Chapter 9

NINE

Most embarrassing moment of my life, bar none.

“Raine?” The deep, familiar voice rumbled from a broad, solid chest that bunched and rippled beneath my fingers.

Yep, I was laying full length on top of the wide-eyed king of the shifters, who released my arm and rose on his elbows to look me in the eye, his face only inches from mine.

It took at least three breaths to recover from my shock and roll away from him. Another few seconds of shutting my eyes and cringing in horror before I felt sufficiently recovered to struggle to my feet. Brush off my clothes. Paste a perfectly normal expression on my face and turn to look at the man who had so recently offered me a job.

“What are you doing down here?” He was already in full glare mode, somehow re-clothed in that same t-shirt and jeans, and still not wearing any shoes. “You were supposed to stay safe on the roof.”

“Do you even hear yourself?” I muttered, still suffering from a serious humiliation hangover. “Safe? On a roof? Most of us don’t have wings. We can’t just fly down to safety if someone attacks.”

He digested that for a moment. “I told you to stay because I was coming right back.”

“Oh, and I was supposed to get all that from you pointing emphatically?”

I should mention it was a known weakness of my personality that helplessness or embarrassment made me belligerent enough to argue with people who could kill me. It was a big part of how I survived captivity. But back then I’d had a certain amount of immunity—I’d known that no matter how annoying I was, they weren’t going to end my life. I was too valuable.

Callum-ro-Deverin might be a completely different story.

His mouth opened again. He took a step towards me, and then stopped.

“You’re right.” He glowered at the ground for a moment before shaking his head. “I’m sorry.”

I almost fell over. That was the second time.

And I was about to conclude that there was nothing sexier than a man who knew how to apologize when he turned from his contemplation of me to push through the double doors into his newly renovated space.

It was fortunate that the construction crews had already left for the day, because the stench of smoke and plaster dust filled the air, mitigated only by the water that was pouring from a pair of sprinkler heads in the ceiling.

Glass littered the floor, from fallen light fixtures that had shattered on impact. Strangely, unlike the top floor, the ground-floor windows were completely intact, and I wondered what we would find on the intervening levels.

Had our attackers known where we were? Intended the blown out windows specifically to frighten or injure us enough that we couldn’t pursue them?

Callum swore fiercely under his breath and started across the wet floor, murder in his eyes, and some instinct led me to reach out before he stepped on a pile of glass shards.

“Don’t!” I tugged at the back of his shirt, but it was like trying to stop a freight train with a feather duster. He just kept going, oblivious to the trail of blood he left behind as he crossed beneath the useless spray from the sprinklers to approach the eastern wall of the main floor.

It had been freshly textured and painted in light gray, a bright note against the dark wood and steel accents. But now it was covered in words, the letters two feet high, scorched into the wall as if with a monster blow-torch.

DEATH TO THE TRAITOR’S

END THE SYMPOSIUM OR DIE

THE HUMAN’S WILL KNEEL BEFORE THERE RIGHTFUL RULERS

IDRIAS POWER WILL RISE AGAIN AND THOSE WHO STAND IN HER WAY WILL BURN!

Melodramatic much? And right out in the open, where anyone walking by could see the message through the windows?

Someone was indeed threatened by this Symposium, and they were willing to risk war with the humans in order to stop it. Or maybe war with the humans was what they were hoping for?

Callum just stood there, staring at the words, arms folded, water dripping down his face as his jaw turned to granite and the veins on his forehead seemed to pulse with fury. Power gathered in the air, growing stronger and heavier with every breath.

I couldn’t even have said what impulse drove me to open my mouth. Only that I was becoming increasingly unsure of how he was going to respond, and I needed to say something to break the tension.

“At least we know we weren’t attacked by a high school English teacher.”

It worked… Well, partially. The dragon stopped staring at the wall as if he could burn it down with the power of his gaze, but then he was staring at me instead, as if he couldn’t believe he’d heard me correctly.

Oh right. Kira had warned me. The king of the shifters had no discernible sense of humor.

“This wasn’t the work of an individual, but a group. The attack required—at minimum—three different elementals working in tandem. Fire to burn the letters, air to blow out the windows with precision, and earth to create the localized quake.” His voice was flat and clipped—almost robotic—but beneath it was a towering rage. “It took time to write this message. The fact that no one outside raised an alarm means a siren may have been involved as well.”

A siren? I hadn’t heard of those before. Part of me wanted to ask what a siren was and what they could do, but this was clearly not the right moment for idle curiosity.

“And did you discover anything else while you were flitting around out there?”

That one won me a sarcastic side-eye.

“The complete lack of any suspects or evidence in the vicinity,” he bit out. “Which might also mean fae rather than siren. It’s possible they somehow glamoured either themselves or the building.”

A chill shook me as I considered that a glamoured fae enemy could be literally anywhere. Could easily be someone I knew. Someone who knew me.

“Anything else?”

