Page 46 of Shadows of Air and Earth
Riley’s hazel eyes peered up at my shocked expression, his wavy green hair flopping over his brow, and he smiled. “You need not be alone anymore Rem.”
Xi’s uncovered face, also looked up, her eyes bright and focused. “We are amici animae. Friends of the soul and we are better for it.”
A wide foolish smile spread across my face and I fell to my knees, leaning into them, our foreheads touching as we laughed nervously. “I accept your vow but you need not kneel to me. We are equals,” I choked out, “and I also vow to always uphold the trust you have given me as both your leaderandyour friend.”
“We accept,” Riley grinned, pulling away to ruffle my hair playfully. “So what’s next oh great war general of Faerie?”
Xi groaned, shaking her head, leaning back on her heels. “What’s next is another hot bath and a week’s worth of sleep at the very least.”
I snickered, “You might need to hold that wonderful plan for another day.” Eyes sparkling, I held up the note that had been burning a hole in the shadows ever since they returned from the City of Night. “This is what’s next.”
Tugging her hair across her face, Xi cursed. “Goddess help us. There’s that tone again. You heard it, right Ri?”
He nodded, rubbing his hands together, the air swirling around them eagerly and his eyes gleamed. “Oh, you bet I did. It means another round of troll bowl, here we come!”
Laughing freely, I felt the strands of fate begin to unravel but this time I would not face it alone, and for that—I would be patient.
Epilogue
Morta
Iknelt on thedestroyed remains of the City of Light, staring numbly down at the mountainous rubble and the frayed leather bracelet in my hand. The sharp, jagged marble cut deep into my knees the same way loss sliced open my heart, and I clenched my fist around the broken leather. I was fucking bleeding out, but on the inside, the loss of Remnant Dark drowned me in an abyss of grief.
I barely heard the sharp commands and barking orders of the shifter fae around us. The only thing I was aware of outside of this pain was that Xi was with me. Fucking goddess to Sheol and back, I swallowed hard. She could have been here, buried beneath the destruction where our beloved general likely lie.
Days. We had spent days digging through it all, with both power and our own hands that broke open and bled and then healed again on repeat. Desperate to find one fae beneath. One living soul. But there were none.
There was onlyherleather bracelet, shredded and scorched, a testament of what had happened here, and I clutched onto it with wretched desperation as if it would bring our general back to us.
Xi’s exposed grey eye caught my own, a flicker of hope burning within them and I looked away, narrowing my gaze at the massive shifter looming over us. His body looked just as broken as we all felt. Deep blue bruises and half healed wounds that still bled littered the once smooth bronze muscle, darkcircles of fatigue strained around his fierce and bright golden eyes. Seemingly, too exhausted to brush back, his hair fell across his face as he wavered. Quickly supported by the fae who had captured us at his side, the healer accompanying him scanned his body—healing what he could. But from what I could see, hidden deep within the golden one’s eyes, there was nothing that would heal those scars even if the wounds did close.
Nothing here that is.
But thisgolden onedid say he believed she was alive before he stared off into the distance with both longing and pain, need and desperation, like a lost lover, vowing to find her. To bring Remnant Dark back home.
Home.
We had no home now. Everything we had worked for, the sacrifices we made, the times we held our tongue watching our beloved friend be abused and subjugated by the queen all for the goal to free Faerie from her rule, was gone. And so was our sole purpose. There would be no fae left to even be free, no elemental court to lead, not after today.
We had lost. We had lost everything.Shewas our everything.
The crunching of heavy leather boots in front of me drew my attention back to the present and discreetly I tucked Remnant’s leather bracelet away. Gaze traveling up massive muscular thighs encased in tanned leathers to a bared torso covered in tattooed ink, I swallowed. Trailing that ink, I followed the exquisite detail all the way up to the top of his head. A tapestry of art permanently etched into every defined groove of his savage body. Muscle rippled when he crouched his heavy form in front of me, meeting my studious gaze with violent purple eyes that gripped my soul.
A brow pierced with a heavy barbell arched amusedly at my deepening scowl. “So you’re shadow forces huh?” His voice waslow and gravelly, dark and beastly. A dangerous tone that had me shivering despite myself.
The petite one who found andcapturedus snickered. Her deep brown eyes flashed brightly with knowing and despite her stature, it was clear that she was not to be mistaken for anything but powerful. “Stop playing with your food, Tyr.”
Penina. Thegolden onehad called her Penina.
Snarling, I broke the corded bonds around Xi and I’s wrists with a slice of air, and lunged, barreling into the grinning, unsuspecting shifter.
Fuck him.
Pinning him to the ground with air, a knee on his throat, and a dagger in hand, Xi guarded my back. Her earth trembled beneath us all and I smiled darkly. “Yes. We aretheshadow forces, shifter. You got a problem with that?”
His returning growl cut short, his eyes widening, and nostrils flaring, I stilled at the sudden delicious scent enveloping me. A deep warmth, something clicking into place inside my chest. An intense need, adesire.
Violet eyes began to dissolve into dark heady hunger and I knew then that the great shifter’s reaction was similar to mine. His deep resonating purr sent a hot spike of exotic thrill into my bloodstream and my breathing increased.
