Page 48 of What Hunts Inside the Shadows

“You know, it is fairly rude to sneak out of your lover’s bed while they sleep,” Caldris said, making me heave a sigh as I spun to face him. One single eye opened, studying me with a quirked brow.

“We don’t have a bed,” I said, smiling at him playfully. He studied me, waiting for me to elaborate on what would drive me out in the middle of the night without a word. “I couldn’t sleep,” I admitted, shrugging my shoulders and making sure I kept my posture casual. Given our history, if I gave him any reason to believe I wasn’t being truthful, he might think I was trying to escape while he slept.

I didn’t want that. Not after the little progress we’d made. I wanted to cling to it and own it as the hard won victory it was. “Is something wrong?” he asked, shifting to sit up. He pulled on his boots, standing to follow after me.

“I’m just restless,” I admitted. “I can’t seem to turn off my mind. I was just going to go read by the fire.”

“I have a better idea,” he said, standing beside me and unknotting the ties on the tent. He pulled the flaps open, stepping out into the night and waiting for me to follow.

“You don’t have to be awake just because I am. You should get some sleep,” I said, nodding my head back toward the tent. I was entirely capable of reading in the middle of a well-protected camp full of dead things that didn’t need sleep.

“You’re my mate. If you need something, I’ll provide it,” he said, starting to walk through the snow. I curled my cloak tighter around my shoulders, missing the warmth of his embrace already. I should have stayed by the tent, only the lure of the warmth of the fire was enough to tempt me away. But Caldris carved a path through the outer edges of the camp, taking me around to the side as far from the other Fae Marked as he could. Members of the Wild Hunt watched us curiously, looking just as lost as I was.

He turned to face me when I stopped a few paces away from him, trying to ignore the sinking feeling in my gut. A stern glare from him sent the riders of the Wild Hunt back to their previous tasks, leaving us with the delusion of privacy for a few moments.

He closed the gap between us, raising a hand to hold out in front of him. With his palm facing the sky, he held my gaze as a rush of wind rise from his hand. Snowflakes danced above his skin, hovering in the air in a mini-snow storm, all contained in the boundary of his palm.

He raised my hand with his free one, mimicking his positioning as he turned his hand upside down. Waving that snow storm above my hand, he let the pulse of cold touch my bare skin. It rested above my palm, levitating and following my movements as I moved my hand from side to side. Caldris pulled his hand away, leaving me with the tiny snowfall.

“I know you’ve been taught to believe that magic is something to be afraid of, and it can be,” he said, reaching beneath my hand to cup it in his grasp as I stared at the snow drifting up toward the sky. The magic felt the same as it had when I’d killed Loris, that same threat of something all-consuming as the white lines of my Fae Mark lit up in recognition of my mate’s magic. “But it can also be beautiful.”

“This is yours,” I said, feeling that the magic that sustained the little storm wasn’t coming from me. My mark recognized it, but didn’t own it.

“Yes,” he agreed, and the knowledge hung between us that, even if I managed to pull power from myViniculum, this magic would always be his. “We’re going to focus on the Winter Court abilities for now. You seem to favor them, and they’re farther from whatever magic is hiding inside ofyou.”

I nodded, watching as the magic of the storm faded away. “How do I do this intentionally?”

He gripped my wrists in his hands, touching the Fae Mark and giving me that added connection. “Find the bond. Imagine you’re tugging on that golden string and pulling it toward you.” I closed my eyes, envisioning the shimmering gold of our mate bond and tugging on it. “Good. Now think of the cold. Think of the snow and the winds of winter. Of the smell of fresh snow and of ice filling your lungs. Push that feeling into your hands, like a spark to bring the winter.”

I did as he said, picturing the snow he’d created in his hands and the way it had felt in mine. The touch of cold against my skin with the cool air surrounding me. My hands buzzed with warmth, making me open my eyes.

There waited only my empty hands to greet my gaze, with not a single snowflake floating in the air above me. I sighed, scowling as I tried to think wintery thoughts.

“Not everything can come easy, Little One,” Caldris said with a chuckle, dragging his thumb over the sensitive skin at my wrist. “Mastering magic takes a lifetime, and most human mates do not learn until after the bond is completed.”

“Is it even possible to learn before that? Who is to say you haven’t set me up for failure?” I asked, but I kept my eyes trained on my hands regardless, picturing snow-covered trees beside me.

“Anything that exists is possible, and the magic is already within you.” His thumb stroked theViniculumas it curved around my wrist. “You just have to learn to communicate with one another.”

“You act like it’s alive,” I said, huffing a laugh.

He tilted his head to the side. “Of course it’s alive. You’re tapping into the magic of the world, using the nature around you to do your bidding. If nature isn’t life, then I don’t know what is.”

My understanding shifted, and I closed my eyes as I considered the beauty of the snow for the first time. All my life, it had been a detriment. It had represented the hardship that came with being unable to work the gardens for a season, and with having less food to eat.

Something rose up in me. I wouldn’t have said it was magic exactly, but it felt like a drain on my energy, quieting the turmoil of my brain until a yawn burst free.

“I think we’ve accomplished the goal for the night,” Caldris said, releasing my wrists from his grasp. I nodded sleepily, swaying slightly as he turned me and guided me back toward our tent and to the bedroll we shared, so he could wrap me in his warm embrace.

I was too tired to feel defeated and incompetent for not being able to channel the magic that was supposed to be mine now.

That would come in the morning.

Ivery much, sincerely regretted my sleeplessness the next morning. Even if it weren’t for the way my body slumped back into Caldris’s form, the feeling of failure that rode alongside us all day was enough to act as a deterrent spilling from our bedroll in the future.

I’d had plenty of sleepless nights in my life, wandered in the woods at all hours, but none of those had ever left me feeling as exhausted as Caldris’s lesson. Still, I flexed my hand in front of me, trying to call the winter air to my palm as if it would come to me as we rode along.

“You should take a break,” he said, his presence at my spine both a comfort and a deterrent. He grounded me, giving me a piece of winter that I could hold for my own, but at the same time he felt like a safety blanket in a lot of ways.

---