Chapter 13

Thirteen

WESLEY

T ea. The soft fruity scent of a good strawberry green tea roused me. “If you’d tell me where you are, I can bring you some,” Sebastian said as he poured a cup.

I blinked through a haze of half formed images. A dream, but not completely. Was the Summer king finally embracing his power?

“Trying. You’re still mine, right?”

Not really. Simply waiting for my place. Serving power was a double-edged sword.

“You protected me when you could have served me up to Winter with ease. I want you to be happy and safe, Wesley. Can I help you achieve that?”

Why would he want to?

He stared at me, and I met his gaze, feeling mute, but also at peace. His stupid omega power eased the waves of unease I’d spent my entire life burying. “Kiran says you’re a seer.”

I sucked in a hard breath, terrified of what him knowing would mean.

“You protected me for a long time. I’m grateful. Liam is a little more conflicted, thinking you should have prevented all the things I went through. But you’re not a god and I needed to learn.” He stared off into the distance. “We are all bound by fate. I understand that. You can’t see your own fate, right? How would you know where you would end up?”

Other than the face I’d seen frozen in ice before he had shifted into a dragon of nightmares and dragged me into this world, generally yes. Fate hid my future from me. In fact, anyone I got too close to, or who would be woven directly with my own life often vanished to my second sight.

“Liam said you kept others away because it helps you see them. If we got too close, you’d be blind to mine as well, right? Can we fix that? I don’t mind not knowing. I won’t demand you tell me anything. Fate is rarely kind. Can I help you somehow face what’s coming? Do you know? I think isolating yourself only to glimpse terrible futures sounds really lonely. Who does it help?”

He wasn’t wrong, but I did what I thought was best anyway. People who knew me hurt me. Distance kept my eyes open. Would the little king really not demand his future foretold?

“Liam says you knew I was meant to be this.” He waved his hand as if indicating him sitting at a table in a dream creation drinking tea and talking to a statue of me was something special.

King. He was the Summer king. Different from any legend or mythology ever written. Chaos and peace all in one. Ascended, as the heat radiated off of him, though still building because I could see the fluctuation of his power. Kitsunes, a species of magical half-breeds, part fae, part mortal, exuded wild magic in a structured world. Technically, I was among their kin.

Staring at him, I couldn’t see anything beyond the dark forest. Not his future, nor the babe he’d created from spitting out Underhill’s corpse, or the touch of any of his people. Had we grown too close? Did our fates intertwine? When had that happened?

Sebastian sighed and slid the cup of tea over. A giant slice of strawberry shortcake appeared on a plate, heaped in glowing summer magic. “Liam thinks this might strengthen our bond to help me find you. But I give you the choice. Eat it only if you want to. I won’t force you to serve me. You know that’s never been my thing.”

The little king’s past created a lot of pain for him to work through. I stared at the cake, uncertain if I could reach for it even if I wanted to.

“I have been trying to find the forest god.” He took a sip from his own cup of tea and stared off into the distance. “He’s not answering. Either he doesn’t know where you are, or…”

I was where he wanted me to be. The earth elementals were fickle beings. Liam, an alpha werewolf, had been chosen as mate to the Summer king by the elemental. It seemed like a bad deal for Liam at the time, as he was a stable and strong ruler, wise and organized, while Sebastian was chaos on a razor blade. Dangerous and wild. But the duo fit perfectly, an ebb and flow of magic, power, and emotion that I could never fathom would have been possible before meeting them.

What did that mean for me? If I was the stable one, did that mean madness was my other half? I prayed not.

The world faded. Sebastian’s power eased away. “Your choice,” he said as he left the cake and tea behind. I’d have reached for them if I could, but was too warm to move for the first time in ages, and let myself sink into restful dark, dreamless sleep for a short time.

When I woke, opening my eyes to the cabin, it was because the chill had returned and I found myself alone in bed, the door to the cabin open, a slight chop chop coming from outside. But a slice of cake and a teacup sat on the counter in the kitchen untouched.

I jolted out of bed. Was it real? I approached it with caution. Finn was no longer in bed, and the bathroom door was open, light off. Was he outside making that noise or had the world done something crazy like turned him into the cake and tea I longed for?

I turned to the open front door, the morning chill crisp as I stepped out and found Finn outside, cutting wood, shirt off, chest glistening with sweat. Frat boy had a nice body.

He glanced up. “Morning, princess,” he said as he picked up the next log to split it.

“Not a princess,” I said. “I hope you didn’t cut down a tree. Fae trees are usually living beings of some sort.”

He hesitated, then shook his head and brought the axe down to split the wood as though he’d spent his entire life doing it. “This one was fallen and rotting. Do living things rot in the fae world?”

“Sometimes, depends on the realm.”

Finn examined the wood. I couldn’t sense any life from it. I shivered and decided it was a good time for a hot shower. Small favors and all that.

“I’ll stoke the fire in a few minutes,” Finn said. “Get back inside and curl up in the blankets to keep warm. It’s chilly out here.”

“Says the man without a shirt,” I remarked.

“Ha. I run hot.”

“You are hot,” I muttered.

A tiny smile lifted the corners of his lips as if he’d heard me. I hoped not. He bent to pick up another log and half turned his back to me. A dark blotch of discoloration painted his back as though he had a bruise nearly large enough to coat his spine.

I gasped.

“What?” he asked, turning my way.

“Your back.” Maybe I was overreacting and it was a birthmark or something. My gut said it was from the nightmare, where the shadow ooze slunk up him trying to reach me.

“My back?” he turned around as if he could see his back. He set the axe down and tried to touch the spot. “What?”

I crossed the space, rocks digging into the sensitive bottoms of my feet, but my heart pounded in fear as I closed in on him to examine the mark. “You don’t have some giant birthmark on your back, right? Something that would look like a bruise?”

“No.”

The mark painted a long diagonal swatch of purple and blue darkness up toward his right shoulder. I hovered my fingers over it, afraid to touch for a thousand reasons, but watching for any sign of movement.

“Does it hurt?” I asked.

“No. I feel a little chilled now that I’m not cutting the wood, but my back doesn’t hurt.”

I traced the edge of the mark with my fingertips, fearing it would stick to me, or hurt him. “Anything?” His skin, hot where it was unmarked, chilled my fingers where the dark blotch began.

He frowned.

“What?” I demanded.

“Touch my shoulder, please.”

I hesitated, but after a few seconds rested my hand on his shoulder. He nodded.

“Now where you see this mark?”

I slid my hand back down, touch light.

“Are you touching it?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“I can’t feel it.”

“What if I press harder?” I put my palm to the center of the mark, the chill adding a burning ache to my skin as if I stuck my hand in a freeze. “Fuck, that’s cold.”

“Can’t feel it.”

I pulled my hand away and he turned to face me, eyes wide.

“What does it mean?” he asked.

“I don’t know.” And I didn’t, but I suspected it had to do with the dream we shared. Was it because of me? Had I cursed him? I backed away, heading back toward the cabin. Maybe it was still a dream… a nightmare even.

“Wesley?” Finn asked.

“I don’t know,” I said again and raced inside, heading into the bathroom to drown myself in the shower, or at least bury my fear.