The more she stared, the more she could make out: The suggestion of great height, impossibly wide shoulders, something that might have been horns, and, if she squinted… the after-image of glowing eyes.
An electric current of fear passed over her body, raising just about every hair on her person. Just as fast, Petra’s stomach dropped somewhere around her knees. “Holy fuck.”
Silas’s lips twitched. “Told you.”
She barely heard him. A part of her was still convinced she was hallucinating, the animal part of her brain seeing predators in the darkness, but even that slim doubt was destroyed when Talmoved.
He’d only drifted about a foot away from the door when Silas snapped, “No, you stay there. Don’t move a damn inch.”
Petra slapped his stomach with the back of her hand reflexively. “That’s not nice.”
“You two keep pushing me and we’re gonna have even lessniceon our hands,” he growled, dragging her into his side until she was all but smashed under his arm.
Tal stopped his approach and instead made a motion that might have been a wave. Maybe. She was pretty sure.
Wraiths are real.Petra tried to take a deep breath, but it wasn’t easy.Good gods, wraiths are real.
She was a devout priestess. She put her life in Glory’s hands and prayed for guidance not only for herself, but for the world. That meant she accepted, evenhoped,that there were a great many unknown wonders left to be discovered in the world. But it was one thing to hope those unknowns existed and quite another to come face to face with one.
Speaking through his teeth just a little, Silas told her, “Tal wants you to know that he’s happy he finally gets to meet you. He wishes he could say so himself.”
She blinked rapidly and tried to get her bearings back. “I’m… I’m glad to meet you, too.” Casting Silas a dark look, she added, “Andnotin a closet this time.”
Silas rolled his eyes. After a beat, he said, “He says he’s sorry he scared you, but he’s not sorry he did it. Also, he wants you to know that youpack quite the fucking punch.”
That startled a laugh out of her. “If it makes you feel any better, I definitely thought you were Silas.”
She had no idea what Tal replied, but it was enough to make Silas growl, “Okay, I think you two are chummy enough. You’ve met, Petra knows you’re real, and now we’re done.”
Wrapping an arm around her middle, he began to haul her backward, but Petra dug her heels into the dirt. “Wait, that was like two seconds! I have questions!”Dozens and dozens of them.
“You’ll just have to save them for when he can answer himself.”
Petra’s mind went blank as she took in what exactly that meant.He needs my bond to give Tal his life back.
She’d known since the beginning that Silas wanted her bond for very non-sentimental reasons, but now that she understood exactly why, and who would be affected if she refused…
Petra could barely make out Tal’s wave goodbye as Silas pulled her back toward the deer track.
After everything that happened with Antonin and then the shock of finding out she was Silas’s mate, Petra hadn’t had a lot of time to analyze her feelings about holding up her end of the deal. She still didn’t.
All she knew was that they’d just gotten more complicated.
Silas had left a light on in the living room. Not because he needed one, but he’d noticed Petra liked to always have at least one light on. He noticed everything about her. Discovering new facets of her, no matter how mundane they might be, was his new favorite pastime.
He watched her toe off her shoes and then pad over to the couch, her lithe legs weaving around the scattered trunks on the floor. Her expression wasn’t upset, exactly, but thoughtful in a way that raised his hackles.
Leaning his shoulder against the door jamb, he demanded, “Tell me what you’re thinking.”
Petra didn’t look at him as she sat on the cushions and drew her legs up. Her brows were furrowed, the skin between them grooved deeply. “It’s a lot to process.”
“How so?”
“I… I just can’t believe that there’s been people all around us for probably ever and we’ve all just— just dismissed them as a myth.” She shook her head. “I know it doesn’t make any sense, but I feel guilty. Like I've been ignoring people who needed help.”
“Guilty?” Silas made a face. “Like one in a million demons can communicate with wraiths, and it’s been kept hush-hush for ages because no one wants to be the one to say they talk to dead people. Even if you’d known wraiths were real, you wouldn’t have been able to talk to them.”
“But I could acknowledge them. I leave offerings for gods who might not even be paying attention. Why couldn’t I dignify a wraith with ahello?” she argued, pulling her knees tighter to her chest. “I could have done something or— It just feels wrong. I know what it’s like to fall through the cracks, Silas. To have people just walk on by you and pretend you don’t exist, like you’re nothing just because you’re on the street or in the shadows or… I can’t imagine feeling that way for gods know how long.”
