by Elle Thorne
Not too far, just a few yards away. Her steps already felt lighter, as though a weight had been lifted off her shoulders.
Aaannnddd…
The damned dizziness hit.
At the same time, a dark form appeared in her peripheral vision then somehow ended up behind her, and a blade pressed against her throat.
She opened her mouth to scream.
Chapter Three
Slate knew immediately the person he held with a blade to the throat was female. Victor Saizon had sent a female for him?
He whirled her around.
She gasped. Her eyes grew wide. “You.” Her voice was low, the word, spoken on a breath, an accusation. Or a curse.
“Me?” He frowned. Why did she seem surprised it was him? She was hunting him with Saizon, was she not? “Where’s Saizon?”
It was her turn to frown. “Saizon?” Then she nodded slowly, as though she understood something, making him wish he knew what it was.
“You work for him, don’t you?” It was his turn to accuse.
“Me?” Her surprise seemed genuine. “Why would you think that?”
“Why did you say you, as though you were expecting me?”
“I…well, I…” She shook his arm off, pushed the blade away fearlessly, and shoved her hood down.
He scowled, studying her. Vivid green eyes stared at him. Blonde hair escaped her braid and framed her face. “You, well, you—what?” He stared, realizing this was no mere human before him.
His bear could tell she was something other than human. His skilljack senses flew into overdrive. She was something. She had some skills. Taking skills was something he did willfully. Usually. But sometimes, his skilljacking happened as if it had a mind of its own. This made him wonder if his bear controlled the skilljacking at times. Whatever controlled it, he could feel it happening right now. The siphon was kicking into action. He could feel it pulling her skills away. Whatever those skills were, he’d know soon enough because they would be his own.
Slate clenched his fists as the woman’s powers surged through him. A field of energy flowed between them. Could see it? He definitely could. It was a visible ribbon of power. Ethereal and ephemeral, it was gone in seconds, leaving him unbalanced and overwhelmed.
He stumbled backward, assaulted by unfamiliar paranormal vibes. He’d skilljacked plenty of people in his life, but the last two times had been different. Very, very unfamiliar. Ciara’s skills had been new ones for him to adjust to. It seemed this woman’s skills would be as well.
His body began to shake uncontrollably. A wave of dizziness struck him. He tumbled backward, falling into a tree. And dropping the knife he’d been holding. The hell with the knife, the woods, the woman. Everything faded away as a vision entered his mind.
That was when he realized what the woman’s skills were. She was a seer. He leaned against the tree and grunted as the dizziness faded away and all that remained was a vision. It was like looking through a foggy window.
A man laid on a table. No. Not just any table. A table in a morgue. And then the vision tightened on the image of the man, panning closer, swiveling, heading toward his face.
Dunn!
The man in the morgue was Dunn.
He inhaled sharply. His blood ran cold. All those things he’d heard that happened to people when they were faced with something so traumatic now transpired in him. In his body.
The woman came into view as the vision pulled away. “You are a seer,” he said, unable to keep the accusation from this tone. “Who the hell are you?”
“You’re Slate Youngblood.” Her voice definitely accused, as though he were vermin. She raised her hand, which unfortunately held his blade.
He narrowed his eyes. “So, you do know my name.”
She nodded, and the blade moved slightly, glinting where the sun slipping between the branches touched it.
Time to move cautiously, Slate thought. Though really, she wasn’t a shifter—as far as he could tell—and probably not much danger to him. He tested his senses swiftly and found he hadn’t skilljacked any sorcery skills, so yeah, most likely not a sorceress. Yet, there was an aura surrounding her still. Some type of supernatural power.
“And yet, I don’t know yours. Or what you are,” he reminded her. She was definitely something more than a seer. “Or if you work with Victor Saizon.”
“I don’t work with him. I don’t even know him.”
“Yet, you know me.”
“What did you do to me?” she shrieked.
