But the first mind she found at the other end of the soul bond was the kraken’s.
A tremor gripped her. Not the restlessness of her suffocation-fear but a violent, cold shaking that started in her bones and clamped down on her entire body. Fairchild stopped ranting and stared at her, eyebrows raised. She ignored him.
He must be there. He must. I just have to reach farther—
Deeper into the darkness. The soul that had spent so much of its existence alone.
He had to be there. If the kraken was there, then Moss was, too.
Unless—
Her breath turned to ice in her lungs.
Moss had been chosen by the kraken after its last host died. What if Fairchild’s men had attacked the house after they took her? What if he—
No.
No.
Pure rage rose up inside her, burning away the ice. She’d spent her entire adult life hiding away, telling herself she couldn’t be the woman she’d always dreamed of being because of her face. And Moss had built a whole life for himself that had been ripped away from him when his soul merged with the kraken’s. Both of them had been changed forever by their shifter powers.
It wasn’t fair that she’d had to hide away. It wasn’t fair that he had to face a life locked away from the world.
It wasn’tright.
*Moss!*she cried out. *Kraken! Come to me! I need you!*
And if it was only the kraken who answered her call, and not Moss, then she would happily become the monster Fairchild thought she was.
43
Moss
“Carol—”
Moss plunged into wakefulness like the ocean had picked him up and thrown him. His mate’s name was on his tongue, and his tongue tasted like grit and antiseptic and stale breath. He coughed, rolling over, and found himself staring into Lance MacInnis’s watchful eyes.
Strange, how sometimes you couldn’t tell if someone was a shifter, and sometimes you couldn’t see anything except the predator in their eyes.
Lance stepped back, and his inner snow leopard retreated. “You’re back with us?”
“Where’d I go?” Moss said automatically. Tried to say. His throat was raw and dry. He coughed, and someone passed him a cup of water. “Pania?”
*Hey, cuz.*She sounded wary—and weary of being wary. He sensed Ataahua next to her, biting her tongue about something.
“I think it’s traditional to sayWe almost lost youin these situations. But frankly, I’m not sure what just happened.” Lance settled against the wall, and the shadow of a toetoe brushed overhis face. He knew that shadow. They were still in the lodge on the peninsula?
What had happened? Why did he hurt all over? What had—
“Pree!” Sharp claws pricked Moss’s ankles. He looked down the bed—he was in bed?—and met Maggie’s golden eyes. She stared pointedly at him, then lowered her head and bit him on the leg. Pointedly.
He stared, and not only at the angry dragonling. His foot was… in a shoebox?
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“We almost lost you,” a low voice deadpanned.
Moss turned. “Mathis?”
