19

IVY

I DIDN’T move until the crying ended, and even then, I found it almost too difficult to leave the room and face the rest of the house.

Pain laced every breath as I held back my own sobs. Eloise was finally asleep in my arms, her breaths sharp with her now-dried tears. Ginny and Maisie had fallen into their own fitful sleep, the silence broken by their whimpers and the rustling of sheets as they restlessly tossed and turned. Their little hands reached for Kerry subconsciously, and all I could do was stare at their grasping fingers and wait for my mother’s hand to appear.

I squeezed my eyes shut. My chest burned with a familiar fire that threatened to explode. It rushed beneath my skin, igniting each nerve and tendon, a flurry of intense agony fuelled by fear. It scorched a path through my body, threatening to burst out of me at any moment.

I knew I needed to escape. To run. To get myself as far away from my sisters as possible. If I didn’t, I risked hurting them and everyone around me. The team had warned me of the risks of not being anchored, of what my magic could do if it weren’t tied to my mates. What could happen if my emotions became too much, and the magic took over.

And now, I understood their fears.

I was dangerous. The energy building within me was powerful, a storm of untameable magic that could not be held for much longer. It wanted release.

Are you alright in there, Angel? His voice. It should have calmed the raging storm inside me, but even as his concern trickled down the bond, it did nothing to the electricity tingling at my fingertips or the voice—that sharp, horrible voice from my nightmares—giving me warnings of death. My wolf’s bond was there, a bright light in my mind, a sharp tug in my chest, but fear propelled me away from the bridge between us. What if I hurt him? What if I played with the bond too much, and the magic did something to him?

I lifted myself from the bed the children shared and looked down at my trembling hands. Purple light wound around my palms and over my fingers like snakes, teasing and threatening me with what I could do if I lost control. If I went nuclear. That’s what everyone feared, wasn’t it? That I couldn’t control the power Nyx was flooding my body with?

Maybe they were right to fear me, to fear this power.

It was the magic of a Goddess, and I was no God.

Without another thought, I ran. There was no one in the hallway to stop my escape. I took it as a sign from the Goddess herself that I needed out. Needed to be free from the confines of this house. The house where I let my mother die. The house where I failed my sisters, where I couldn’t protect them from the atrocities of the world we were being dragged into.

Bile rose in my throat as I descended the stairs onto the main floor. The soft drone of conversation ceased, and I felt the burn of stares on me as I started for the back door.

“Ivy?” His voice. My mate. There was a softness to it, a caress in the way he spoke my name that should have eased the pain throbbing in my skull.

I felt him approach. Felt the bond between us strengthen, the chord pulling tight, urging me towards him. It was tempting, the promise of safety. I would have taken it. I should have.

My vision grew blurry as I took in the gathered teams and their worried—fearful—expressions. Through the haze of magic, I could make out my mate. His tall, powerful frame edging closer. The careful shift of his eyes from their forest green to the bright green of his wolf. He reached for me, his hands strong. I remembered what they felt like against my skin, the comfort and safety I felt when he was near. The burning softened to an ache the closer he came, the fire of my magic dulling just enough to allow me to breathe.

If he gets too close, I might hurt him, too. Fear shot through me at the thought, and I threw up a hand. “Stop,” I ground out, my voice hoarse, like I’d been screaming for hours, unheard until now. “Please. I can’t hurt you, too.”

“Ivy, Angel, you can’t hurt me.” His voice was so sure, and I could almost believe him. But then I saw her face. Kerry. My mother. Her gaunt cheeks and vacant expression. The words ‘she won’t make it’reverberated through my ears. I hadn”t thought I would ever be capable of hurting her, and yet, here we were. She was gone. Dead. Her body taken to rest in an unfamiliar place.

I wanted to throw up. Scream. Anything but stand here. Eyes on me, pitying me.

“Ivy, look at me.” The command in his voice sent a shiver down my spine, but my eyes snapped shut. Instead of his handsome face, I saw death.

The blonde woman with the blade in her gut.

The shocked man with the knife in his throat.

Their dying words as they vowed for my death.

Then there were the others. The soldier guarding my family and his screams as the house shook.

The girl undercover telling us to shoot her so she could remain with the enemy.

The shadows and how they’d almost taken another from me.

My throat tightened as I stumbled back a step. The voices around me grew louder as I opened my eyes. Violent magic slithered over my skin, sparking with a purple haze over my flesh. The marks I’d noticed over a week ago now played along my heated flesh in strange patterns I didn’t recognise.

“Sweetheart?” Another shiver down my spine. I turned my unseeing gaze on my second mate. The one I’d killed for. The one my magic had tried so hard to protect. I brought his face to the forefront of my mind, but it was immediately overtaken by the image of his pain as he fell into my arms: the blood dripping down his chin, the light dying in his eyes.

Another stumbling step back as his presence ignited electricity along my sensitive skin. I felt others approaching, too. Their worry tasted bitter in my mouth. I wanted to tell them to step back. To stay away. But words died on my tongue.

“We need to get her out of the house,” someone else said, their harsh voice grating against my ears.

“What she needs is to be anchored, but I don’t see that happening. She’s going to fucking explode,” another said.

A third spoke up softly and said, “We are not equipped to handle her if she does.”

I squeezed my eyes shut against the onslaught of voices. The harsh, nightmarish voice from my dreams urged me to run. Run, run, run.Run away from the ones who would protect you, as you are not fit to be their queen.

I didn’t want to believe it, but I knew the voice was right. I was not fit to be queen.

So, I ran.