Chapter Four
Panic flowed through Lana. She gripped his knife tightly. Though she’d thought he wasn’t a bad guy—he’d spent all those hours talking to Griz, Krisztián, and Ciara at the picnic table beneath the majestic pines beside Mae’s Bed & Breakfast—she was beginning to question that assessment. He carried a knife after all. And—
“What did you do to me?” she screeched at him, voice shrill, even to her own ears. “What have you done?” She brandished the blade, her hand shaking.
Introductions be damned. He’d—
She shook her head while he watched her through narrowed eyes. His gray eyes had turned darker, resembling granite. Where was the man she’d seen talking at that picnic table? A man whose body language suggested humility and a sense of humor. This man was hard. He was unforgiving. And most importantly, he’d taken something from her.
She felt an emptiness. Something was amiss.
He stumbled back, fell against a tree, the impact sending bark flying. His eyes glazed. His mouth tightened, and he seemed so far away. The familiarity struck Lana immediately. Though she was confused as to how this could have happened.
“You stole my visions?”
He didn’t say anything, merely shook his head. To clear it, she knew immediately. He was trying to clear the visions away. But how had he stolen her visions? And had he seen what she’d seen? Did he know what they meant?
Though she’d never been one to resort to violence, fury made her want to shove the knife into his chest. Lana took a step closer. He was vulnerable, in the throes of a vision. She paused. She couldn’t kill him now, could she? If she did, would he keep her skills? Would they die with him? Frozen in thought, she contemplated a life without the visions that seemed to complicate her world. They’d been worse lately. Before, they’d occurred every so often, on occasion, also it seemed more prevalent when she met a new person. It wasn’t something she could turn on and off at will.
Anger at his stealing her skills—though at times they seemed a curse—surged through her. How dare he? Rage flowed from her center to her fingertips and toes. It was all-consuming and unlike anything she’d ever experienced.
A sensation rose to the forefront of her consciousness. Something she’d never felt before. A swell of power completely foreign to her. She tilted her head, trying to assess what was happening.
An image appeared in her mind. A large brown bear, standing on hind legs, ursine jaws wide in a silent roar. Lana studied the image, trying to figure out what it was. She knew what it wasn’t. It definitely wasn’t a bear in the woods with them. It was—
The bear cocked its head, dropped to all fours, and took her measure. Lana, in return, took the bear’s measure as well. Massive head, wide. Rich, thick fur. Flint-colored eyes.
Flint-colored eyes?
Flint-colored eyes!
She bit back a gasp. This was Slate Youngblood’s bear. Of course, she thought. He’s a bear shifter. But why haven’t I ever seen a shifter’s animal like this before?
She scrutinized the bear, studying it. Why she could see it like this? Then something drew her. Pulled her. No, she wasn’t being pulled. She was the one doing the pulling. But how? What was this? Some sort of sorcery skills she had inherited but never been aware of? She wasn’t sure, yet the force within her pulled the bear closer and closer, until she could feel the bear’s presence within her.
Slate Youngblood flinched. His gaze cleared, no longer immersed in a visi
on. “Some–something’s wrong. Some—” He blanched. He scrubbed his face with his hands, then ran his fingers through his dark hair. The tendons in his neck stood out. “What did you do to my bear?” Panic laced his voice. “You killed my bear?”
He reached for her, took her shoulders in his massive hands—which reminded her of bear paws—and squeezed.
Lana winced and couldn’t have said what drove her to do it, but she raised the blade and put it against his chest. “Back off.”
He glared at her but dropped his hands.
Chapter Five
Slate stared at his hands. He’d never—ever—not fucking ever—raised a hand to a woman. He couldn’t have said what drove him to it. Well, yeah, he could say. This business with his bear. She’d killed it? Was that even possible? He dropped those hands of his and, instead, looked at the nick in the fabric where she’d placed the knife. Just enough of a threat to get him to do as she’d asked—to back off.
“What did you do to my bear?” He kept his voice low and controlled, through the last thing he felt was any semblance was of control.
