Only those endless black depths, where I could have lost myself forever.
“Anything would be better than this,” I whispered.
My fingers began to tingle. My arms. The golden thread was there, would always be there, to keep me from fully letting go. But when the void pulled, when the ember of power inside of me blazed to life, I did not fight it.
I did not let myself imagine that there was a low growl there, at the edge of my consciousness, before I disappeared.
And if that was my name on his lips, I did not want to hear it. Not as I gave myself to the yawning emptiness inside of me and slipped away. As the voids of darkness welcomed me home.
82
ARRAN
The walls of Eilean Gayl pressed in around me. Tighter, tighter. So close, I could not shift. I could not breathe.
On two legs, I stumbled down the stairs. No one to see me. Too late, too dark. Too alone. These walls had once shielded me, but long ago, so long ago, had failed. Then caged.
I had to get out. My beast tore at my control, shredding the ties that bound him.
I wanted to feel the cold winter air on my skin. Needed it. But the beast was in control. I shifted before I burst through the doors. Over the bridge in four massive bounds.
Then it was just me and the forest. There was no moonlight to glint off of the lake, to remind me of Veyka’s hair. A ceiling of ominous shadows blocked out every star. Soon, it would rain. Maybe snow. Snow as white as my mate’s skin.
Veyka, who was the other half of me. Who needed me, loved me.
But I could not give her what she needed.
She had vowed to love me forever.
I could be the High King of Annwyn, if that was what the Ancestors demanded of me. It was my duty. But to give myself to Veyka, to love her—
My beast flooded my mind with a snarl. The line between the two of us was blurring with every bound, deeper into the snowy mountains. The wolf inside of me loved her, needed her. No conditions. No questions.
But I was not the beast.
I controlled the beast.
Controlling the beast was the only way I survived. Without that control, I would turn into a monster.
But without Veyka, would I become something worse?
83
CYARA
She dispatched Percival and Diana to the kitchens to help prepare the evening meal. The kitchen servants and the priestess were the only terrestrials in Eilean Gayl who did not look at the two humans as if they were calculating how they would taste. But at that moment, anywhere was safer than near Veyka. The queen might finally decide to rip out Percival’s throat, just to calm the roaring pain inside of her.
She even sent away Osheen and Lyrena, encouraging them to join Maisri for the communal meal. But Cyara herself lingered in the corridor, ears alert, wings tucked in tight in the narrow space. The guard at the stairs ignored her. She returned the favor. Most of her attention was focused inside the sitting room. Even her sharp ears could not make out the words; she would not have wanted to. That would be an intrusion.
But as soon as the voices died, she moved.
Cyara was through the door into the queen’s bedchamber, door closed, before Arran opened the one into the corridor and disappeared, his gait even heavier than usual. The bedroom was empty.
Veyka had taken to the void. Either to find some other place of solace, or to lose herself in that endless in between. She had done that more and more, used the void not as a means of transportation, but as an escape.
How long would it be before that was her true home, and Annwyn the mere stopover?
Cyara picked the first garment from the never-ending pile of clothing in need of mending and settled in to wait.
