CHAPTER 12

Nika

I tensed, body growingimpossibly stiff with the oncoming attack, but the wolf's shape distorted from wolf to man, strobing in front of me like flashes of a memory. Each strobed flicker put my attacker closer and closer to the ground, morphing him slowly from wolf to man with each flash.

Then a tall, completely naked man stood in front of me, not moving and silent. My enemy's strong form was riddled with scars and tattoos. The same symbol I'd seen on Silas when he changed his shirt was inked onto this strange man's pec. Everywhere I looked he was shaped with powerful muscle, but none of it moved. His red eyes were pinned to mine, his mouth lax, his shoulders slumped, and the dark curls around his head a tangled mess. But he didn't move.

I wasn't sure what to make out of this odd turn of events, and I stood in paralyzed shock for a few seconds. When I finally got my head together, it was then that I realized the man standing in front of me was the same wolf we'd been fighting.

This was Bear Claw.

Time seemed to have completely stopped in this weird stolen window. Was it a vision? Was it a memory? Was it a fabrication? None of it made sense.

Dark Fae powers could take many forms. Time abilities were among the strongest and most formidable. Fae were rarely born with them, and the ones who survived when their power was awakened even rarer. It would, however, explain the memory my father left for me. Perhaps the Dark Fae council's fears were because I could control time, though it wasn't clear why they hadn't just let me use them and die. The likelihood of me dying was greater than me surviving with that sort of power.

Time Corrupters, as we liked to call those who could manipulate time and space, rarely survived after using their power the first few times. Ironically, most were overcome by the corruption of space and time and its effect on their bodies. Controlling a power like that was difficult, and any misstep could mean they were split into different times and spaces, effectively severing their bodies and ending their lives, much like the danger with transportation powers—the risk of splitting into pieces in several places.

Unfortunately, the greater the power, the deadlier it was for both the person who wielded it and the one they fought against.

I was curious if time corruption was the power the necklace unbound. It was the only logical theory that made sense. I wasn't aware of any others that could pause the world. Since there were so few Time Corrupters still living, the literature on their gifts was severely limited. Most weren't sure how the power worked, and the ones who were kept those secrets to themselves.

I glanced over my shoulder at my frozen companion, his head mid-turn and eyes wide with terror. The fear in the look was genuinely confounding for a man I'd just met. If I hadn't seen it for myself, I wouldn't have believed someone like Silas, a trained assassin, might be afraid I'd be killed. Sure, the Fae seemed attracted to me and convinced it was fate, but he'd seen enough death that losing someone like me wouldn't be all that surprising. So why now? Why did he look like he was worried Bear Claw might succeed in killing me?

The whispers in my head, the chorus of the unintelligible, continued as I offered our enemy another onceover, unable to comprehend what was truly occurring here. But as the seconds ticked on and we stayed frozen together in this odd step out of reality and time, at the mercy of a power I hadn't any clue how to control, Bear Claw's skin paled to a ghostly white from its original mocha brown.

Visible icicles grew across his skin everywhere I looked, sparkling in the moonlight as I walked a small circle around the unmoving man. His pupils were thinned to tiny pinpoints and the red of his eyes dimmed, losing their vibrant color the longer we were stuck in this weird, paused event.

Several thin strings of white but translucent smoke escaped my frozen enemy's open mouth, taking a visible circle around the man—the path I'd walked before coming to a stop in front of him. The eerie smoke strings were the only thing that moved outside of me. They coiled through the air slowly between us before fleeing towards my chest.

My eyes dropped to the necklace I wore, and I was surprised to find its blue glow returned—the same glow as the one that'd first awoken my power.

Inside my head, the whispers grew as the man in front of me continued to be bled of both the color in his eyes and flesh. The second the last drop of red disappeared from his irises, his once-brown form now covered from head to toe in ice and the color of fresh snow, the world moved again.

Bear Claw stood frozen in front of me, his dead eyes and frozen body the way they'd been in my unintentional step into a space where time didn't move. I stared wide-eyed at our enemy before realizing that the whispers were gone and my necklace no longer glowed.

Silas cut through the silence, his deep baritone audibly stricken by the sight. "You can't be..."

I looked over as the mercenary came to stand beside me, his mask off again and his golden eyes returned. His shimmery gaze took in the state of Bear Claw left standing immobile in front of us, pale as death and no longer a threat.

"What is this? What just happened?" I demanded, the thrum of my anxious pulse in my ears. "What kind of power does this to someone?"

Stealing someone's life like this wasn't time corruption. It wasn't anything I'd ever seen or heard about. Worse, this sort of devastating power was the darkest of the Dark—one that could end a life before the person was ever given the chance to fight back. It wasn't a power I wanted, and it spread through my chest like a curse.

My heart punished my ribs as I stared at the dead man, knowing it was my power that did this. A fear unlike any I'd ever felt in a lifetime of torture ate away at my insides, destroying my usual calm and collected demeanor.

It was impossible for it not to.

Silas, a man who'd probably seen a whole world of shit, was spooked by whatever this power was. The reality of what that meant was debilitating. It meant that maybe what had been foretold was true. Maybe this power of mine was destined for darkness. I was the Marked, the Scorned, the Foretold, and I never once considered it might all be true until this moment.

Silas's eyes dropped to the necklace around my neck before they did a quick pan of the area around us, the tension in his body painfully clear. "Not here. It's not safe out in the open and..." His golden eyes returned to the frozen man. "I don't want anyone to know it was you, love."

"What is this power, Silas? Tell me," I demanded angrily.

