Page 15 of Hunted
“You think he’s still in there, even when the vampire, or the darkness, or whatever it is takes over?”
Another nod.I knew he was, without a doubt.
“But you’re scared one day you won’t be able to reach him.”He spoke like someone with experience.
I closed my eyes.
“Yes,”I said aloud.Like today, for example.One dayhad arrived far sooner than I thought it would.And I wasn’t ready to face this pain.
He didn’t speak for a long time.His aura pressed against mine, tentative.Testing.He reeled it in like a curious puppy testing the end of its leash.
“You haven’t lost him,” he said aloud, once I opened my eyes.“He’s still here.He’s lost himself, maybe.But that’s not a permanent condition, in my experience.”
That...hurt.In a way that felt almost hopeful.And again, it sounded like something he had personal experience with.Had he lost himself and come back from it?
I didn’t know the bubak all that well.But from what little I did know, he had been a prisoner of the syndicate once, before he ended up with Robin and her defiant rebel court.And I knew enough of him to sense that he acted as if he expected people to treat him like a monster.
I exhaled.Looked at him fully for the first time.
Dusek, the bubak.Death mage.Nightmare to his enemies.Looming, pale...hauntingin a way that made most people flinch when they came in contact with his aura.But his magic didn’t bite at me now.It settled beside mine like the welcome shadow of a tall oak on a hot day.My alpha nature was strong enough to withstand any lingering fear.
“Why are you here?”I asked.
“You’re bleeding,”he signed back.
“That’s not why,”I signed impatiently.“You’re not a vampire.”
A faint twitch of his lips.“No,” he said aloud.“But it was the first excuse that popped into my head.I panicked.”
We stared at each other.
The last time I’d touched him had been in passing—brief, accidental—but his presence had sparked more than one kind of reaction in me.I had ignored it then, brushed it off as interesting but not important.But now...
I reached out purposefully.Slowly.Rested my fingers lightly on his bony wrist.
He didn’t flinch, the way he sometimes did when the others tried to get near.His aura stilled.Like a predator watching, waiting.I could feel the fear there, waiting to be unleased.But my own alpha nature let me brush it off without much effort.
“For a second there, I let myself think I was all alone with my pain,”I signed.Then, after a brief pause.“You think you’re alone,too,” I signed.“But you’re not.”
He stared at his own hands.Then looked up.
“You are a very different man than I thought you’d be, when I first heard Ruya was sending us a strange alpha,”he signed, picking his words carefully.
The gym was silent, save for the quiet thrum of residual magic.
He moved closer, hesitantly, giving me time to withdraw in terror.I didn’t stop him.
He brushed my shoulder with the tips of his fingers, a gesture that, coming from him, seemed as intimate as a kiss.I let him.
Not a promise of anything more.Not yet.Just contact.An experiment.Maybe a bit of comfort.
After a long moment, he stood and offered his hand.I took it and let him pull me to my feet.
“That’s...weird...often,” he mused as he looked own at our still clasped hands, and I lost the ability to see what he was saying well enough to read his lips.Then he lifted his head to meet my eyes again.“You aren’t afraid of me.”
I shrugged.Then I tugged my hand free of his to sign,“Why should I be?”
His lips curled up at one side in wry amusement, and I realized I was rapidly coming to love that little rare half-smile.“Don’t get ahead of yourself, naga.You’d still piss your pants if I approached you in my true form.”
