I snickered at his priceless expression. Confused Silas looked kind of adorable.
His eyes flicked to my bare skin, and we both froze. “Why are we nude?” he asked in a low voice that sent shivers up my spine.
I bit my lower lip to keep from doing something totally, completely stupid. “It rained, and hypothermia, and your lips turned blue.” I cleared my throat and tried again. “I dragged your unconscious butt across a glacier after your stupid stunt nearly gave us both hypothermia.”
“You were supposed to keep moving,” he said, untangling his limbs from mine. I held very still as his firm torso slid against mine. He hovered over me, lifting his body so we weren’t touching. His biceps flexed on either side of my head. His eyes lowered to my lips.
I forgot all the perfectly reasonable and important reasons why I shouldn’t get tangled up with him. An entirely inappropriate thrill shot through me. “You could say thank you.”
“Why don’t you ever listen to me?” His eyes were on fire. I didn’t know if he was angry or turned on. Maybe both.
I wanted to run my fingers over the muscles of his chest. My insides twisted as a slow tingle spread in my belly. I ached to kiss him until his scowl disappeared for good. “You don’t get to tell me what to do.”
His voice dropped to a low growl, and his head dipped toward mine. “You’re entirely too stubborn.”
I put my palm on his chest, fingers splayed. I meant to push him away, but my hand drifted across his chest, feeling the hard muscle there as he held himself above me. “I’m not one of your little soldiers.”
He lowered to his elbows, closing the distance between our bodies. His face was inches from mine. “You couldn’t follow orders if your life depended on it.”
My brain short-circuited, and I gripped his hair, pulling him down to my mouth.
He kissed me back hard. As he pinned me with his weight, the evidence of his desire fueled the flames inside me. Our verbal sparring became physical as our mouths fought for dominance. He gripped the back of my head and held me exactly where I wanted to be. My tongue teased his lips, and he deepened the kiss. He kissed like he fought—passionately and with skill.
When our lips separated, his mouth traveled down the side of my neck. I slid the tips of my fingers over the tattoos along his back, fascinated with the contrast of soft skin over hard muscle. The symbols continued all the way down his side, twisting with the curve of his muscles as far as I could see. I had the sudden urge to go exploring for more.
“You’re determined to get yourself killed,” he said as his mouth moved to the base of my neck. He nipped at the sensitive skin before his mouth traveled across my collarbone.
“You’re a control freak,” I said, grinding my hips against him.
His hand slid between my legs, and I moaned. Then my brain caught up. “Jesus Christ!”
“Not my name,” he murmured against my skin.
His lips traveled to my breast, and I lost coherent thought for several seconds.
“Silas!” I yanked at his hair.
He hissed and pulled back.
In a moment of sanity that wouldn’t last long if I didn’t act immediately, I pushed him away. His eyes were dilated, and in the shadowy dark of our little shelter, they looked almost black.
“This is a bad idea,” I said. There were so many reasons not to have sex with Silas. But God, I wanted more. And obviously, he did too. The air seemed to crackle as we stared at each other.
A sudden flare of power shifted the air around us in a familiar pull that seemed to spear me straight through my stomach. Skimming.
We both froze, alert to every noise outside our little cave.
Silas motioned for me to stay quiet and reached for the packs at the entrance to our shelter.
Clothes. I need clothes. Fear snaked up my spine as I dug for the clothing I’d shoved into the bottom of our bags and tossed stuff at Silas.
He maneuvered into his clothing and slipped silently out of the cave. Just as I finished dressing, his head popped back in. His voice was barely audible over the whistling of the wind against the rocks. “Hurry. We need to move.”
We ran through the field, crouching low between the gigantic boulders, our tattered packs on our backs. Silas scouted behind us, while I moved as quickly and quietly as I could, but we didn’t see anything. Still, I didn’t question what we’d both experienced—someone had skimmed onto the mountain, near enough that I had sensed the impact of their flare.