Voices shouted behind me, but through the haze of magic, I could see only the door leading out of the house. Then, there was the path into the darkening forest, where the light of the real world could not penetrate. My heart thundered with each step, my blood thrumming in my ears, deafening the sound of the others in pursuit. My mates wouldn’t be far behind me. The vampire would have surely caught me if it weren’t for the sun still hanging low in the sky.

Each step away felt like another shovel of dirt burying me alive. I couldn’t breathe. The air burned like ice in my lungs, but I propelled myself into the trees. I ran until sticky warmth coated my arms, and my legs ached with the need to stop. Even then, I pushed aside the pain and continued my path through the forest with no end in sight.

It wasn’t until strong arms wrapped around me like chains did my body failed me. My legs gave out from beneath me, and the person holding me tightened their embrace, trapping my own arms to my body, trapping me against them. My blood sang in my ears at the person’s proximity, but it wasn’t one of my mates. It wasn’t my wolf, my bonded, the one who calmed the raging storm. And it wasn’t my mage, my sweet prince who I had yet to claim.

I sucked in a breath, and the intoxicating scent of smoke and cinnamon filled my senses. It wasn’t anything I recognised, but I grew drunk on it as I breathed it in.

“Time to toughen up,” a rough voice whispered in my ear. There was a slight lilt of an accent I couldn’t identify that softened something within me. “Time to stop running.”

An image flashed in my mind. The monster and the cheering voices as I failed every demonic test in my nightmares. I groaned as the memory burned bright in my mind. “I can’t,” I whimpered, my voice scratchy, my mouth dry. “I can’t.”

There was a hiss behind me, but the arms didn’t loosen. I could feel the heat radiating off my skin. Was I burning him? Was the magic slithering across my flesh too much?

“Going nuclear—letting your magic win—won’t do anything for you, and you know it.” He grunted, and I felt myself falling—

No, not falling. He still had his arms around me, but now we were on the ground, his legs another cage around me. Through my own sharp breaths, I could hear his. Through the fabric between us, I counted each thundering beat of his heart as it crashed against my shoulder.

One. Two. Three. I sucked in a breath and released it slowly.

“You can’t let the magic control you every time something goes wrong,” he continued, his rough voice softening, the accent thickening. It was almost magical, and something about it was so familiar to me. It tickled a long-lost memory, one hidden behind the burning magic. “You think blowing up will solve your problems? That pushing the only people away who are capable of handling you will protect them?”

Yes, I wanted to say. There was danger in this magic. It would hurt him too—it was trying to. I gritted my teeth as the burning flickered into an ember of what it had been. The magic that had been dancing across my skin like the sparks of a flame died down with the weight of his words.

Blowing up would not solve my problems. The magic within me was something dangerous…powerful. It consumed me in a way that scared me.

It would control me if it could. It wanted to.

“You need to leave me,” I whispered, my voice broken. “You need to go before it consumes you, too.”

His chest vibrated with a dark laugh. “You think this will make me run? Sorry, princess, but I’m here to stay until you’re under control.”

Everything was too much, and I slipped into the darkness where the warped figure waited. Skeletal hands reached for me, beckoning me with the promise of safety. The crown atop its head glinted, shining violet, in the waning light of the crescent moon above us.

What do you want from me? I tried to ask, but my voice was trapped, caught in my throat.

The figure dropped its hand, and the crown vanished. To fight.

~

I came to with a different body wrapped around me. Loud voices broke through the cotton in my ears.

“What the fuck were you thinking, Nash?” Rowan asked, his voice a sharp knife that sliced through the rest of the dream.

The other man snorted. “I got her to calm down. That was the objective, was it not?”

“You had no authority to interfere,” another replied. This voice belonged to Adrian. I felt his hand against my cheek, and as I forced my eyes open, I found him kneeling beside me with his gaze focused on the half-Fae team leader.

It took me a long moment to realise the one who had held me—the one who had forced me out of the magic—had been him. I immediately found his dark eyes, and a shiver raced down my spine. Like Maeve and Elias, he hid his emotions well. I couldn’t read his expression. But one quick glance over his body, and he seemed okay.

I shifted slightly, and the arms around me loosened somewhat. Pine and earth tickled my nose. Elias.

How are you feeling, Angel? You really scared me there. His voice was soft and calm despite the fear trickling down the bond.

I checked myself quietly, taking in the emotions leftover from the power surge. There was an emptiness inside me, a pit of darkness that swallowed most of my energy. I felt almost...nothing but exhaustion.

There was also a hunger within me. I recognised it almost immediately as a need for my mates.

As if sensing it, too, Elias shifted, and his hard length brushed against my ass.

“She seems well enough now,” Hawk said, forcing me to look over at him. He was no longer watching me. Instead, he focused his gaze on Rowan and gave him a lazy once over. “I’ll report back to Grey.”

Bile rose in my throat as I watched him turn and stalk off into the trees. I felt his departure almost immediately. But as soon as the longing appeared, it was replaced with a deepening desire that swelled in my gut.

“Follow Nash back to the safe house,” Elias commanded, his voice thick as his arms tightened around me.

Rowan looked at us, almost startled, his brows furrowing in confusion. “You okay there, Wolfy?”

I choked on a half-laugh, half-groan as Elias growled. “Go. Make sure Grey gets the full report.”

The mage spared me a glance. I wanted to tell him I was okay now, but his eyes shuttered, and he sighed. “Fine. Take care of her.”

“She’s my mate,” Elias replied. I felt the scruff of his beard scrape against my shoulder, making me shudder.

That was all that needed to be said. Rowan bowed his head in a nod before following the path Hawk had walked, leaving me with my wolf and my mage.