He understood what I was going through better than anybody, having experienced it himself.Ripping out of his skin that night at the Council to face Whirlwind, but finding not the sleek, purpose-built predator he’d always been, but another form: uglier, crueller,horrible.I shuddered in memory and had the sudden, strong urge to rip my skin off, only I wasn’t sure what I’d find below.
I shuddered again, and he drew me in, his arm hard around me, just holding on.The night was chilly, as the desert often was after sunset, but with him here, I didn’t feel it.Unlike the chill inside.
“Does it go away?”I finally asked, my voice so low that a human wouldn’t have heard it.
“What?”
I turned to look at him.“Does it goaway?Or is Sophie right?Are we this...thing...forever?”
“I don’t know.”
“But you’re not, right?”I asked, suddenly desperate.“You Changed that night at the Council, a lot of people did after Danny slipped that brew into the wine, but you haven’t since!Not into that thing—”
“That thing was still me, Lia,” he said quietly.“Like it was still you today—”
“It was not me!It almost killed Caleb!Itwantedto kill him—”
“But you didn’t—”
“But it wanted to!”I heard the hysteria in my voice as he kept referring to it by the wrong pronoun.It wasn’t me!“Do you understand?He’s been my friend foryears.He’s pulled my ass out of the fire more times than I can count.If not for him, I’d be dead many times over, yet thatthingdidn’t care!
“All it saw was prey.”
I wrapped my arms around myself, and Cyrus hugged me tighter.“But you didn’t do it,” he said again.“You were still in control, just as I was that night.I was overwhelmed at first, didn’t know where I was or who I was.Just saw all those tiny people down there, running, screaming, looking like—
“Food.”He swallowed.“I’d have gone for them, too; I was a split second away from doing so: breaking bones, hearing screams, tasting blood—the blood of my kind, but that didn’t matter.I was too confused and het up for the fight, and they wererunning away.”
He was silent for a moment, remembering.“When the others transformed, the other Relics, I saw them as pack.I didn’t mind when they crowded around, did obeisance, and submitted themselves.It felt right; made me see them as allies, not food.They were acceptable, but the rest...”
He shook his head.
“Then you understand—”
“I understand that something incredibly primeval had just swamped my psyche, completely overwhelming me.I understand that I was so swept away, so confused, so out of my league that I lost control for a moment.And it might have been a moment too long.
“But you saved me, jumping down from above, transforming for the first time, something I thought I’d never see, that we would never have—
“It shocked me.So much that it knocked me right on my heels, the sight of you, the scent, how utterly fearless you were.You turned your back on me—onme—and knew you were safe to do so.You didn’t run.You didn’t crawl on your belly like the others, head down, eyes averted, waiting for my acknowledgement.You made me acknowledgeyou, for you were Lupa.You were Mate.And you were pissed as all hell because I hadn't immediately welcomed you, and so before I knew it, I was the one crawling, and whining, and apologizing.
“And then we were up and running, because that was what my mate wanted to do, so it was what I wanted, too.And the rest just followed our lead.
“You saved the entire Clan Council that night, and they know it, even though most of those over-proud bastards will never admit it.But youdid, like you saved me.And over the course of time, I began to come back to myself, to remember who I was, to regain some measure of control.
“Just as you would have done today.”
“I didn’t have time today,” I whispered.
“But you had something else, and you used it.Caleb told me what happened.He said he was fighting for his life and might easily have killed you after you forced a Change on yourself without warning, suddenly reverting to a defenseless woman without weapons, shields, or even clothes.But you risked it, because you’d rather hurt yourself than a friend...
“Or a student.”
Yeah, Cyrus knew what was really wrong with me, I thought, staring over the desert.The trauma of losing a student never really faded, but it was a thousand times worse when you’d killed them yourself.It had been in self-defense; Adam had been enthralled and was being used against me, I hadn’t meant it to be a killing blow, and it had all happened so fast...
None of which made it any better.
Just like it wouldn’t have today.
“I don’t know if I can do this,” I whispered.
