Chapter Twenty-Six

The sun kissed my bare skin as Ayden's fingers traced over the warm skin and my lips curled into a content smile at his touch.

"That tickles," I sighed happily as I leaned closer into his touch.

I felt his lips against my cheek. The touch was gentle and sweet as he moved up along the side of my face to my temple, then back down towards my lips.

"Ayden," I sighed. I opened my eyes to peer up at him, his body silhouetted by the sun as a soft halo shone around his head. I traced the lines of his jaw with my finger and smiled as I watched his lips curve just the same.

He bent down to my lips, and the world slipped away as our hands roamed each other's bodies.

Our bodies were floating in the air. Our breaths blending as one. I arched my body against his as his hands ran along my spine and my leg intertwined with his.

"I love you, Ayden," I moaned against his lips.

Icy wind rushed around me, and the warmth of Ayden's body and the sun vanished. I felt myself falling as the air rushed from my lungs. The world went dark around me, and the ground slammed hard against my back.

I gasped as my throat and body fought for air that seemed to still all around me. Air that refused to come into my lungs.

My gaze moved frantically around me for any sign of help to come for me. For Rory, who had always been there for me in my time of need. Or Baer, who had become like a brother to me over the years that he and Rory had been together. I cried out down the bond to Ayden but found only silence at the other end.

I was completely cut off.

"There, there,"a dark voice came from the darkness. "There is really no need for panic, Sasha. The darkness won't hurt you. Just feel how it caresses you. You only have to relax, and it will give you everything you need."

I turned towards the sound, a sense of dread coming over me as the shadows shifted and moved, and a tall figure stepped from the darkness.

His hair was as dark as the shadows that clung to him, though a soft shine of light somehow reflected from the kempt curls. His eyes were the darkest of browns that I had ever seen, voids that seemed to swallow up the smallest hint of light within their sight. And he was handsome.

Like a statue of David come to life, his shoulders broad and his body lean with muscles. His face appeared flawless as he came closer, not a single fleck of discoloration or markings. It was as if he was the dreamed up perfect man from every magazine cover come to life.

I felt my eyes watering as the air still refused to enter my lungs, flashes of my near-death experience with the kelpie coming to mind as I felt myself drowning in the darkness.

"Just relax, Sasha,"the man said again, his voice triggering more memories of that night and every other time I heard the silky darkness in my mind.

My eyes widened as I realized who stood before me. Though I still did not know his name, I knew him. He had saved my life and sent my mind spiraling with questions for weeks now. Ever since the moment we came to this realm.

As air filled my lungs, I felt an overwhelming urge to speak and finally obtain the answers I had hoped for. The man smiled as he watched me gasp for air, my body rejoicing in the oxygen as it rushed through my veins to revitalize my strength.

"You," I gasped out as I stared up at him. "It's been you all this time."

He smiled and kneeled beside me, his fingers tracing my jaw with such gentleness, I had almost thought he was the shadows themselves stroking me.

"Yes," he said. "It's me. It has always been me and it will always be me. I am the only one who will ever be able to give you all that you truly need. The only one who will ever truly understand you."

The part of my head where my wolf should be vibrated with his words. The tone of his voice setting off alarm bells in the rest of my mind as the oxygen helped my brain register his tone.

I jerked back from his touch and glared at him as I shook my head. "You can't manipulate me that easily. Who are you?"

He chuckled and leaned back on his heels as he regarded me with a tilted head. "Who do you believe me to be?"

I looked around us at the darkness, the thought of how sunny and warm everything had been with Ayden and how dark and cold it had turned the moment my mate disappeared. I frowned, looking around for any sign of my mate or where he could have gone.

"You are darkness," I said, my eyes still scanning the shadows for Ayden. "You're the one we are after."

He chuckled again, the sound darker than it had been before. "I thought you were after Minerva."

I shook my head. "No, she's just a clue to lead us to the darkness that The Fates warned Ayden's uncle about. That's you. You are the darkness. But who are you?"

I could see his eyes roll at the mention of The Fates, the back of my neck tingling the more I watched him.

"The Fates should learn to not interfere so much into matters of mortals. They can't prevent tragedy any more than they can create it. Their words, their crutch. Their hill to die on."

My skin prickled at the distasteful tone in his voice as he spoke of the very beings who controlled our lives. The ones who decided our fates from the moment we all were born. The goddesses I had been raised to respect and follow.