“It smells wrong.” He shook his head in evident frustration. “All of it. Something isn’t right and I can’t tell what.” Then he turned to me with an almost accusatory gaze. “Which you might have been able to sense for yourself if you were willing to embrace the fact that you’re a shapeshifter.”

He wasn’t going to let this go.

“I told you, I’ve chosen not to use any magic. I don’t want it.”

“Wanting has nothing to do with it! You act like it’s something you can change, like your name or your hair color, but it’s not. It’s who you are.”

I was so tired of this fight. So tired of battling the magic within myself, in addition to the reality that no one else would ever understand.

“It doesn’t have to be who I am,” I said fiercely. “I can choose not to let it change me.”

“ Change you?” he echoed incredulously. “It is you. I don’t know what you were taught by the humans who raised you, but magic is not wrong or unnatural. You can’t make it go away by denying that you have it.”

I could try. I didn’t know what else to do. Had no other way to grapple with the guilt that I lived with every minute, every hour of every day that I survived.

“And what about when it can save lives?” he demanded. “You say you hate bullies, and you’ve used your power instinctively twice, both times in defense of those weaker than you. So why not embrace that? Why not choose to use it to fight back against those who hurt others?”

His words hit me like a physical blow.

Because in some ways, he was so very wrong—my magic was unnatural. I shouldn’t be able to do magic at all.

But he was also right. I’d used my magic not because it gave me an advantage, but because someone had needed to stand up to a bully. To confront someone who chose to pick on those weaker than themselves.

I’d always rejected this power because I felt somehow complicit in its possession. Because I refused to benefit from someone else’s pain and suffering.

But I couldn’t change the past. Couldn’t undo the events that led to this moment.

Wouldn’t it be a better memorial to those who’d suffered if I used this power to prevent anything like this from ever happening again? If I learned to wield it properly, not for my own gain, but to protect others like me, like Logan, and like Ari. Like everyone else we’d known who hadn’t been as lucky.

If Callum was telling the truth about the Symposium and its purpose, fate had handed me an opportunity to do just that. Was it possible that it might actually be more wrong to reject this opportunity? To turn my back on it and walk away?

I would still be walking a deadly tightrope if I chose to do this. And once I made the choice, there would be no backing out. No backing down. I would be committed to a pretense that could eventually cost me everything.

I wasn’t really the type to quit, anyway.

“Okay, I get it.” I shut my eyes and hoped desperately I was doing the right thing. Prayed silently that Callum couldn’t see the evidence of my struggle or its outcome written all over my face. “Maybe you’re right. But can we talk about my magic later? You’re bleeding all over the floor. And…” I took a deep breath. “If I’m going to be your bodyguard, I believe it’s my job to tell you when you’re being stupid.”

It was almost worth it just to see the shock painted across his face. But the surprise vanished almost immediately, giving way to a brief flare of satisfaction, followed by a narrowing gaze that pinned me once again beneath that deadly, raptor focus.

“So you’re agreeing to take the job?”

I grimaced. “I… Yes. I guess I am. But how about we figure out who attacked us first and deal with the details later?”

One of his eyebrows shot up, and I was surprised to see the faintest glimmer of humor lurking in his expression. Perhaps Kira hadn’t been entirely right about him.

“If I have somehow given you the impression that accepting this position allows you to tell me what to do…”

One of the two large windows to the west shattered. Glass showered the floor as a dark shape loomed in the shadows outside, its face obscured despite the bright blue glow that sparked between its hands—a ball of pure, malevolent fae magic.

It happened so fast, I couldn’t recall making a conscious choice to act. I was already moving, shoving past Callum’s bulky form. Part of my mind reached for that blue glow out of habit, but another power leaped into my hands with such ease that I instantly took it up instead—as if giving myself permission to embrace my magic had drawn it out and allowed it to spread its wings.

The water from the sprinkler was flowing all around me, raining through the air and puddling on the ground, so I swept it all together in a single swift motion. It was so much easier this time, like breathing or laughing or simply opening my eyes to greet the sun.

The fae magic hurtled towards me. Towards Callum. It probably wouldn’t kill him, but in his human form, I knew it could hurt him, so I didn’t stop.

“Raine!” On Callum’s lips, my name was an urgent cry, almost a warning, but I felt no fear. I held water between my hands, and it was mine to do with as I pleased.

And what I pleased was to turn it into a shield of solid ice.

The crackling ball of magic impacted with a hiss and went out.

A wild grin tugged at my lips. I turned back towards Callum and suddenly realized why he’d called out. Not because he was worried about the fae…

It was a warning that we were surrounded.

Callum was pinned between a lion and a wolf, both stalking across the floor towards him from opposite sides. But where could they have been hiding? And why hadn’t Callum sensed them?

They were clearly shifters—half again the size of their mundane animal counterparts. The lion was probably five feet at the shoulder, and the wolf looked as if it might easily top two hundred pounds, all of it muscle, sheathed in dark, shaggy fur.

