“Come on,” I say softly, even though Wild Girl is many yards away. “I’m not here to hurt you.”
She huffs, stomping her hooves a few more times, her dark eyes glaring at me, but she takes a step forward.
Just one.
Then one more.
As she steps closer, I discover that her energy feels a lot like mine. I’m startled by the intense darkness in her silvery eyes. Even more surprised by the soft dusting of silver across her pearlescent coat that I didn’t see from the distance yesterday—not so much the color of her hair as a shimmer of power that rests across her body. Much like my power rests across my skin right now.
I wish she were close enough to run my fingertips across her hair and see if the dusting of silver comes away on my hand as I suspect it might.
I sense Roman’s presence a moment later.
“Wild Girl is from deep within the Forbidden Lands,” he says. “It’s rumored that nightmares originated from there. She recognizes your energy, just as you recognize hers.”
“We’re all creatures of nightmares,” I murmur.
In Vegas, fear appeared to me as a coating of dust across others. Roman was speckled with it for a few moments when he was wounded by the angel’s light—but not for long. By the time we arrived in Mortem, his fear was gone. I wonder now, knowing all I know, if his fear was for me and what I was about to discover.
“I can’t beat you until I find your fear,” I say, turning to him, our bodies so close now that I could brush the back of his hand. Brush the side of his thigh.
The lingering hint of disappointment that was visible on Roman’s features vanishes, as if he's been waiting for me to come to this realization.
He says softly, “You’ll never truly weaken your opponent until you learn to reach into the furthest recesses of their psyche and pull forth their greatest fears. Surface fears are fine, but they’re not enough to take on the strongest demons, like the other royals.”
He reaches for my hand, lacing my fingers with his, his thumb stroking across my palm and the inside of my wrist, the same steady swirl as the night we first met. “You need to find my fear.”
I consider him carefully. He was willing to bear the brunt of my nightmare power, but this is different. Searching for his fears requires delving into his deepest thoughts—however it is that I’m supposed to do that.
“You don’t need to be afraid of this, Nova,” he says, and I’m not sure if he means the challenge of finding his fear or… his touch.
“You really want me to find your greatest fear?” I ask, my voice low. “Isn’t that a vulnerability you’d rather keep to yourself?”
Truth be told, I’m astonished that Roman has any deep-seated fears at all.
His eyes are shadowed, the green dark and murky. “My greatest fear is a truth I can give you that no one else knows, not even your father. Hopefully, it will help you learn to trust me completely.”
He takes my other hand, the same soft, alluring swirl of his thumb against my skin.
My throat is tight, and I hope he can’t hear how hard my heart is pounding in my chest. Having a piece of Roman that no one else has feels like a gift—one I never expected to receive—even if that piece will be the darkest part of him.
I have no doubt that it’s a dangerous gift.
And yet a thrill runs through me.
I am a nightmare demon, after all.
Roman draws me away from the railing, releasing me only as long as it takes him to gently remove Ingrid from my shoulder and return her to Temple’s back.
Then he speaks quietly to my demon wolves and they back away to form a wide semi-circle around us.
Before I even think to ask, Roman explains. “I asked them to give us some space. They will look after each other and Ingrid while we work.”
Drawing me down to the ground, Roman sits cross-legged, his knees pressed to mine when I join him.
Striking a rune across his wrist, he casts it into the air where the script swirls and expands like ink through water, filling the space with dark light. A clear night sky quickly forms before my widening eyes, blocking out everything around us, concealing the morning sun and filling the sky above me with twinkling stars.
I gasp as the ground falls away near us, leaving us sitting on the peak of a cliff that extends only twenty feet in every direction before it drops away.
