But the guy’s castle is set higher up in the mountains to the east, a fortress in its own right. The only way to reach it is a steep road coming up from Khalida, or the lake pooling outside of the valley before the water disappears into the distance through a thin river.
Jutting a hand at one of the open window holes on a tower, I let it sum up my entire point. “How are we safer here when people can literally come and go as they please if they can fly or climb?”
Raiden holds out a hand. “Let me show you?” Biting the inside of my cheek, I tentatively slide my hand into his, and he lifts it to his lips, pressing a lingering kiss to my knuckles. “I give you my word,mo chuisle. I won’t protect you until my last breath; I’llliveso you never have to face another threat on your own again.”
He gives me a look I’m not quite ready to decipher and earnestly adds, “If you want us to kill Mason,Malcolm, today, I’ll turn around and take his head myself. But it would mean you’d have to continue looking over your shoulder until we’d unearthed and eliminated every one of his pathetic followers. Decades, possibly longer. You’ve already been through so much, I don’t want to put you through the heartache and sacrifices that war demands unless there’s no other option. Please. Give me a little time to see if there’s another way to spare you that?”
Swallowing, I tighten my grip on his hand. “Don’t make me regret trusting you, Raiden. I don’t do second chances.”
The front door is a massive, obnoxious thing, but impervious to lockpicks. Only when Stone slides a faux rock cover to the side and presses his thumb to the scanner do the massive doors open, and they’re more daunting than comforting. On the interior are iron rings, and Kodiak drags them closed behind us with an ominous thud. A whirring of locks can be heard as they seal shut and my heart skips a beat, but the normal claustrophobia doesn’t settle over me. The space ahead is too open, too massive to feel trapped.
While the entryway is narrow for a small stretch, it opens into a massive space of high archways leading to side rooms, and a sweeping staircase ahead of me in an anteroom bigger than any apartment I’ve stepped foot in before.
“Every entry point is met with a door barring it from access to the main structure without prior authorization,” Kodiak explains, walking ahead of us to guide the tour. “Every anterior door has a thumbprint scanner, and a single failed authorization attempt is sent out as a silent alert to all of our phones. A second sets off the alarm system.”
I try to take in everything they’re pointing out as we walk, I really do. But I’m reaching my limits of sensory overload after everything I’ve endured tonight, and each additional room we pass in the hallway that I’m expected to keep track of is an additional stressor tightening my chest.
Kodiak gestures for us to stop in front of a door then takes a second to mess with something on his phone. “Press your thumb to the scanner, Amara.”
I do so, then a few moments later he says. “Perfect, you’ve been added to the approved list. You can come and go as you please; no need to wait for one of us, though I beg you to at the very least let one of us know you’re leaving.”
Glancing down the hallway, it seems to go on forever in either direction. A labyrinth of corridors, both reassuring in their ability to hide me away, and daunting in their quest to keep me confined.
Stone places a hand to the small of my back. “We can finish the tour tomorrow. It’s been a long night, and you look like your legs will give out at any moment. How about we show you to your room?” Guiding me to the center of the third floor, we finally end up down a small corridor that only has four doors. He points to each as we go, starting on the left. “Mine -” a little father up on the right “- Kodi’s -” and again the left “- Raiden.”
Coming to a halt at the final door where the hallway deadends, my mouth goes dry. A marbled slab of stone, black with veins of opal eerily close to the color of Stone’s eyes and a few wisps of smoky grey makes it stand out like a sore thumb. Beside the handle is another small scanner, and after an awkwardly long stretch of silence with the weight of the guys’ stares on my back, I press my thumb against it, making sure to smudge my residual fingerprint after. I’m not sure exactly how these things work, but I’ve seen enough crime shows to worry about someone being able to lift and replicate the print.
Taking a cautious step inside, I scan the room with one foot out the door. It’s already furnished, everything covered in thick white sheets to stave off the dust, but move-in ready. The four-poster bed has a sheer white canopy that’s tied back to reveal a king-sized mattress under the dust shield. At the foot of the bed, the wall has a giant TV mounted above a massive dresser, an open door beside it revealing a walk-in closet. Raiden slips past me without a word, turning the light on inside before closing the door. A sliver of light can still be seen from the crack beneath, and my chest tightens with the consideration without me having to say a single word.
Across from me is another door slightly cracked open, and I don’t wait for an invitation to explore, trailing my fingertips along the ornate engravings in the wooden footboard and posts along the way. If it’s a cage, at least it’s a gilded one. But at this point, even if I’m upset, I have to admit that Kodi was right. I have complete faith that he’d bust me out in a heartbeat if this turned out to be a trap, legion be damned.
I could live in the attached bathroom, it’s so massive. It’s modern, with sleek, black tile flecked with red, and silver threads veining throughout. It’s elegant in an entirely different way than the rest of the ancient castle aesthetic, but all the better for it, like every room is a portal into a world of its own. To the right is a double sink set up with an abundance of drawers beneath the huge counterspace, straight ahead is a walk-in shower that’s big enough for four, and on the left is a bath recessed into the floor that could comfortably hold just as many people. Pivoting on my heel to return to the bedroom, I take in three nervous faces still clustered around the door to the hallway, studying my reaction intently.
All the pieces click into place, and my heart lodges in my throat. “You... kept a room ready in case you ever found your mate?”
Kodiak's Adam's apple bobs as he tucks his hands into his pockets. “Hope is a dangerous thing to have, but even more dangerous not to.”
All three of them are watching me warily as they brace themselves for my reaction, and it hurts to witness. But the fact that it means so much to them that I'm happy here, happy with them? The longing in their eyes they’re trying so hard to conceal calls to my own.
“It’s absolutely perfect.”
Stone’s eyes close, some of the tension leaving his rigid shoulders. “Anything you don’t like, we can swap out, just say the word. We want you to be comfortable, to make the spaceyours.Not stuck feeling like a guest in your own home."
In your own home.
It’s a surreal concept, planning on staying anywhere long enough to even consider it becoming home. But... he’s right. Even when I had my doubts and was hurting, when I came face to face with my biggest nightmare, I ran to their car instead of taking off to start over.
Theyare my safe place. I can’t imagine starting over alone again, going back to a life without them in it.
“Seriously, I love it. What about Avery, though? We’re going to need to go back to pick her up, along with our stuff.”
Raiden tucks his hands behind his back, donning a military stance. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of everything.” There’s an anxious look on his face that makes me feel guilty, like he’s determined to prove himself capable after the clusterfuck earlier tonight, to convince me not to give up on him, on them.
“Avery comes and goes as she pleases,” he elaborates, “and her anklet is key-coded into the sensors with a microscopic barcode in the engraving to allow her access. If I’m not back to feed her by tomorrow night, she’ll automatically begin circling all legion owned properties until finding me. She can take care of herself, but I’ve trained her exactly for these sort of unexpected situations.”
Stone scratches the back of his neck. “In regards to your things, one of us can go get them, or we can shop for new; whichever you’d prefer.”
“As much as I loathe wasting money, I’m not emotionally attached to anything we left behind. It would probably cost more in gas to go back than heading down to the nearest store and snagging a few things to get by.”
