Between one breath and the next, shadows crawl over Aric’s tattooed skin, extending to creep over onto my own. A feeling as deep and dark as despair seeps into me. It spreads through my chest with a ferocity that makes me cling with bruising force to the asshole who pulled me against him without so much as a warning.
My anger sits heavily on my tongue, but I can barely squeak past Latham’s heavy stare. His gaze traces the way Aric’s arms band around my body before he goes up in another poof of fire, disappearing in a way I’m growing used to.
What the hell am I doing with these three?
“Buckle up, buttercup.” Aric’s dark tone sucks all the humor out of his words. He should really stick to being scary, humor isn’t a good look on him. Or perhaps he’s more terrifying when he’s trying to lighten the mood.
I don’t get another second to contemplate as the same dizzying, shadowy void descends. It presses in on me with a pressure that might kill me if I take a single breath. It eats us up. Then it spits us back out in some other place.
Aric releases me long before I’m ready, and I nearly fall to the chilled ground as my lungs heave. The air around me fills with that smoky steam you get when you exhale warm breath into winter air.
Latham’s hand strokes soothingly over my back until I’m ready, and then he guides me through the shroud of woods covering us. It takes a minute for my brain to catch up with the speed things are coming at me, but I realize we’re still blocks away from my cottage.
“It was safer not to take you directly to your front door in case they’re waiting for you,” Latham explains, and I nod, like this is all completely normal.
Not one thing about this day has been fucking normal though.
I know if my pack catches me, I’m as good as dead. And if by some miracle they let me survive, my fate as the pack whore is sealed.
I’m out of options, except to play out the offer from these hellish men.
Aric and Latham jump a tall wooden fence and I follow. We land on our feet, me with a bit more of a stumble than the two infernal men at my side. They peer around at the village, the park benches abandoned with only a layer of snow now decorating them in the quiet of the night.
“The snow’s getting heavier,” Latham whispers as we keep to the shadows, heading toward the row of cottages and tromping through their backyards.
“It shouldn’t be snowing,” I comment offhandedly, peering up at the flurries that are only growing thicker.
“End of Days,” Aric grumbles oddly, and my brows pull down as I stare up at the towering beast of a man next to me.
I collect their words, but really, I’m just buying time while we head back to the home I grew up in. I don’t know where I’ll end up at the end of this messy night, but I know I can’t trust them. It balances out to about as much as I can trust my own pack though, and that’s sad.
Asking for my cat was more of a test. If I’m a hostage to them, they would take me with or without my approval. But I’m not a hostage it seems, and they’re not violent.
Toward me anyway…
Do I believe them enough to find out if they can take me to my mother, someone who has been a mystery to me my entire life?
I guess we’ll see.
“No, it’s because of us. We’ve been in one place too long. We’re affecting their world.” Latham scans the night with a casual sweep of his gaze.
“You’re claiming responsibility for the snow?” It’s half a scoff, but then reality sets in. I’ve legit seen these guys disappear into thin air. Fuck, they just transported me in the same shroud of darkness. Deep down, part of me registers what they say as truth. I even thought as much myself.
They’re not from here. And if they’re not from here…
“Hell creatures shouldn’t be in the Realm of the Living. It throws everything off balance.” Latham catches my hand, and I stiffen hard before he points down in front of me and I realize I’m half an inch away from falling face first over a tricycle in the dark.
“Thanks,” I whisper and he slides his hand down my wrist as he releases me swiftly. His words linger in my mind as much as his smooth touch lingers on my skin. It’s not hard to imagine these men as some kind of demons. I’ve grown up hearing the stories of the light and dark gods. Once upon a time, shifters used to think our magic was a gift from the gods themselves, but over time that belief faded until it became nothing more than fairy-tale fodder. Now, I’m questioning everything.
If wolf shifters exist—a hard and true fact in my life—what else does?
Somehow the words are forced from my mouth, my curiosity eating away at me. “Am I a Hell creature?”
“In a way.” Latham shrugs like he’s not changing my whole life with three small words. “All magic comes from one of the nine realms. Some, like Torben, are a mixture of magic. Just like you.” Latham kicks a soccer ball out of my way just before my foot nearly rolls off of it.
He keeps his watchful eyes searching the perimeter, but he seems unnaturally aware of everything and everyone.
“Nine realms?” I ask as we turn down my street.
