Page 9 of Synodic

I should run, but I couldn’t bring myself to move. It was as if the dead roots had gnarled around my feet and anchored me like a tree in soil.

Noticing where my gaze lingered, he looked down at his weapon, then back to me with dark amusement. “You should be afraid. Do you even know the creatures that hunt you in these woods?”

I gave him a good once-over, up and down. “I think I have a pretty good idea.”

A wicked grin pulled at his lips, flashing his white teeth. His smile was genuine enough to reveal the sharp peaks of his canines. “Oh no, sweet girl. No, you don’t.”

He was trying to scare me, and he was most definitely succeeding. But we’d gone weeks without being able to speak to one another, and now that he was here and practically within my grasp, I wanted answers.

“Rowen,” I said after a while, trying out his name on my lips. His gaze quickly darted to my mouth, then back to my eyes, as if shocked by my saying it. I met his stare equally and asked, “Why have you been dream-stalking me?”

“As I said, it’s more of a hunt.” He crossed his arms over his broad chest and ground his teeth. “I would suggest you start running.” His eyes slowly raked up my body, tracing over my bare feet and exposed skin like a forbidden whisper. “Though I doubt you’ll get far.”

Fighting the instinct to take his advice was a physical effort. It seemed he wanted me to flee from him, but I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. I’d stayed this long, and I was determined for more of an explanation from him.

“You have something you’ve been wanting to tell me. Before I go anywhere, I demand to know what it is,” I declared with more bravado than I felt.

He laughed at my pathetic attempt to intimidate him, but the amusement didn’t last long. His face grew dark and harsh as if he remembered he wasn’t supposed to laugh, not even for a second, and I took a step back, shaken by the abrupt change in his demeanor.

He looked painfully validated as I retreated, almost satisfied that I was smart enough to withdraw from him.

“And what makes you think you are in any position to make demands?”

“I deserve to know why I’m being followed.”

His eyes rippled the color of a gold-green forest, not the hue of the wildwood itself but more its reflection upon the water of a loch. Striking in and of themselves with his tan skin and dark hair, but even more so against the colorless grey woods.

His voice lowered to a menacing whisper, “Did you really expect to scream out into the night and not attract the notice of the monsters that live in its darkness?”

The question alone was enough to knock me off balance—it seemed my screams could be heard from all sides of my consciousness. Was nowhere safe?

He darted forward and reached out to steady me, grabbing me lower on my arm just above my elbow. This time, however, there was no fabric between us, just skin on skin.

His touch on my bare flesh shocked me in a brilliant silver-white flash, and I sucked in a sharp breath. Electricity traveled through me, tracing a pattern that branched across my body like the limbs of a tree. The ignited current followed the path of my veins and marked me as if I’d been struck by lightning, creating a fern-like embossment on my body. It seared me like stardust, then absorbed into my skin in a glimmering blaze.

I felt forever marked by that touch, whether for good or evil, I had no way of knowing.

I glanced up to see if he had felt it too, that lightning bolt, that collision of worlds. Surely something that powerful couldn’t have only traveled through one body, but his face showed no change whatsoever.

He carefully released me, and I studied his tapered fingers that looked smudged in black graphite as he flexed his hand by his side.

“The truth is, I’d like to help you,” he carried on as if nothing happened. “Unless you’d prefer to take your chances with whomever, or whatever, comes along next. And believe me when I say something will come along. Although I can’t promise they will be as charming as me,” he said with a positively sinful grin.

I let out a scoff. Did he consider this charming? “I don’t need your help.”

His cryptic smile widened, mocking me as if I was blissfully unaware of something so obvious. It unnerved me that he could see into my blind spots, and my fists curled in frustration.

“I’ve been doing just fine on my own,” I thought I would add for good measure, trying to regain some semblance of control in this conversation. Even though we both knew I had none, not even a little.

“Is that so, Copeland?” he asked casually, taking a small step towards me.

On reflex, I took a step back, suddenly missing the protection of the fog. “It’s Keira, and yes, it is,” I said, not all too convincingly, ignoring the trembling in my bones that came from equal parts fear and raw, pulsing energy.

He took another step in my direction, backing me up against a tree before placing his hands on either side of me, caging me in against the trunk. His height surged over me as the bark bit into my back and my blood rushed through my veins. We were almost chest to chest, nearly touching, but not quite.

“If I were to leave you right now, I’d wager you wouldn’t make it ten steps before your pretty little mouth started screaming my name.”

Half of me wanted to run and never give him a second glance, I’d get farther than he thought, but the other, slightly more prominent half wanted him to put his hands on me. To touch me again and see if that lightning bolt from earlier had been a fluke—a strange, singular moment never to happen again, or if we were two electrical fields charging for another blast.

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