than an echo of a dream. I’m so close. I seek more and more, scanning lands and mountains. Quicker and quicker I go.
Morocco.
Stop, Bette. His words filter through my brain, grounding me like a silken caress. He pulls me to him like a magnet, and I go to him. Arms tighten around me until like a rubber band, I snap back into reality.
My eyes flutter open, seeing Balor first, then the rest as they huddle around me.
I lick my parched lips, suddenly ravenous.
“Oh shite! Her eyes!” Patrick shouts. But I tune him out.
My hunger grows, my body shudders, and I can’t control the vibrations that break out all over me. I need. I need food. But not just any food will do. I need a very naughty soul.
“Casseus!”
I stand, brushing the bodies away. My hunger consumes me. I try to turn into the mist, but it doesn’t obey. Fine. I stumble to the edge of the clearing, seeking food.
I’m so, so hungry.
A roar echoes above me. Ember swoops down, her jaws opening. Men shout behind me, but she’s already grabbed my shirt. Lifting me, her claws dig into my side as she holds me close. Another day, I want to do this again, but right no
w I just need to fill the void within me.
She swoops low, dropping me onto pavement. I watch as she flies away, getting far from me.
My eyes glaze over as a pulse of hunger seizes my body, and pain shoots out from every nerve ending. I stumble, falling to my knees. I don’t know where I am, I only feel. And it hurts, the pain overwhelms me.
Until… Until there. In the distance, so close. My mouth waters. My eyes flutter open. People. Immortals, mortals, others. I don’t know what they are, but I crawl toward them.
They smell so good. Their sins, so delicious. My darkness creeps out, tasting one with just the tip of her tongue. Then another, and another, until I dive into everyone. Men, women, and the old, but not the young.
My shoulders slump as I consume their sins, feeding myself and the Sluagh. But I don’t stop there. More and more, I dive in and out until I taste every single one. Just a taste. I swear. But it’s so delicious. I almost can’t contain my need.
“Stop her!”
A body slams into me. My head bounces on the pavement. Pain explodes behind my eyes. I gaze up and the sky swirls with dark clouds. My head slowly turns to the side. Everywhere they land, bodies lie. Scattered all around.
Death scents the air.
I knew those fucking clouds were an ominous warning.
Chapter 19
Bette
Sorrowful Remorse
If there was ever a time for regret, it is now. I look down, seeing that Balor took me out.
Fucking Balor took me down. And from the looks of it, just barely. A chill spreads throughout my body and fear steals my breath. I wiggle out from under Balor, before sitting up slowly to gaze at the destruction I caused.
Me.
Bodies litter the ground in an abandoned parking lot. To my left sits what was once a big box store. To my right an old fast food place. And in between...
My mouth dries up, and bile burns my throat.
“I won’t comfort you.” Balor’s voice is a shock to my system. I turn my body to face him. The rest of the men stand behind him. Their faces ashen.
I can’t speak. The horror of my actions is too much for me to handle, and my mind immediately begins to shut down.
“You don’t deserve comfort.” His words are cruel, bringing tears to my eyes. “You need to realize what you are capable of. This is what you can do.” He stands, lifting me with him. My eyes close, tears leaking out. “Look, Bette, you aren’t a child. You are a powerful immortal woman. It is time you honor that.”
He spins me, his hands a dead weight on my shoulders. “How many?” It’s the only words I can form. I rein in my emotions, needing to acknowledge what I’ve done.
“Seventy-one,” Balor replies. “They weren’t great, but they were alive.”
“All of them? I killed them all.”
“Yes, through you we could see their sins. They were just trying to survive in this world. Though you did kill a vampire hiding in the shadows waiting for nightfall.” He tilts my chin up toward the sky where the sun begins to sink. “For hours we tried to reach you, and for hours you did nothing but expend your power. Until you became starved.”
“Were they bad people?”
“I told you I wouldn’t comfort you.” Balor’s tone hardens.
“Balor, man, come on,” Mac pleads.
“No.” His voice rings throughout the day, birds fleeing at the power he threads into that one word. He spins me back around to face him. “You need to realize your strength. Just as I have had to realize mine. You don’t have two thousand years to sit in isolation to fully grasp this.”
Pain bleeds into his voice. “I know what I have done.” I swallow my emotions, raising my chin.
“Do you, Bette? Do you completely understand? Because I don’t believe you do.” He grips my hand. “Come walk amongst the dead.”
“Balor,” Logan implores now.
“No!” Balor roars.
I don’t want to see, I want to hide, but he pushes me in front of him, to look, to see the fallen. I glance down to where a man lies, his body dirty from head to toe. The ball cap he wore lies but mere inches from his head.
The next is a woman, my age, her face withdrawn and malnourished.
“We work with them to keep them safe. That was the plan. You alone single-handedly killed them all, and for what?”
I spin on him. “Don’t you think I get it?” I roar back at him. “I fucking do. I see it. I see them. I killed them, yes! But you forget I can only kill if their sins are neutral!”