She glared at him. Her eyes hard. Her blonde hair wild about her face. “What did you do to my skills?”
“I asked first.”
“No, actually. Before” —she cleared her throat— “before that thing with your bear, if you recall, I asked you about my skills.”
He nodded slowly, still trying to process what was going on. To process the vision of Dunn on a slab in a morgue. To process that she was a seer. And that he’d stolen her skills without actually intending to. To process that his bear was gone.
He had to get control of this situation. He had to rein it in before it became even more turbulent. Slate took a deep breath and counted to twenty so his pulse would regulate. He called out to his bear in his mind, but the only response he was rewarded with was silence. Pure silence. He tried again and again to reach the bear. And failed, again and again. The bear was definitely gone. Dead or gone? He had no idea.
Rage made him want to kill her. He’d felt that before. Not to this degree. But losing his bear was like losing a brother. And of course, that very thought put Dunn right at the forefront of his mind all over again.
“Can we talk? Civilized and such?” He tried for a charming smile. One that had worked for him countless times, but he knew he was failing in his efforts. “Please?” With a wave, he indicated a couple of large boulders that would pass for seating.
The woman gave him a look, suspicion in her eyes, her lips taut in a forbidding line. “I want my skills back.”
“I understand. And I want my bear back. He’s alive?” Slate hoped.
She nodded. “He’s alive. But really, if you can take skills, why don’t you take your bear back?”
He waved toward the boulders again. “If you please. And it doesn’t work that way. I can’t steal shifters from their humans.”
“Ever?”
“Ever.” Once they were seated—albeit, not exactly comfortably—he cleared his throat. “About your skills. You’re a seer.”
She sniffed. “I was a seer. Evidently, I’m no longer one.”
He grimaced by way of apology—sort of—because he wasn’t exactly sorry he took her skills, since they showed him Dunnigan. Notwithstanding, Dunn was not in a good place because laying in a morgue was never a good place to be. He prayed to a god he wasn’t sure he fully believed in that Dunn was simply in a deathbender stasis and not actually dead.
Her gaze was fixed on him. Then he noticed something different about her eyes. An amber flame that hadn’t been there before. Was that his bear? Did she take his bear from him? “How did you do that? Take my bear?” Was she holding his bear hostage? She had to be. His bear would never abandon him. Never.
“You took my seer skills.”
He acknowledged with a swift nod. “But you had other skills I didn’t take. Ones which weren’t apparent when I took your skills.”
She glanced down, making patterns on the boulder’s rough surface, chasing a pebble with her fingertip. Her eyes were averted for a long moment. Then another. Finally, she raised her gaze to his. Discomfort played on her features. “I didn’t know I had other skills.” She shrugged, and managed to appear vulnerable somehow, though he suspected she wasn’t even trying. “I’m not sure I’d call them skills. More like a fluke.”
Confusion rocked him. “What do you mean?”
“I didn’t know I could do that. I didn’t know I had the ability. Until—”
“You didn’t know you could take my bear?” Then it struck him. “Until what?”
She sat back, seemed to become smaller as she tucked her legs against her body and propped her chin on her knees. “Until your bear beckoned me?”
What the hell? “What do you mean, beckoned you?” Slate scowled. “Did he wave for you to come hither?” Sure, sarcasm was something he resorted to when he was pissed.
She frowned at him then scoffed. “Don’t mock me. I’m just saying, he drew me in. Or drew me closer. I’m not sure how to explain it. All I know is one minute he’s there, all fearsome and badass looking, and the next, he showed me he was your bear and came closer.”
“Came closer?” Disbelief was hard for him to conceal. Her explanation stretched the confines of his imagination. And he had a great imagination. All shifters did, else how could they wrap their minds around the fact they were shifters? And yet, this was too much, even for him. “So, this was what? In your mind?”
She rolled her eyes. It was subtle but definite. “I know. It sounds wacky, but it’s true. And of course it was in my head, but it was so…” She flailed her arms wildly. “It was so real.”