And Callum was trapped in a place where he couldn’t shift without bringing this building down on top of us. He was going to have to fight as he was, in his human form, without shoes, on a floor covered in water and broken glass.

Another flare of fae magic flew towards me. I blocked it again, but the ice was already melting beneath the pressure of all that crackling energy. My shield wouldn’t last forever, so I needed to act.

I looked back at Callum. He stood tall and poised as the two shapeshifters approached, crouched low, teeth bared, ears flat, threatening growls rumbling from their chests.

There was no way he could fight both of them. No way he could survive those teeth and claws. I was going to have to do something to help.

I whirled back towards the dark figure in the window, just as it tried to climb in over the tall wooden sill—seeing a weakness and hoping to take advantage.

Pure fury shot from my core to my fingertips, and almost without conscious thought, I flicked both wrists outward.

The block of ice hurtled through the window like a battering ram and struck the fae squarely in the chest. Threw him right into the middle of Oklahoma Avenue, where he hit with an audible thud, rolled twice, and narrowly avoided being hit by a pickup truck full of frat boys.

I heard a blaring horn, a chorus of expletives, and squealing tires, then saw a lump of clothes lying in the street, but I couldn’t spare the time to investigate.

An inhuman roar split the air, shooting straight through my head like a dagger and dropping me to my knees with the pain.

Somehow, I knew it was Callum. I whipped around with clenched teeth, expecting to see him buried beneath a thousand pounds of fur and fangs and claws.

My jaw dropped.

Callum remained standing, but the wolf lay on the ground, its belly exposed. It appeared completely untouched and its eyes were open, but it had also gone utterly limp—as if it were either unconscious or too terrified to move.

I hadn’t really stopped to think about what Callum’s role would signify to other shifters. Maybe part of me had assumed “King of the Shapeshifters” was a courtesy title, and Callum was little more than a figurehead.

But I would never make that mistake again.

Physically, he appeared the same, and yet, his presence had somehow grown to fill the space, emanating such a powerful sense of threat that I nearly bowed my head. His eyes glowed so brightly, I almost couldn’t stare directly at them. It was a struggle not to drop to the floor—to make myself smaller in hopes that he wouldn’t notice me.

Unlike the wolf, the lion kept coming, but it was more cautious now. Less sure of itself.

And when it sprang, Callum moved forward to meet it.

They called him demanding, responsible, and controlling, but no one who watched him fight could doubt that he applied those characteristics to himself first. He was almost too fast for the eye to follow, blending perfect economy of motion with iron self-control—fluid, impossibly strong, and utterly mesmerizing.

Callum-ro-Deverin was a weapon, and he used his shifter speed and strength to slip beneath the airborne lion and catch one of its hind legs between his hands.

The other leg flailed, digging bloody furrows across Callum’s chest, but he shrugged them off, his shoulders bulging with the effort of maintaining his grip. An instant later, his whole body twisted to the left. The lion’s leg turned sideways, and it screamed, contorting in midair to swipe at Callum’s face with its front claws extended.

But Callum’s body continued to turn, and when he’d completed a full rotation, he let go. The lion flew across the room, hitting the wall with a ground-shaking thud.

I had to remember how to breathe.

“Are you finished?” Callum growled, his voice still hovering in that subterranean range that was more dragon than man.

The lion snarled and lurched drunkenly to its feet.

The king of the shifters snarled in answer. He crossed the floor in long, fluid strides and hammered a punch into the side of the lion’s jaw.

It staggered, and Callum hit it with his blazing amber stare. “Stay down!” he commanded, and the lion collapsed.

I was still not quite coherent when he turned away from the broken shifter and stalked towards me, past the still-motionless wolf, to stare intently into my face from those incandescent eyes.

“Where is it? Where is the fae?”

I pointed at the window. At the block of ice still sitting in the middle of the street outside.

Before I could tell him what had happened, Callum was already running. Heedless of the broken glass, he raced across the floor, somehow without slipping, and leaped straight through the broken window, landing on the sidewalk outside.

But the fae was already gone.

He’d been lying unconscious in the street one minute, and the next vanished, as if he’d blinked out of existence.

I moved to the window in a daze and watched as Callum walked into the road, his feet leaving bloody prints with each step. He bent down and picked something up. Hefted it in his palm. Swore viciously.

“Callum!”

Kira’s horrified voice penetrated the adrenaline-fueled haze that still held me in its grip.

I saw her racing towards us from the direction of The Portal, but it was as if she were moving in slow motion. Then I registered dark wings arrowing out of the sky as Draven joined her, followed by Faris’s bearded bulk appearing behind them.

But Callum turned back to me, his gaze filled with questions.

What happened?

Are you all right?

Did he hurt you?

That last one was probably no more than wishful thinking. And in light of the uncomfortable realization that I wanted him to ask it, there was only one thing I could do. I crossed my arms over my chest and glared at the terrifying king of the shifters with every bit of the adrenaline still coursing through my veins.

I’m fine, you idiot. But we are going to have a very long talk about why you lied about needing a bodyguard.