“And what were their sins, Bette?” he counters.
“I...” I look around, licking my lips again. “I don’t know.”
“Your power took control, you lost control, Bette. Some of their crimes were nothing more than petty theft.” His palm engulfs my chin. I latch on to that small kindness, but his words shatter me. “How can we claim to be better than the Fae when we don’t act like it?”
He steps away from me, tearing my soul with him.
“Don’t you dare walk away from me right now.” Every emotion rips through my soul, burning a path to my heart.
He pauses, his head bowed and his shoulders slumped, while the others look on with wide eyes. The silence hangs heavy over us until he turns to look at me. His hands lift to remove the eye patch.
My nerves flutter and I do my best not to flinch, even when the guys take a cautious step back.
“I can see the fear ripple across you. I can smell it waft off your body.” His hand falls the eye patch in his hand. “That is my legacy, Bette. Is that what you want?”
I don’t know how to respond as words fail me.
“You can’t answer me, can you?” He opens his eye and every single one of us drops to the ground. Balor’s laugh roars across the parking lot, echoing off the mountains in the distance. “Look at me, Bette.”
I glance up, my body pressed against the pavement. He’s looking down at me with both eyes open. One an icy shade of blue, the other red. Red iris, red pupil. I swallow my fear and stand.
He holds his hand out to me. Every piece of me demands I run as he tests my trust, and my arms shake as I struggle to keep them under my control. His hand engulfs my smaller one. He tugs me close.
“I still smell your fear, sense it like a predator. That isn’t a life you want.” He rubs his chest over his heart. Tears fill his eyes, shocking everything inside of me as one spills over the lip of his eye, trailing a path down his cheek to get lost in his beard. “The woman I love fears me. I have razed villages to the ground with this eye, cities, battlefields. Killing all. Humans and others. Mortals and immortals alike. That is my curse. Yet none of that hurts more than your fear. But that is the legacy I created. The eye patch is nothing more than a prop. It is the control I hold in here.” He taps his head, then his heart. “And here.”
My own emotions bubble over as a sob breaks free of my lips. This is not how I imagined him telling me he loved me. That isn’t how this was supposed to go. But this is our reality, this is our life.
“I don’t fear you.”
His fingertip gently brushes away my tears. “My sweet demon.” I fucking choke on his words. “Never lie to me. Your control will come. But for now, you need to think it through.” He leans down, sweeping a kiss across my lips before backing away, turning to grant me his back.
“Balor.” Tears flow from my eyes. Yet he doesn’t turn, he just tosses the eye patch to the ground. “Balor.”
My chest breaks. I fall to my knees as sobs rip from my throat. Panicked, I look to the others, I know they can feel me. Yet they don’t move, torn between comforting me and teaching me a fucking lesson.
I get it. I do.
“Bette.” Mac kneels before me, his eyes full of unshed tears. “I want you to understand something. We have all been where you are right now. We have all made mistakes that cost lives. A price that is too high. You and only you can come to terms with that. Your thoughts repeat that you understand, but I don’t hear how
.” He, too, brushes a kiss against my lips before walking away.
They’re leaving me. One by one they are leaving me. This pain. It hurts. I fucking hate it.
Logan kneels in front of me, his forehead resting against mine. “I didn’t want to understand. But, Bette, we couldn’t get through to you and you nearly took Aeden down. There aren’t many who can challenge a sidhe.”
This time I scramble up as he stands. My legs shaking as my fear overrides my brain as he, too, walks away. Casseus doesn’t even fucking look at me as he leaves.
Patrick stands there. His cheeks ruddy and his flask upended in his hand, dry. “We love ya. Find us when yer done here.”
Alone.
They left me alone.
I furiously wipe the tears from my eyes as I watch them all walk away. Leaving me. I spin. My body working on autopilot as I shut down internally to feel that blessed numbness, begging it to take over.
Except it doesn’t. My own mind refuses my demands as I struggle to shut down. I scream into the fading day. A headache begins to pound at the back of my head as I stare across the parking lot.
Seventy-one. My legs give out as I sit on the cracking asphalt. What am I supposed to do? I feel like a child playing in adult clothing. Only it’s my mortal mind that struggles to keep up. There is a reason the Fae go insane. It is because they were born of immortals and humans. With their mortal mind degrading over centuries.
Is that my fate as well? Am I doomed to live a life as Balor stated? Is this my legacy? For others to fear me? For the guys to fear me?
My heart aches as I recall the look on Balor’s face. His love for me and my fear of him when it is he who should fear me. Yet he doesn’t. He looked upon me with love and acceptance. I could not do the same.
I cannot do the same even with myself.
Standing, I look out over the vast array of bodies. Each one makes my chest spit open further. I did this. I don’t get it. Even when I said I do, my actions were selfish even if I thought I was helping Aeden. The power expenditure was too great. I taxed myself and took from all these people.
