by Ava Benton
“We have to hurry. Come on.” He grabbed my arms, pulling me behind him, linking my hands around his waist.
There was no tenderness like before, back in bed when things were good, and he stroked my skin and kissed me until I melted in his arms.
That time was over.
It would never come back.
“Ready?” he didn’t wait for me to answer before racing off into the woods, so fast the world became a blur around me.
I hated it, going that fast, losing sense of reality as everything around me became a shapeless mess.
I closed my eyes instead of trying to make sense of it.
That way, with my arms around him, and my cheek pressed to his back, I could pretend everything was all right.
17
Alexander
I slowed down to get my bearings when we were deep in the woods, past the cabin we stayed in that first night. Back when I cared about whether she’d wake up from the bear attack.
How could I have cared like that?
She used me.
Her sister wanted to kill me and the rest of us, and she was going to let that happen because it was who she was. A Tracker by blood.
No creature could forget who they were, or take off their identity like a piece of clothing.
“Are we on the right track?” I asked over my shoulder.
She was still there, holding on as tight as ever.
“Yes. According to the location she gave me, the entrance is at the other end of the chain of mountains The Fold exists in. He was so close, but we never knew it.”
“I don’t know why they didn’t keep him there all along. It makes sense, having him so close to his kind. Come on.” I took us back to where we started, where she had found Claudia and me.
The sky was starting to lighten by then, and the birds were waking up. Their early-morning chatter was nearly deafening.
All I saw in the distance was trees, and more trees, lining the sides of the mountains as they stretched out in front of us. It was almost beautiful.
“This is where we first met,” Daniela said, loosening her grip. “Can we please rest for a minute. It’s not easy, traveling like that when I’m not used to it.”
“As long as you don’t slow us down.”
“Please, stop with that. I can’t stand it.” She sat on her backpack, head in her hands. “I don’t even have the energy to banter with you right now.”
“Sorry if I tired you out,” I growled.
“Why are you doing this? Why won’t you let yourself believe I really care for you?”
“Why do you insist on bringing that up right now? This isn’t the time.”
“When, then? What if I die in that mine, or if you do? There’s no other time to explain things.”
“It’s a waste of time. We should be on our way.”
“Just another minute. Please. I feel sick and dizzy.” She put her head between her knees.
I wanted to move on without her.
I wanted to stroke her back and tell her it would be all right.
I curled my hands into fists and turned away.
She had destroyed me. It didn’t matter if I died in the mine, because I was already dead in all the ways that mattered.
“You know you’ll come out of this all right,” I muttered, looking out over the landscape while I waited for her. “Don’t even talk about dying down there. They won’t let that happen.”
She laughed bitterly. “I don’t think you understand. I’m a traitor. How many times do I have to explain it before you get it? I wasn’t pretending. You changed my heart. I want you to know that, no matter what happens.”
What I hated most was the way I wanted to believe her. Even worse than no longer being able to trust myself was wanting her to be telling the truth.
I remembered what Claudia said about me being in love. I wished she had never planted the idea in my head—no matter how much a seed was ignored, it could grow. It didn’t always need tending.
That was my stupid, careless fault. Falling in love with a witch whose entire purpose in life was to kill me and guard my charge in my place.
If I had spent the last century in stasis dreaming up the worst possible scenario, the most hellish situation, I couldn’t have come up with anything as twisted.
“Come on. We’re losing time.” I helped her up and slung an arm around her slim waist.
As told myself not to think about the way she felt under her clothes as I took off up the mountain. It would be easier to travel higher up to get a better look around us.
She said the entrance to the mine was on the other side of the mountain chain we’d started off at the base of. If I got lucky, I could outrun my twisted thoughts along the way.
The sun was low in the sky when we reached the fair side of the peaks, and I climbed down with care. The face of the last mountain in the range was nearly shear, like a giant had come along and sliced the end off.
I looked down, gauging how long the drop would be.
“What will we do?” she asked, still clinging to my side.
“I’ll climb down. Don’t you know how agile we are? You’re supposed to know so much about vampires.”
She only sighed, when usually she would’ve fired back a sharp, sarcastic retort.
Had she changed that much toward me?
“On my back,” I grunted, ignoring the way she pulled at my thoughts.
She mounted me from behind, arms around my chest, legs around my waist. I ignored that, too, or tried to ignore it even as my body responded in ways which most definitely would not help me in my climb.
I crouched, fingers hooked into the rocks at my feet, and started the descent. Even as I concentrated on finding footholds, I couldn’t ignore the rapid heartbeat against my back or the way her shallow, panicked breath hit my neck.
“There’s nothing to be afraid of,” I called out.
“Except every bone in my body breaking when I hit the ground,” she laughed. At least she could still laugh.
“You won’t fall if you don’t let go. I won’t let us fall.”
