Page 80 of In Your Light

A smile flickered on his lips.

“And she was playing with his shadows,” Ciaran said, putting the backpack on. “Whatever that means. Personally, I thought his raven shadows were kinda creepy, but she likes them.”

“I thought they were cool,” Sawyer said.

Ciaran chuckled. “Of course you would.”

“I thought they were magnificent,” Fyn whispered.

Ciaran snorted. “Of course you do.” He nodded further up the hill. “Come on, let’s keep going. Go at your pace, and we’ll try to keep up.”

Fyn laughed. It was the first time Sawyer had heard him laugh in days. He didn’t push any faster, though. He kept to their pace.

“I’ll take you for a swim when we get home,” Ciaran said. “We can trade places.”

“In your cove?” Fyn asked. “It’s a bit deep for me, I think.”

He then went on to tell them all about the river by their camp, which he now thought was a stream by comparison to the river by the hut, apparently. But Fyn was happier, it seemed, and for that, Sawyer was grateful. And so they chatted as they climbed further up the mountain. Fyn told them of the trees, and the seasons, and crops, and planting, and how to give back to the earth.

Fyn did it so effortlessly. He moved like he was part of the forest, and the way the streams of sunlight caught his curls and the warmth of his skin, Sawyer was taken aback by how ruggedly handsome he was.

He’d always thought of Fyn as a kid, kind of. No pun on the goat thing either. Fyn was more than ten years younger than Sawyer. Sawyer had spent his adult life as a cop, seeing all kinds of shit, and Fyn had been living in a camp in the mountains. He didn’t even know what the internet was. He was sheltered and naïve, innocent to the ways of the world.

But listening to him talk about his mountain and about nature as a whole and watching him move with the agility of a mountain goat, his thigh and shoulder muscles flexing with each leap and reach, Sawyer had to admit he hadn’t really noticed Fyn before at all.

He wasn’t a kid. He was a mountain man in every sense of the word.

Albeit clean-shaven, bright-eyed, and with a smile that could light up the dark, but a man, nonetheless.

And the forest was beautiful. Tapestries of greens Sawyer couldn’t begin to describe. Mosses, ferns, trees, vines. The smell was damp and earthy but also fresh and invigorating. It was magical.

Listening to Fyn talk helped pass the time, if nothing else. Though it did little to help the burn in Sawyer’s legs, and just when he was about to ask how much further, they climbed up a steep gully and stepped out into a clearing.

To find two men waiting for them.

Sawyer recognised them. They’d come down to Tenebrae with Cern to collect Salem when they’d first seen Fyn.

He’d smiled at Sawyer back then, like he smiled at his friend now.

“Zaq,” he said. Then he lowered his head a little, his smile gone. “Pax.” He gestured to Ciaran and Sawyer. “I bring with me Ciaran, leader of the Tenebrae consortium, and his partner, Sawyer.”

Pax and Zaq wore clothes similar to Fyn’s. Natural fibres, earthy tones, and handmade. They were barefoot and broad shouldered, and they looked human enough, but Sawyer could easily picture them in faun form.

Ciaran stepped forward. “It’s an honour to meet you.”

Sawyer thought it was best to not say much and to certainly not run off at the mouth like he was prone to do. Things between Fyn and his brother were tense enough without Sawyer pissing anyone off.

Pax acknowledged Ciaran with a nod, but then he studied Sawyer for a beat before he turned to Fyn. “You bring a human here?”

Oh, great.

Sawyer raised his hand. “Uh, yeah. Human. Unfortunately. Also a police detective, which might come in handy if you need a liaison to the human world. Which you do. So yeah, human.”

Ciaran intervened. “He’s bound by the treaty, as are we. He is my mate,” he said with a little snarl that made Sawyer happy. “And he will be respected as such. As he respects the secret of our world. He cannot bring harm to our kind, and by association, yours.”

Pax didn’t look particularly happy about any of this, but he gave a small nod. “Very well.”

Sawyer didn’t miss the way Zaq smiled at Fyn.