His palm brushes my cheek, his voice quiet. “I need you to do this because until you know my fears, you won’t know me.” His eyes search mine, a searing gaze. “You won’t know how much you mean to me.”
He grasps my hand, pulling it to the base of his neck, where his pulse beats. At the same time, his wings close in around me, pulling me closer to him. “You have to go all the way.”
His body heats mine, counteracting the chilling nightmare power that frosts my fingertips.
“Rune, I…” My whisper dies as his gaze continues to burn me, and despite my better judgement, I let go of my hesitation. He said he needs me to do this, and there’s a large part of me that needs to know what shaped him into who he is—and why he believes it will show me how much I mean to him.
“Okay,” I whisper. “But Iwillstop if I need to.”
He gives me a single nod, and it’s somewhat comforting that now I’ve agreed, the tension in his body eases instead of building.
The rich, purple haze of my nightmare power sinks into his skin as I close my eyes. My demon sight explodes like it did before in a crimson wash. Every shade of red. I’m prepared for it this time, reaching beyond the surface despite the hitch in Roman’s breathing and the increase of his pulse.
Releasing another trickle of my power, I cut through the crimson curtain to the vision beyond, bracing for the cold fear that it invoked last time.
It’s suddenly apparent to me how far I’ve come in just the last few days that the vision in front of me is no longer glossed over and muddled, but clear.
Horrifyingly clear.
I’m lying on my side in a vast hall that has the same polished stone walls as Roman’s hidden bedroom. Immediately in front of me lies an overturned, broken table, while the pieces of three chairs are scattered beside it. The soaring ceiling above me is painted like some kind of royal cathedral, with symbolized stars made of streaks of onyx above the inky images of wolves.
I reach forward, my hand covered in blood, except that it isn’t my hand, and I realize now that I’m seeing the room from Roman’s point of view.
His fingertips come into view, his fingernails scraping across the stone as he tries to push himself upright. His arms are much smaller than they are now—much younger—his muscles still developing, but his skin is just as bronzed.
My head fills with Roman’s thoughts, his cold terror as he struggles to rise, trying to crawl across the floor to the soft form that lies beside him.
It’s a wolf. Its fur is as bronzed as Roman’s skin, its eyes closed, and its chest completely still. Its paws are russet and so is the tip of its tail while a distinct patch of darker fur sits across its right shoulder.
He reaches for the wolf, his hands shaking, his thoughts scrambled, but I make out one thing clearly, a cold, horrified thought:
They killed my wolf.
A woman wails, a scream of deep grief, and his focus flies to her.
Mother! No!
She has collapsed on her knees ten paces away from Roman, her dark blond hair—the same color as Roman’s—flowing down her back, her robes a deep, emerald velvet. Her face is half-turned away as she reaches for a man whose facial features are so close to Roman’s that he has to be related.
The man lies beside her, his eyes vacant, his body still.Dead.
Another wolf—this one with rust-colored fur—lies beside the man, its body also completely still.
My heart lurches—or maybe it’s Roman’s—as pure desperation fills him. He’s scrambling to his feet, half-running, slipping, half-crawling, trying to get to his mother as fast as he can because they’re coming for her…
“Mother! Father!”
Wails tear from his mother as she rocks next to the man, who must be Roman’s father. But now she seems to hear Roman running to her and she whirls, still kneeling. Her eyes are pure black. Pure demon.
This time, her desperate scream is directed at Roman, her hand reaching out to stop him.
“Roman! My son! Run—”
Her cry is cut short as a blast of power explodes across the room, tugging at the wolves’ bodies and sending the table and chairs crashing into the far wall beneath the window. The blast cuts through the woman, staining her emerald dress with blood, a crimson slash in the darkness.
Rage.
Pure rage rises inside me—rises inside Roman as he pulls up short within the blast while forms take shape within the smoke. His demon power is colder than anything I’ve ever felt, colder even than my own.