Even so, the rock was slick with early-morning dew and it took all my focus to keep us clinging to it. Once we were close enough to the ground that I could see the trees, I let go without announcing my plan. She screamed, clutching me so tight I could’ve sworn she would crack my spine, and the scream echoed through the trees as I landed in a crouch on the soft forest floor.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” she shrieked, untangling herself and shoving me away before lurching behind a tree.
The sound of her strangled retching met my ears.
“I’m sorry,” I said, though I didn’t feel it. “I wanted to hurry. A controlled fall was smarter than accidentally losing my grip on the rock.”
She straightened up and wiped her mouth with the back of one hand. “I hate you for that.”
“Good. Keep that in mind.” I looked around for clues to the entrance. “Did Gwyneth tell you anything about how to get into this mine?”
“If it’s an actual mine, I’m sure there will be a marked entrance somewhere. It’s not a secret.” There was the sarcasm I had missed.
“But it may be overgrown by now,” I snapped. “Can you… I don’t know… reach out in your mind and find it?”
“You have a high opinion of my powers,” she muttered. “Come on. We have to look for it. There’s bound to be a road or something like it leading to the entrance—even if it’s overgrown, we should still be able to find it if we look closely.”
She climbed over a fallen tree, leaving me behind. So, she wanted to take the lead. I would let her.
After all, I had other things to concern myself with. “What about sensing your Trackers? If they’re here, guarding the place, you should be able to feel their presence.”
She sighed. “Right. I didn’t think about that.”
I stopped short of crashing into her as she froze and closed her eyes. It was an excuse to look at
her without her knowing, and I watched closely as her head turned from side to side. The sunlight played off her delicate features and turned her hair to gold.
“I feel them,” she murmured, barely moving her full lips.
I licked my own, remembering the taste of her. The way her mouth moved beneath mine, the way she sighed and moaned when my tongue slid over their plump sweetness.
“Where?” I choked out, pushing desire aside.
“Follow me.” She took off in the direction we’d started in, but with much more determination than before. She needed no help managing the rocky terrain—of course, I reminded myself, because she was a Tracker. None of this was really new to her. She had been following Claudia for weeks over similar ground.
After covering a mile, maybe two, she held up a hand and froze in place.
I listened hard and heard what she sensed: the presence of witches. My hackles immediately went up.
These were no ordinary witches.
“They’re here,” she whispered, though she didn’t need to.
“Can you tell how many?”
“There were only a handful of us out here—the rest are guarding witches further north. I imagine Gwyneth went to the motel on her own. That’s her style. There would be another four here, then. Two outside, two inside.”
“You’re sure?”
“Of course, I’m not sure,” she hissed. “But it makes the most sense, doesn’t it? She had to know we would arrive before her.”
“I don’t particularly enjoy the idea of a spell thrown at my back when I’m unaware,” I snarled in reply.
She looked above us, eyes darting back and forth. “Can you climb trees?”
“I just scaled a mountain face.”
“A simple ‘yes’ would’ve been fine.” She pointed up. “Get up there, then. Watch me. They won’t know you’re up there.”
“You won’t give me away?”
“Why the hell would I do that?” She shook her head, looking away. “You’re impossible.”
I used my claws to start climbing and didn’t stop until I was well above her, at least thirty feet in the air. And once I was, I had a clear image of where the witches waited.
She was right—there were two of them down there, guarding the entrance to the mine. There weren’t any signs except one which warned trespassers against entering.
Both were dressed similarly to Daniela, and both looked ready for a fight when she approached.
“What are you doing here alone?” one of them asked. A dark-skinned girl with big, angry eyes and a ready scowl.
“Since when do you challenge me like that, Mia?” Daniela slowed down, taking one careful step at a time.
“Since you betrayed everything we stand for, Daniela.”
“Think for yourself for once.” She turned her attention to the other one, a small redheaded girl who looked like she belonged in a schoolyard.
Something told me not to underestimate her or any of them, no matter how young they looked.
She nodded to the redhead. “What about you? You feel the same way?”
“Of course. I didn’t betray us. You did. I remember who I am and why I’m here.”
“I’m sorry. And I’m sorry for you both. You don’t need to hate me. You don’t need to hate anybody.”
“We don’t hate you,” Mia sneered. “We feel sorry for you, just like we feel sorry for your Nightwarden and all the others.”
“Which is why we’re ending it here. For good.” The redhead placed her hands on her hips. “You can try to stop us, but it won’t do any good.”
“You don’t have to do this. Any of it.” A note of pleading crept into Daniela’s voice. “Please. Listen to me.”
“We don’t have to listen to you ever again.”
She looked from one of them to the other. “Fine. If that’s the way you want it.”
She threw up both hands, each pointed at one of the witches, and bolts of red light flew from her palms and struck them.
They collapsed.
She examined them both before looking up at me, shielding her eyes against the sun. “You can come down.”