“Okay, he came closer,” Slate conceded, though he wasn’t buying the idea his bear would have initiated being held hostage. Nah, he wasn’t buying that one bit. “Then what happened? After he came closer, I mean. How did he end up with you? He is with you, clearly.” As an afterthought, he added, “And I still don’t know your name.”
“Svetlana. My friends call me Lana.”
“Lana,” he said, “about my bear—”
“I said my friends call me Lana.”
He gritted his teeth. Point taken. They weren’t friends, and he was definitely alone in this quest to find Dunn. “Apologies,” he said through clenched teeth. “Svetlana.” He uttered her name—a beautiful one, undeniably—barely concealing his ire with the situation. With her. “My bear?”
“Your bear is fine. He’s just fine. You started this,” she reminded him. “You started this by taking my skills. What the hell are you?”
He sighed. “I’m a skilljack. I take skills. How did you know my name?”
“I was in the B&B when you were talking to Griz.”
“So you don’t work for Victor Saizon? Really?”
She scowled and sat up straight, unfolding her legs and letting them dangle off the boulder. “Really. I don’t. Now, return my skills.” Her green eyes were like emeralds on ice.
“I can’t.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
Could she really see through him like that? Or was she guessing? “I want my bear back. I need my bear. Without my bear, I don’t have my bear senses.” This was true. His hearing and sight had diminished. And doubtlessly, with them, his strength had lessened as well. He could feel the loss of power his bear had brought him.
He’d been silent too long, not answering her questions. He could see it in her face.
She nodded. “So, you won’t.”
Her expression crushed a part of him that he’d been sure had no longer been vulnerable. “Please, understand.”
“What do you want me to understand?” She blew out a breath and, without waiting for him to answer, pressed on. “What did you want from Griz? Why did you run when that man, Victor Saizon, appeared?”
“I need you to understand that—” He clenched his fists and pressed them against his thighs. He started again. “My brother’s missing. Griz was supposed to help. V
ictor Saizon isn’t exactly on our side. My side. My brother’s side.” He unclenched his fists and put one of his hands on hers, where it rested on the boulder. “Your vision showed me my brother. He’s in a morgue. He—”
“I had visions of your brother. And of you. Or maybe it was just one of you,” she interjected. “He’s being chased. Or you were—are. A woman was in the visions. Two women, actually.” She exhaled, then whispered, “And I was one of those women.”
“What did—” A sudden burst of energy crushed through his next thought, replacing his words with a vision.
He clutched his head as the images surged through his brain. Images of Lana, behind a window, watching him talking to Griz, Krisztián, and Ciara. Of Victor Saizon approaching the picnic table where the three of them sat. Images of Dunnigan. Of a morgue. A dark-haired woman. Of Lana. Himself. And then finally, an image of Victor Saizon. In the scene involving Saizon, he was facing Slate and Lana. Slate squeezed his eyes tightly, concentrating on the vision. He, Lana, and Saizon were all gathered in the woods. Some woods. Somewhere.
His eyes flew open, and clarity took hold as he glanced around. “Shit.” He rose to his feet and began to pace. “Shit. Shit. Shit.”
“What is it?” she asked. “What did you see?”
“Lana.” He couldn’t call her Svetlana. It didn’t roll off his tongue the way Lana did. “Victor Saizon. I saw Saizon. Here.” He waved his hands to and fro in an indication of their surroundings. “And you and I were both here with him.”
Silent, she focused on her entwined fingers. Finally, she glanced up. “The visions don’t give a timeline. There’s no telling how far into the future that may be.”
“We’re wearing the same clothes.” He watched her to see what expressions crossed her face, but none did. “How accurate are the visions? Have you ever had a false one?” He began to pace again, his nerves getting the best of him. He needed his bear. He felt unarmed without his bear.
“Never,” she said on a breath. “Though I don’t always understand them.”