In a dozen yards, we reached the end of the field and the base of another mountain range. A ten-foot cliff face rose above us.
“Silas!” I whispered frantically. “I can’t climb this without a rope.”
He glanced behind us. “We don’t have time to find another path. Put your hands and feet where I do. You’ll be fine.”
Don’t look down. Don’t look down. With my heart pounding, I placed my sweaty hands exactly where he had put his and gripped the rock, hyperfocused on each movement and not on the drop below me. At the very top, several inches beyond my grasp, I reached for the final foothold. His longer legs spanned the distance with ease, but I couldn’t stretch that far. He reached back over the ledge and offered me his hand. I took it, expecting a small boost to the foothold. He pulled me straight to the top, and I landed on my feet next to him with a little yelp. He steadied me with his hand against the small of my back, and our gazes caught.
Heat pooled in my stomach as I remembered the feel of his hard body on mine. His eyes lowered to my lips for a moment before he stepped back and scanned the path ahead.
Focus, Maeve. I surveyed the cliff top. Another hiker’s hut sat a short distance away. Like the last one, a bright shade of green clashed with red trim along the sloped metal roof. It was a safe oasis in the middle of the snow. “Let’s go to the hut.”
“This way,” Silas said at the same time, pointing toward the west and the ridge he’d chosen. “The elevation will give us a vantage point to scout for the Brotherhood’s position. We’ll have to avoid them if we want to get to the temple. I’m not sure we’ll be able to take the most direct route any longer.”
Getting stranded out in the open would be a death sentence, which increased my desire to curl up in the little cabin and hide. But that was stupid. We were being chased, and we couldn’t stop moving until we found the Fate’s temple, wherever it was.
We climbed the ridge to the west, moving as stealthily as possible. Every crunch of snow made me flinch as I imagined it echoing back to the Brotherhood. Silas reached the summit first and lowered to his belly. I caught up a minute later, trying to ignore the nauseating flip of my stomach as we climbed higher and higher. The range became a dead end—a huge drop surrounded us on three sides. But the height did give us the view of the entire valley below.
We stood over an endless expanse of peaks and valleys. Hundreds of ranges spread before us, but no path seemed any more promising than the next, and no mystical road signs pointed to the temple. Disappointment weighed me down. We had come so far but were no closer to our goal. Below us, Mint Glacier glinted in the distance. It was strange that something so beautiful had almost killed us.
Silas’s mouth pulled into a thin line. He pointed at dark shapes loping along the glacier. I squinted at them in the distance. My stomach plummeted as I counted ten distinct shapes, each moving on four legs.
“More Shifters?”
“Shifters includes anyone who can change to another form. These are Rakken.” He scowled as he peered at the beasts. “They’ll track our scent, and they’re close.” He grimaced. “Fratch. I told you to keep moving.”
“If I kept going, you’d be dead! Last night, I dragged your stupid ass across a glacier and saved you from hypothermia. Would it kill you to show a little gratitude?”
His brow furrowed in anger. “You were supposed to get to the Fate’s temple.”
A shrill shriek echoed through the valley, and I cringed. Only something excited to eat us would ma
ke that kind of noise. We watched as the Rakken in the lead found our little cave, and the others rushed over to sniff it out. They all took up the call, building into a frenzy of screeches and howls until my ears rang with their high-pitched calls.
“We have to get off this ridge before they cut us off,” Silas said.
I scooted away from the edge and scrambled back toward the path we’d just ascended, the sound of the Rakkens’ screams making me cover my ears as I ran.
The noise ended abruptly.
“They have our trail,” he said.
“Can they get up that last cliff face?” It had been almost impossible for me to climb; surely a four-legged animal couldn’t scale it.
“They’ll claw their way up.”
I so didn’t want to know that. I wasn’t sure what was worse, hearing their frenzied, shit-in-my-pants howls or knowing they were approaching silently with claws that could sink into rock.
