You owe me one hell of an explanation, Princess. He smiles, assessing the men on the floor.
A hand grabs mine and drags me toward the back of the bar. “Go quickly. The town guards are on their way,” Peaches hisses. Once in the alleyway, I look around. Sirens approach, and I run in the opposite direction.
To my irritation a fence is erected between the two buildings on this side of the alley, but I don’t let that hold me back. I send out feelers, and when I don’t feel vibrations of other shifters nearby, I use my magic to lift myself over the fence. Midair, my magic falters and drops me to my knees. Climb it is, then. I return to my feet, ignoring the throbbing in both my knees and my ribs.
Backing up, I leave enough space between myself, the fence, and the wall. I set off in a fast-paced run and push my foot against the wall, angling myself toward the fence. I grasp the steel bar across the fence and hoist myself up and over, gently landing on my feet. With a quick glance over my shoulder, I jog away from the sirens, away from the chaos I just left behind.
Chapter 44
Can You Love a Monster?
JESSICA
Seven Years Ago
Irun until I can’t breathe, until the pain from my broken ribs make me crumple to my knees. Pounding the ground with my fist in anger and frustration, I tilt my head back and scream. “Why?” I yell at the moon. “Why am I here? Why am I alive if I can’t have a life?!” I dig my fingers into the earth. “Why is this happening to me?” I whisper. Thunder erupts in the distance. Like the little girl I am, I cry.
“Sometimes things are just the way they are, Princess,” his deep, gravelly voice answers.
“Will you stop stalking me?!” I shout.
None of this is his fault, but he’s here. And I want to fight some more. I want to hurt someone else, make them feel my pain. Haven’t I already done that to him? I stand, gritting my teeth against the sharp pain in my ribs. I adopt a fighting stance.
“Fine. Don’t talk. You want to hurt me? You want to get back at me for hurting you?” I spread my arms. “There’s no one around—no recruits, no lead guards, no one to interrupt youfrom finishing what you started in the exam room. You want a piece of me? I’m right here!” I can’t see his face in the dark—another one of my disabilities.
In the moonlight, his jaw tenses. He doesn’t move, doesn’t answer me. I squint at him, calculating my chances of survival. It makes me wonder if his eyes are all black, like a pool of obsidian. He looks taller, bigger, more muscular. Is it possible that he changed his physical appearance? I continue to stare, waiting for his attack.
He takes slow, calculating steps toward me. I can see now that this isn’t my Shadow. His energy is dangerous, menacing. Did I do this to him? Did I change him? He transformed from a strange man with a lack of personality—he couldn’t even smile without looking weird—to a sweet, funny, and loving man, to this. How?
I shake myself out of my thoughts and tighten my stance. He hurt me. He grabbed me and shook me, leaving bruises on my arm. I didn’t make him choose to do that.
I lift my chin, challenging him. “You wanted to hurt me, so I’m giving you a chance. Do your worst.” I motion with my hands to encourage him forward. “Get it out of your system. Then leave me alone.” I choose those last words, knowing it will hurt him more. I know it did because saying them hurts me.
Silence grows between us. A light wind stirs. But this isn’t my doing. It isn’t my magic. Whistling wind sounds—no, not wind. A ghostly muffled cacophony of screams filter from a dark cloud covering the moon.
Shadows move and slowly circle around me. I smell the anger, loneliness, desperation, and fear radiating off... him. As shadows dance around me, I close my eyes and summon my own magic. I focus on that well in my chest. It flickers, but it’s so weak. I push into to it harder.Come on! I’m going to die if I can’t wield my own magic!I concentrate harder. Tingles of mymagic course under my skin. My wind whispers across my cheek. Slowly, I open my eyes to face the terror.
The wind swirls around me. Lightning flashes. Thunder explodes just above our heads. Gaunt, haunted faces pass by, caught in my whirlwind of air and dust. The faces stretch out with looks of pain, horror, and helplessness. They’re trapped on this plane, controlled, wielded by Shadow’s magic.
I reach out to them, searching for their vibrations. They weren’t good souls—heartless criminals, murderers, thieves. I lift my arms, pushing the wind out and away from me. But a shadow slips through, wrapping itself around me like a vise.
I shake, squirm, and wiggle my body, trying to free myself from its grip. Nothing works. Little electrical currents crackle in my hand, and I bring it as close to the shadow as possible. It does nothing. The shadow’s hold tightens and migrates closer to my face. I refuse to scream. I refuse to call out for him to stop. If he wants to end me, then he can do it. I’m not afraid of death.
A face appears in front of me, half-burned, eyes black like his soul. I smell burning flesh. The face looms in front of mine. My mouth falls open in a gasp as the pain to my ribs intensifies. That’s all it took—an opening. Tendrils of shadow slip in through my mouth, filling me from the inside.
Everything becomes still, silence, darkness. I am either dead or near death’s door. If I fell, I don’t feel it. If I stopped breathing, I don’t know. I feel nothing, hollow. Am I now one of them, a shadow of what I used to be?
A dull light in the far distance appears. A boy’s laughter is followed by a husky one. “Come on. It’s just one beer.” The boy’s voice echoes around me in the dark.
“Gods, if I take you home drunk, our parents will kill me.”
“They won’t know. I’m not going to tell. Besides, we’re supposed to be celebrating. You just graduated from law school. “
“No. I’m supposed to be celebrating. You crashed my party, you little cockblocker.” Laughter from the boy and the young man bounces around in the dark.
The light fills the space. A faded picture, like an old-fashioned home movie, plays in front of me. A boy not older than twelve and a young man in his mid-twenties sit at the end of a yacht, dangling their legs off the edge. The young man sighs and takes a bottle of beer from the cooler near him.
“Alright. Just one. Then I’ll take you home before the parents send out a search party.” A smile from ear to ear materializes on the boy’s face. The young man pops open the beer using a pocketknife. He hands the beer over to the boy and ruffles his black hair with his other hand.