“What did you do to them?” I asked as I touched the ground.
“They’ll be unconscious for a while. They won’t remember anything that just happened. It’ll be like waking from a deep sleep.” She picked up the redhead and threw her over her shoulder. “Grab the other one. We have to move them out of the way, and I don’t want to leave them exposed to the elements.”
“Why do you still care about them?” I asked as we carried the girls inside.
Just like that, all light disappeared. I had never known such darkness.
“Why wouldn’t I? It’s not their fault they believe what they believe. They don’t know you or any other Nightwarden. They’ve never…”
She trailed off, and I didn’t press the matter. I knew what she meant.
We found a small alcove cut into the rock and left the witches inside.
“Sorry,” Daniela whispered before we walked away.
I heard real regret, too. It wasn’t easy for her to do what she did, even when she believed she was in the right.
“Can you see?” she whispered, running her hand along the wall as we made our way through the tunnel.
“I don’t need much light to see by,” I replied.
“It’s a shame you can’t be the one leading the way, then. I’m having trouble, and I don’t dare create a torch to see by.”
“I’ll go first, then, and you can direct me.”
She was the one who could find her kin by feeling for them.
The tunnel was narrow. Moving in front of her meant our bodies brushing against each other, and I wished I didn’t leap to reaction, but I couldn’t control what she sparked in me even when the stakes were so high. So nconvenient, being at the mercy of my baser needs.
She placed a hand on my shoulder. “Straight ahead.” I
walked slowly, arms extended on both sides to keep her from hitting jagged bits of rock or the wooden frame which supported the tunnel walls and ceiling.
I wondered how old those beams were, how long they could support the weight of all that rock bearing down on them. We walked in silence, with only the trickling of water and the occasional creak of a beam echoing through the dark.
She shivered. “I don’t like this.”
“No? This is a dream come true for me.”
“Shut up,” she hissed, but there was an edge of laughter in her voice. “All right. Coming up soon, you’ll make a right. There… there should be another tunnel which extends off this one, and they’re at the end of it.”
“You’re sure?” We hadn’t been walking for very long.
“It’s a very long tunnel, leading into the heart of the mountain. He’s there. Don’t you feel it?”
I did feel it.
Ralf was near. He was in stasis, but he was near.
“He’s in stasis,” I murmured.
“How can you tell?”
“You have your ways, I have mine. His presence is… there, but not there. His body is here. His mind is somewhere else.”
“Oh, no,” she whispered. “What if Claudia had imprinted on him to wake him?”
“I’m not even sure she could,” I mused. “Not when she had already imprinted on me, and I still lived. Even though she released me, we would still have the blood bond.”
“She released you.” Her hand left my shoulder. “You didn’t tell me that.”
I stopped, hanging my head with a heavy sigh. “No. I didn’t tell you. I thought at the time that it was better for you not to know. So you couldn’t leave me behind.”
“Damn your lying soul.”
“It’s a little late for that. I was damned a long time ago. Come on.”
I waited for her to touch my shoulder again before continuing. I waited quite a while.
“How do you see this ending?” she murmured. “Be honest, please. How do you see us coming ou
t of this?”
“I don’t see us coming out of this. Not both of us, and not together.”
The words weighed heavy on me, and I didn’t take pleasure in saying them, but it was the truth.
There was no way for us to be together, and I doubted I would make it out alive between the Trackers—especially Gwyneth—and the High Council.
If Claudia tried anything outside their laws, they would show up and take her with them. And they might decide to punish me somehow for being part of her plan.
It didn’t matter that I hardly asked for her to wake me. I doubted somehow that the Council would care about small details.
“You’re not a very positive person, are you?”
“You can ask me that question with a straight face?”
“You can’t see my face.”
“I can tell by the sound of your voice that you’re sincere in asking. My answer doesn’t change. I don’t see this ending well.”
“Then by all means, let’s hurry up and get on with it.” Her voice was like the rock bearing down on the wooden beams.
Only it bore down on me.
18
Daniela
It was good that I had him to guide me through the tunnel, since my tears didn’t help me see any better. I did everything possible to cry without a sound, but he had that super hearing of his so I knew he could make out the sound of my pathetic sniveling.
At least he had the grace to keep quiet about it.
He was right, which made the whole thing even worse. There wasn’t a way for us. we were doomed. And even if we both lived, there wasn’t a future where we’d both be happy. Definitely not together.
We were taking a slow, dark walk to our doom, but there was no way we could turn back. That would mean death for him, too.
“They’re close,” I said after a long time. “The spells around the mine are thick, but I can still feel them.”
“Same with Ralf,” he muttered. “They did a good job hiding him, but not good enough.”
“Don’t pretend you would’ve found him if it weren’t for me, or my sister.”
“I wouldn’t need to find him if it weren’t for witches like you and Claudia and your sister.”