We descended back down the little western summit and once again stood at the intersection of the ridge and the hut. To the north, the Rakken were closing in on us. The south held the endless maze of mountains. With the Rakken chasing us, we wouldn’t be able to hide for long. Our only choice was the east. I looked up past the radiant green hut to the east range.
I blinked and focused back on the hut. The little building almost glowed in the sun. I squinted at it, closed one eye, then switched to the other.
Silas glared into the distant south, probably calculating our survival odds in the twisting, unknown mountains.
The hut still glowed.
“The hut,” I whispered.
“We’ll head south,” he said, his eyes never wavering. “It’s our best chance to lose them, maybe double back...”
“We have to go to the hut.” The magic was impossible not to see. The cabin radiated with energy.
“We can’t stop here.”
“It’s glowing.” Arguing with him was a waste of time we couldn’t afford. I sprinted for the little building and threw open the door. Like the other cabin, bunk beds lined two cabin walls with emergency supplies stacked neatly on a shelf between them.
I glared at the plain wood walls, willing them to shimmer with energy. Nothing. No magical Fate’s temple anywhere. My shoulders drooped with sudden and intense disappointment.
Silas entered behind me and scowled with furrowed brows. The sour feeling in my stomach perfectly matched his expression.
“I’ve seen Rakken take their prey alive,” he said. “They tear into the soft organs first, drawing out death while they eat you. I’d like to avoid that if you’re agreeable.”
A grimace spread across my face. I refused to believe our only option was to hide in the mountains and hope the organ-eating, clawed demon dogs didn’t find us.
“But...” The cabin was identical to the other one, except that I had seen it glowing with magic from the outside. The Fate had to be there. It was the only explanation. “It’s glowing with energy. The magic—”
“Now.” He pulled me outside.
I turned back to the cabin once more, and it hit me. The building stood at least two stories high like the last hut, but there was only one floor inside.
The second story was missing.
I rushed past Silas back inside. He swore in a language I didn’t recognize and stalked after me, snow crunching harshly under his boots. I threw the door open and scanned the room again, my heart pounding with every wasted second. My gaze went to the ceiling, where I searched the wooden planks for an opening. Along the edge of one wall, two jagged lines were barely visible, running with the grooves of the wood. Three feet separated the parallel seams. I could have stared at them all night and thought they were cracks in the ceiling, but the opening would be wide enough to fit a person.
“There! Do you see that?” I demanded.
The sharp wail of claws on stone pierced the air with sickening closeness. The Rakken were climbing the cliff face.
“Give me a hand.” I tossed my pack on the ground and dug out Ripper.
Silas hesitated.
“You’re wasting time! If I’m wrong, we’ll know in a second. Lift me up, Silas.”
His eyes narrowed, but he wrapped his arms around my legs and hoisted me up on his shoulder. I pushed against the ceiling then pried Ripper between the cracks. The wood loosened and swung upward on silent hinges.
I pulled myself through the ceiling into the attic.
Triumph filled me. The space was at least four times bigger than what should have been able to physically fit inside the cabin, and a radiant white glow lit it from within. The ceiling soared ten feet above, supported by arched beams carved with overlapping geometric patterns. Around the secret entrance, the floors melted from the rough wood of the cabin into smooth white stone. At the far end of the space in the center sat the only furnishing in the room—an ornate, high-backed chair.
I knelt on the smooth stone floor and motioned for Silas to come up.
He took off his pack, jumped, and pulled himself through the opening. “Fate’s balls!”
“I really need to teach you better swear words,” I said, my eyes on our impossible surroundings. I’d expected some kind of grand Roman edifice but had gotten a hiker’s hut instead. But far from disappointing, the sheer amount of power radiating from the room thrummed inside my chest, confirming that this could only be one thing. We’d found the Fate’s temple.
Chapter Ten
Inside the Fate’s temple, patterns of magic wove through everything, emitting a brightness that overwhelmed my senses. It was more than physical light. The weight of the magic seemed tangible. It was like being able to see the individual pieces of matter that created everything in the universe.
