The moment Louis’s energy departed this timeline and traveled into the past, I sagged and would have fallen if Jessa and Justice hadn’t kept me standing. “He’s gone now?” Jessa asked, urgency in her voice.
I nodded, barely keeping it together. The bond was still in my chest, but it was different, not as strong, more like a wispy tie to the vessel that remained. This was likely because Louis in the past was not bonded to me yet, and now current Louis was back there and our bond didn’t know what the hell was happening.
It wasn’t the only one confused by it all.
“Braxton said that he’s half in the past, half in the present,” Jessa whispered.
Grace and Mischa both nodded too. “Yeah, and my mate bond is acting very weird,” Mischa added. “It almost feels…”
“Stretched,” I finished, and she nodded again.
“Yes, like it’s being stretched across time and space.”
Which was exactly what was happening. Only for them, most of their mates’ energy was still here, whereas mine was very much gone. It was in this moment that I realized how much I truly loved him. I’d been kidding myself to think it had ever gone anywhere. I loved Louis more than I thought it was possible to love anyone. Being with him completed me.
I couldn’t lose him again now. I refused.
So I used what remained of the mate bond and tugged on it every thirty seconds, reminding him what was here in the future for him, reminding him that he had to come back to me. There was no other option. After about ten minutes of that, I received something back along the tattered bond—chaos and pure, unadulterated rage. Panic rocked me again, and I wondered what he was experiencing. This time when I tugged on the bond, I poured a lot of my power into it. So much power that there was no way he couldn’t feel it.
“Braxton said that Louis needs to get out now,” Jessa bit out. “He’s been down the timeline too long. He feels the bonds of this future changing.”
Braxton was right. The longer Louis messed with the past, the more of the future he risked changing. Frustration and fear hit me hard; I should never have let him do this. We should have just taken the consequences and dealt with the humans.
My mate, always trying to play the hero. If he didn’t get his ass back immediately, I was going to hunt him down and murder him slowly. When I couldn’t take it any longer, I broke free from the girls and rushed forward. I knew I wasn’t supposed to touch him, but desperate times….
“Lizzie, stop!” Mischa shouted, and I briefly hesitated before throwing myself forward. Just when I was about to slam my hands to Louis’s chest, the barrier I’d erected around us started to rumble, and all of us were shot backwards, away from Louis. Even the dragons.
Wind, ice, and snow cut into me immediately, and I whispered a spell to protect myself as I tried to figure out what had happened. As I crawled forward, a body came into sight, and my heart stuttered at the sight of Louis sprawled across the ground. Pulling myself up and using magic, I cleared the path to him and ran as fast as my legs could take me, not stopping until I was crouched at his side, gathering him to me. “Louis,” I cried, trying to fit his huge frame into my lap but failing miserably.
The bond was still there, so he wasn’t dead—it felt the same as when he’d been stuck in the demon world. Something was missing from his body, leaving him nothing more than a shell.
Braxton appeared at my side in his human form, and he looked furious. “Is he stuck in the past?” he shouted, trying to be heard over the storm whipping up around us.
I shook my head and shrugged, my eyes never leaving Louis’s still face. I had no actual idea what had happened, and I couldn’t get to him in the past any longer because the spell had been broken.
Tears tracked down my cheeks and I let them silently fall, until a surge of heat in my chest had me gasping out loud. “He’s back,” I said a moment before Louis opened his eyes. Confusion bloomed in them as he blinked at me.
“Tee?” he said softly. “You’re okay?”
I narrowed my eyes on him. “Why wouldn’t I be okay?” I choked out. “You were the one risking your soul by going back in time.”
He let out a strangled laugh, slowly sitting up. I realized all the others were crowded around us; Maximus in dragon form still was blocking a lot of the elements. “Did you stop the spell?” Braxton asked.
Louis’s face went grim. “It was much more difficult than I expected. I didn’t remember being so strong when I embraced the darkness of my power, and it was a … a real fight. I couldn’t stop him completely, but I delayed the spell so the council got to him … and Tee.” His eyes met mine and I could see the fury there. Watching me almost die again had not sat well with him. “So there wasn’t as much power in the spell, and I reversed it as soon as I knew Tee was….”
“You wouldn’t leave until I lived, right?” I guessed.
Louis stood suddenly, lifting me with him like I weighed nothing. He held me close to his chest, his eyes closing as he breathed me in. “If you didn’t make it, there was no point in me making it,” he murmured to me. “So I fought for us a second time, and I would do it a million times more.”
Warm lips pressed to mine, and I forgot everything except my mate. The bond was strong again, thrumming between us like a thick beam of light.
“Uh, guys, can you like make out at home?” Jessa asked, her teeth visibly chattering.
I pulled away, a burst of laughter escaping me. “Oh my gods, I’m so sorry.”
I sent my power out again and blocked the cold from everyone, finally able to focus on something other than my mate. “How will we know it actually worked?” Justice asked, looking scared. “I mean, it didn’t sound like it went smoothly.”
Louis shook his head, hugging me even closer. I rested my cheek against his chest. “It didn’t go smoothly, but I definitely shifted the timeline. We won’t know the full extent of what happened until we get back to the US. If the humans are still camped outside our communities….”
