Page 132 of In Between Death and the Devil

Oh, Gods. Was this what he’d been doing all this time? “How long has Colt been here? Why didn’t you tell me?” My voice broke a little on the last word.

Recognition of the name sparked on Titus’s and Marcus’s faces.

“Since shortly after you fled Death’s castle,” Fen said. “I didn’t tell you because you didn’t need to know. It wasn’t as if you’d be able to visit him. It would have distracted you. And him.”

“But—”

“He’s right,” Marcus said. “About that.”

Titus looked grim but nodded.

My jaw clenched. I didn’t want to hear that Fen was being reasonable. It felt like a betrayal for him to have kept it from me. Especially in light of what I’d discovered him doing, which I still didn’t understand. It made me wonder what else he was keeping from me.

I thought back. The wall I’d discovered in our bond after Talia revealed she’d been a Tempter had disappeared after I confronted him about it, but then I’d run into a limit on the amount of power I could pull, even though I’d felt how vast his stores were when we first bonded. I knew he’d blocked me after Talia. It never occurred to me that he might have also purposely limited how much power I could draw from him, perhaps to keep more secrets from me. Except that didn’t make any sense. He needed me to destroy Death, and I needed his power to do it. Limiting what I could draw would be self-defeating. Why would he sabotage us like that?

I watched him argue with Titus, his expression relaxed except for the tightness around his eyes. He was so unlike the Fen I was used to. Maybe I didn’t know him as well as I thought. Given the troubled expressions on Titus’s and Marcus’s faces, maybe none of us did.

It was happening again. Rage rose in my chest, hot and sticky. Just like with Colt, I’d misjudged Fen. If what I suspected was true, his behavior was putting the fate of the realms in danger. I’d trusted him, that he had everyone’s best interests at heart, but if that were true, he wouldn’t be stonewalling us. Right?

I had to know for sure.

Closing my eyes, I plunged into our bond, diving down until I hit the bottom of Fen’s well of power. This close, it was clear it was an artificial barrier. A construct of stone and will. He was hiding something. My fury boiled over. Gathering every ounce of anger and grief running through me, I mentally hurled myself at the wall. I felt Fen jolt, but I didn’t hesitate. Battering it, I ripped at it with mental claws and rammed into it over and over until it buckled.

“Maeve.” Fen’s voice sounded far away. I vaguely registered his panic, but I was too concentrated on my task to care.

Another couple of hits and the wall collapsed. My breath stalled in my lungs as I took in what was on the other side. A vast reservoir of power, far larger than the well he’d allowed me access to. This was what I’d seen when we bonded. He’d been keeping it from me, putting all of us in danger, and pretending it had all been in my head.

My chest constricted at the proof of his betrayal. Everything I’d thought was between us was a lie.

I was such a fool.

I could feel him trying to push me out as he scrambled to reconstruct the wall between us. His anger, panic and shame overwhelmed me, a tempest of emotions that swept me up and tossed me straight into the sea of his power. It flowed through me, filling every nook and cranny of my mind and body, far more than I’d ever channeled before. Then everything faded, and I was in a room much like Colt’s cell, in a body not my own.

“What are you doing?” Talia stood at the open door, eyes wide with horror.

Fen looked down to the female soul on the floor in front of him, wrapped in shadows. She moaned as her pain flowed between them, sweeter and more potent than anything he’d ever tasted. It lingered for a moment before turning into power that trickled into his stores in an effervescent cascade. Irritation rippled through him at the interruption. He hadn’t had nearly enough. The edge of the hunger that was always with him was barely dulled.

Reality seeped in slowly. Talia was here, instead of in his bed where he’d left her. She wore one of his shirts over her leggings, and she looked like she’d been thoroughly debauched. The guilt for what they’d done the night before resurfaced, leaving a sour taste in his mouth. And then the fact that she was seeing him feed hit him like a punch to the gut. Shame curled in his belly like poison.

“I can explain.” The woman at his feet collapsed as he released her from his shadows. “I’m siphoning off her pain to ease her suffering.” His voice shook slightly.

“Bullshit. I know pain when I feel it, and while you were feeding, she was in an immense amount of it. You weren’t making it better. You were making it worse.” Fen swallowed at the fury in Talia’s gaze.

“I may have inadvertently gone too far.” He reached down to help the woman to her cot, but she flinched away from him.

“How often do you do this?”

“I told you, it was an accident.” He grabbed a blanket and laid it over the woman instead.

“Don’t lie to me. How often?” Talia crossed her arms over her chest. There was no empathy in her gaze, just cold, hard judgment.

This was a mistake, just like sleeping with her. She’d never understand. Sweat beaded on his forehead. “Just because you don’t like the answer doesn’t mean there’s a different one. Don’t make it a big deal when it’s not.”

“What the fuck is wrong with you? You’re supposed to help these souls, not hurt them.” Disgust rolled off of her.

His cheeks burned. “I do help them.”

“This is not what I signed up for. Do the others know?”