Silas stood next to me, an equal measure of shock and awe on his face as we took it all in. I rose first, still gripping Ripper, and headed toward the only item in the room—the empty white chair. The back of it was taller than me and curved in a winged arch to the highest point. The gilded wood frame had carvings in a similar design to the arches on the ceiling. I bent closer to inspect the symbols, when a familiar magical pressure sucked at the air around me.
I leapt backward and stifled a gasp when a child appeared in the chair. I couldn’t tell the child’s gender as I stared at its long, straight blond hair and smooth, round face. Its eyes were too piercing for the baby face it wore. My skin crawled.
Determined not to threaten the powerful being that might be my only chance to live through this nightmare, I forced myself to lower Ripper. “Are you the Fate?”
The child smiled, and my stomach flipped.
“Don’t be fooled by its appearance,” Silas said, pulling me back. “It’s not a child.”
No shit, Sherlock.
We waited in silence while the Fate’s gaze penetrated my soul.
“You are of Earth,” the Fate finally said, surprising me with a strong feminine voice that belonged to a much older person. She cocked her head to the side and examined me. “And of Aeterna.”
I bit the inside of my cheek, wondering what the Fate could have possibly meant by that doublespeak, while Silas went rigid beside me. I was definitely of Earth. The Aeterna part must have meant the magic trapped inside of me.
“The lost shall be found,” she said.
The Fate waved her fingers casually, and I gasped at the sense of being connected to something infinitely more powerful than myself. Without warning, the room glowed with millions of streams of magic energy. Each strand intertwined with the next until the strength of it grew brighter than any light I had ever imagined, bathing us in a surreal glow.
Silas’s skin glowed with the intricate markings of the sigils tattooed over his skin. The layered designs I had seen on his skin radiated magic, subtly moving in layers to create a stunning, interconnected web of archaic tattoos across his body, outlining him with golden energy. He flipped his arms over and back. Finally, he looked up at the Fate with wide eyes as he surveyed the amount of power that flowed
from her.
Like a small sun, the power emanating from the Fate lit the air with clear, bright energy. The veins of magic wound toward her, so bright the aura of energy directly around her hurt to look at. I felt as if I were staring into the sun. The immense power was beyond my comprehension.
“What is this?” Silas asked, staring at his glowing sigils.
The Fate’s eyes slid to him. “Silas. Son of House Valeron: The Eternal Might.” Her voice was low and hypnotic. “Death’s Fury.”
Silas glared, and his shoulders tensed. He looked ready for a fight.
“You were destined for more,” she stated as if that made perfect sense. “Fate forged by magic’s light.”
“I’m not here to discuss fate.” He practically spat the last word.
“We know your heart’s desire.”
The room flared with energy so powerful, I could see the patterns behind my eyelids when I blinked. The air around us blurred into the shimmering image of a beautiful woman I’d never seen before. Her long blond hair spilled over a golden dress that was fitted to her slender body. A delicate circlet of woven gold sat on her brow. She had petite features and full, defined lips, but the expression on her face was indescribably sad.
The woman in the vision stood under a large flowering tree beside a man whose face I couldn’t see. From the tense set of his shoulders and what I could see of his jaw, I guessed it was Silas. He was dressed in gleaming metal armor. Ornamental golden filigree accented his chest and the tops of his shoulders. A gold cloak ran across one shoulder and draped over his back. The woman held a small bundle in her arms—a baby? She reached across the space to hand it to him.
“Stop!” Silas ordered.
The vision disappeared, and the Fate sat silently with her child’s eyes and a smooth, expressionless face.
I shivered.
Silas’s face had gone dark, and his entire body was rigid. The muscles in his jaw flexed tight under his skin. Whatever that vision meant to him had shattered the exacting control with which he usually held himself.
“Return to Aeterna, and all will be unbound,” the Fate finally said. “We can restore your rightful destiny: Prime of House Valeron, Commander of the Guardians.”
Fate Forged Page 10