Jaw clenching, Silas shook his head and dug something out of his pocket. His magic hummed and cracked around the item in his hand, his other securely wrapped around mine, then a vortex of tipsy-turvy sensation stole us away from the place I'd killed a man with a power I didn't understand.

Only minutes afterarriving in a dark place that oddly looked like any other old human motel room, Silas closed the blinds, locked the door, and paced the space twice-over to check different places in the room for little hidey holes he'd stored weapons.

Another safe house was my guess with how many secretly stored weapons were hidden throughout this ordinary-looking room. And though I could hear the steady hum of a city nearby, it seemed isolated enough not to be noticed by many.

After retrieving a few weapons and bags of money, Silas's blue magic swiftly fled him and webbed over the door and window, constructing a translucent barrier quicker than anyone I'd ever met. With a snap of his fingers, the vibrant blue barrier clung to both the door and window's shape then disappeared from sight.

"Trap door is in the closet over there. It'll get us out in a pinch," the Fae murmured to me, passing where I stood again. Frozen to the spot, I watched the mercenary pull a few weapons out of a bag he'd retrieved. He placed a couple on the bedside table—a gun, two enchanted daggers by the looks of it, and a handful of smoke bombs.

Magic wasn't limitless. It was safer to save it for attacks that would have the greatest impact and use other weapons and skills before ever relying on one's magic. Though, Dark Fae magic was considerably stronger than Light Fae magic in most cases. The darker the magic, the more powerful it was, but always at a cost.

Without substantial control, the cost could be death.

It was clear that whatever I'd done earlier took its toll on my body. The echo in my chest and weakness in my limbs despite my determination to stand strong were only a couple things I noticed right away. Should I learn how to control and manage it effectively, I'd be able to use it better with less side-effect. Silas, for example, didn't seem at all winded or weakened by his power use. Granted, he'd only used what one could argue was a small amount for his skill and power.

It really varied based on what power was being used, and something told me that Silas had very good control over his. Still, he only seemed to use his magic with powerful foes. The mercenary hadn't disclosed what he could or couldn't do. Some Fae had a large number of abilities while others only had a couple. From what I'd seen, he could use both defensive and offensive magic, construct barriers, and locate nearby targets. But my unrecognizable power was more concerning at the moment, and I'd worry about his later.

Standing there as the mercenary went about securing the location, I didn't have time to complain about there only being one bed and no sofa, knowing we'd be bedmates again. Even I wasn't heartless enough to make the oaf sleep on the floor. But I couldn't complain when the intense look on Silas's face wasn't one I'd ever seen.

He seemed genuinely worried.

"Are you going to tell me what that was, or do I have to beat it out of you?" I demanded when he finally dropped onto the bed, eyes focused ahead on nothing in particular.

As if my question snapped him out of it, the large mercenary raked a hand through his silver hair and then patted the seat next to him. "Come here, love."

I slowly made my way over, uncomfortable with the tone of his voice. Like someone ready to tell you the worst news of your life. But I kept my chin up and my wits about me.

I'd already suspected with all the chatter and secrecy that surrounded my power it wasn't going to be pretty. I expected it to be damning the minute I finally understood what this entire fucking week had been about. I didn't have any misconceptions about why my father went to such alarmingly unorthodox lengths to start a war with the Dark Fae Council.

I'd at one time wondered why he chose to do it this way and not together, but Father was always a little weird when it came to doing something. It wasn't clear where he'd gone or why, but if the power living inside me was one the entire Dark Fae Council feared, then what my father pulled off seemed necessary. All his talk about fate and telling Silas, a total stranger, decades ago he'd be the one to save me made me wonder if Father knew more than I did about how this all would play out—if someone near to him had a vision and foresaw this coming.

One thing I was confident about was that my father didn't have visions. I wasn't sure if my mother did, though. He hadn't talked about her powers or her family much. I'd heard my grandmother's name mentioned once before, but the air around any conversation dealing with my grandmother was always uncomfortably tense. What I did gather was she'd done something unforgiveable. Something bad enough to blacken my mother's family name.

But I was more curious about my father's assertion that Silas would save me. What was so significant about Silas and I meeting? Why did it feel like two magnets being drawn together whenever I was around the man?

I was surprised when Silas brazenly took my hands in his, but even more so when I didn't punish him for it. The sincerity in his eyes stopped me. "Look, I'm not certain, but I have a pretty good idea what it is your father was protecting you against. I know someone who can help us confirm it and give a little more insight. You'll have to trust me, and I hope I've given you plenty of reason to put your faith in me after all of this," he entreated softly, the low whisper of his voice settling inside my chest in a deep, reverberating pang.

Moistening my lips and not missing how the other Fae's eyes dropped to watch, I looked down at our joined hands and smirked. "I haven't smacked away your hands if you hadn't noticed..."

His eyes sparkled with childlike glee, reminding me oddly of Lev. "Oh, aye. I noticed. Not that I mind the beating either."

My lips twitched as I tried not to laugh, but it bubbled in my chest, and I smiled against my will. "What I mean is, I don't know why my father thought you'd save me or why it feels like fate..." I swallowed, hating the word myself, "but what I did back there scared me, too."

Our eyes met, and his jaw clenched, the muscles in his face and neck moving with agitation. My voice dropped out, the tension between us charged with the same air as what was in that tunnel when I'd given into lust and desire. But I needed to know what the other Fae knew, and I'd ignore it like I had every other damn sexy look the mercenary gave me.

"Don't treat me like a child. I need to know what it is you know even if it's damning. Even if it's a death sentence. Even if it'll change the way I feel about myself." I landed a narrow stare on him, body tensing. "Even if it's the worst thing I could ever be, I need to know it."