The man's lips quirked into a smirk as he noticed my glare. "You don't have to be afraid to speak your mind of them here. After all, can you really say they had your best interest at heart when they are forcing you to mate with your enemy? The one who will cause you and all that you could be to fall? Don't tell me you actually believe that you love that fool?"

I growled, though my wolf's impact was missing behind the sound. Where was she?

"He's my mate. He's saved me and believed in me more than anyone else ever has," I said.

"More than me?" he asked with a tilt of his head. "Wasn't it me who warned you of the blood wisps? Creatures that even the tales of your world have forgotten their danger. Was it not me who urged you to use your power to fight off the kelpie? If it wasn't for the interference of that mark binding you to what The Fates deemed your destiny I could have helped you fight off the griffin, but I was there still. Watching over you after that fool insulted you yet again and sent you running away with tears in your eyes."

A flash of the doorway from the city came to the forefront of my mind. The feeling of being watched and the shifting of the shadows in the building. Just like the shadows now shifted around this man now.

"Why?" I asked cautiously. "Why would you even care?"

He cupped my chin in his hand and leaned in towards me. "Because you are so much more than you allow yourself to be."

I shook him off and backed away from his touch with another glare pointed in his direction. "That doesn't answer my question."

He smiled and merely shrugged as he stood and slowly turned away from me. "All in due time, Sasha. You aren't quite ready yet."

The shadows began to swirl again, and the air ripped from my lungs as I watched him disappear into the void. I clutched at my chest, my body retching as I tried to bring in air. I was drowning in the darkness again, the distant echo of voices sending me through a spiral of panic as I tried to pinpoint where he was.

"Sasha! Sasha wake up! It's just a dream! Wake up!"

My eyes flew open, then quickly shut at the burning light filtering through the windows and door. As I squinted, letting in a little light, I found a very anxious face of Ayden peering down at me.

His moonlit eyes were wide with panic as he searched my face. I felt myself holding my breath, the burn of my lungs as real as it had been in the shadowy void. I released the breath with a shuddering cry and felt my body collapse against the ground and the soft plush of Ayden's sleeping bag beneath me.

Ayden's face fell to relief as I took in a breath. His body fell over mine and he held me close against his chest.

I could feel his body shake against me as his adrenaline seeped through his body.

"It's okay," I said to him. My voice was hoarse and my throat raw as I spoke.

He looked at me and shook his head. "You weren't breathing. It wasn't that you couldn't. You just wouldn't let go of your breath. I've never seen anything like that. You turned purple in your sleep, Sasha. I couldn't wake you."

He clung to me tighter, the fear rolling through the bond into my own body.

"I thought I was going to lose you again," he whispered.

I wrapped my arms around him, my mind racing with the information.

‘What happened?'I asked my wolf.

‘You were gone,' she replied with equal concern as Ayden. ‘You weren't in our mind. I couldn't reach you. It was as if only I lived in this body, but I couldn't take control of it.'

A chill ran down my spine as I thought about the empty space in my mind during the dream. The space where I should have felt my wolf. We really had been disconnected.

But how? How could anyone possibly have the power to cut off a piece of me like that? The dream was already beginning to fade from my memory. The features of the being who had spoken to me fading, leaving only the sound of his voice. The very voice I had been running and hiding from all these weeks. The voice I thought I had blocked out with the bond to Ayden.

Then again, the mark was on my body, and according to my wolf, I wasn't in my body.

‘Maybe you should tell me what happened?'my wolf said.

I hugged Ayden tighter and closed my eyes.

‘I don't know, the dream has disappeared,'I said. I tried to hide the fear as the memories vanished as quickly as I tried to recall them. ‘The voice was there though. I think…'

I paused and pulled back to look into Ayden's eyes as I decided to tell both him and my wolf at the same time.

"I think I was inside the darkness."

I watched as his eyes widened, his breath seeming to stall in his lungs. His arms reached out to me as if on their own accord, thoughts scrambled behind his eyes as he and his wolf fought for control.

He slowly pulled me against his chest and breathed finally as he pressed his nose to my head.

"Don't worry," he whispered, his voice rough with the growl of his wolf. "I've got you."

His words were spoken to me, but I couldn't help but feel that he was comforting himself more so than me.