Paden touched the side of my face. “You have no idea how wrong you are. Look what the trees did back there.”
“They might have done that for anyone with powers.” I was hardly alone in that respect.
He shook his head. “Someday you’ll see. I know you will.” Then he gestured toward the horses. “Four horses. Six of us.”
As though his words made it appear, a fifth horse arrived. Like the others, he’d clearly been well taken care of.
I stared at him for a second. “Five horses. Six of us. Maybe we’re accidentally stealing someone’s horses. Like someone is around here and they were trying to take our horses. Now we’re taking theirs?”
Ryland lifted his brows slowly. “So the Sister might be more like me than like you four. Look at that?”
Paden shook his head while Titus groaned. Zeke and Jett both laughed. It was hard for me to imagine them as Katrina’s guards. What had it been like for them to be around her all the time? A thought dawned on me that made my stomach tighten. Had they been sleeping with her? Having sex with a Sister was an unofficial role the guards often played in the Sisterhood.
I looked down at the ground. This was none of my business. I’d known these guys for days. That was all. They’d not made any moves toward being interested in me that way and they weren’t even my guards, not really. They were delivering me to Anne’s Sisterhood and that was it. They had to make amends for something they did to Mika.
Still, the very idea made me want to gag. Katrina?
Paden tapped my shoulder. “Krystal? You okay?”
“Sure. Thanks.” I forced myself to look up. “What are we going to do now?”
Titus answered from behind me. “Ride the horses.”
“I’ve never ridden one. I don’t know how. You all do?” I didn’t think horseback riding was all that common of a thing. Particularly for people who came out of the Badlands, as most of the guards did.
Titus stroked the side of his horse. “We all worked on a horse farm. It’s where we met. For the nobility. We took care of their horses, the ones they don’t race for money. Those were specially handled by other nobles, or pseudo-nobles. But we took care of the ones they sold to farmers or used to buddy up race horses. We worked there for five years. That’s where we got the call to come to the guard tryout. So you are looking at five guys who can actually ride.”
Paden elbowed me gently. “This guy here can hold both of us. You’ll ride with me.”
“That’s a good call. Paden’s the best rider out of us. He’ll take good care of you.” Zeke winked at me. “Well, the best rider other than me.”
They were laughing again. I’d never been around so much laughter in my life. It almost made me forget my worry that they’d been sleeping with Katrina. By Divinity, what was the matter with me? There were life and death worries here, I didn’t need to be focused on that. I was so distracted that I hardly noticed when Titus helped me up onto the horse in front of Paden.
“Lean back on me.” His voice was quiet in my ear, and I did as he asked. “I’ve got this under control.”
A bird cawed in the sky as I tried to adjust myself, and I looked up. Sure enough, there was a raven. All by himself. Was it that Alexander person again? This one looked slightly grayer. “Do the birds always interfere in your lives like they’ve been doing?”
They’d never tried to speak to me before. Maybe this had to do with my newfound companions.
I couldn’t help but wonder if that bird had something to do with our horses.
“No. I mean, we went looking for Reed. We remembered him right off when we came back to ourselves and out of Katrina’s spell. But other than that, no.”
So then it was new for all of us. My stomach took that second to rumble. The others had gotten on their horses and soon we were riding in a line. Titus and Ryland were up ahead with Jett and Zeke behind us. They’d squished us right into the middle.
“You’re hungry.” Paden shifted in his seat just slightly and pulled out a bag that looked like it had nuts in it. “Here.”
I shook my head. “That’s your food. You have to be hungry, too.”
“I’m not.” He tried to hand me the bag again, and I still refused to take it.
“Then you will be. I’m not taking your food.” We could do this all day. Unless he wanted to force feed me, he wasn’t giving up his nuts.
“I want to take care of you, Krystal. It’s what I want more than anything right now. Let me feed you.”
I sighed. “You are. I can skip a meal until we reach a place we can buy something to eat. I’m not going to starve to death. I have plenty of reserves.” Katrina used to tell me I was fat. I didn’t eat more than anyone else, and I was half convinced I was just built this way. “You are taking care of me. You’re keeping me upright on this horse.”
“That’s not all I want.” He put the nuts back in his pocket. “I’m not going to fight with you over this at the present time. In a little bit, when you’re hungrier, I’m going at it again.”
I smirked. “Paden, I lived for three years in a room, refusing to let the Darkness take me. I’m pretty stubborn.”
“You might have met your match in me.”
We’d see. “You should eat. You have to be hungry, too.”
His voice was soft in my ear. “I’ve actually never felt better than I do right now.”
I didn’t like the rhythm of riding this horse. I didn’t like the bouncing any more than I had liked the sway of the train. I might be a “stay at home and don’t travel” kind of a person. But I did like how it felt to have Paden’s arms around me while he held the reigns of the horse. I did like how it felt to be close to him. Up ahead, Titus said something to Ryland, and they grinned at each other. There it was again, the happiness.
“You guys laugh a lot. I really like to see it. Happiness. Sorry, if I’m not making sense.”
Paden lowered his head just a touch, and I could feel his forehead against the back of my head. “Not lately. We’d been really… sad, I think. With what happened. What we did and didn’t do. Then you were in the woods. The last days have been intense, but happy again. I know that maybe they shouldn’t be. Yet, there it is.”
We didn’t speak again for a bit and instead I contented myself with watching the landscape go by. There was nothing I could see for any distance. Nothing grew.
How had things gotten this bad? Well, I knew. The Darkness had come. Sister after Sister had given up her soul to him and now this was what was left. Destruction. We’d been given powers and just one of us using them for the wrong side had destroyed the world.
“You tensed up. What’s wrong?”
I shook my head. “I’m just thinking about how things got this bad. Sorry. That’s not at all helpful. Tell me about you. You worked on a horse farm. That’s all I know.”
“Well, I did for the five years before I became a guard. My mother used to clean houses for nobility. She’d take the train back and forth. Then she was possessed.” I heard the hitch in his voice when he said that. “One day she never came back. It had gotten really bad. I was fourteen. Anyway, a million stories like mine. I took the train to go see if I could find her. I never did, but one of the nobles she cleaned for took pity on me and brought me on to work the farm with the horses. The guy in charge used to be a guard. That’s how we ended up hearing about the call for guards. That’s not what you were asking.”
He laughed, a low sound, and it moved right through me. He also smelled like springtime, the way it would suddenly be in the morning when I’d cross from one end of the Sisterhood to the other. I’d loved the scent of a new spring day.
“That’s my story, pretty much. Never knew my dad. After my mom, those four were my family. Weird we all got chosen and all got to stay together.”
I shook my head. “Not as weird as, say, birds shifting into men.”
It was my turn to make him laugh, hard. I grinned. What a great sound that was. If Titus hadn’t shouted out
a warning, I’d never have seen the flying demon in the sky. I gasped. These were the things of legend. I didn’t know a Sister who had actually seen one. Some demons had been entirely wiped out. That one—the Flying Menace as it was referred to—was supposed to be one of them.
It dove straight for me and I’d be dead except that Paden shoved both of us off the horse and onto the ground in the nick of time. If he hadn’t been so fast it would have gotten me in its talons and taken me who knew where.
“Are you okay?” Paden had taken the brunt of the fall. He’d made kind of an oomph sound but otherwise seemed fine.
He nodded fast. “It’s coming back for another pass and…”
Whatever he would have said, I didn’t get to hear. Beneath us, the ground started to shake. Violently. Our horse—whom I suddenly realized we hadn’t named—darted backward away from the earthquake targeting us. Titus shouted something, but the ground opened up beneath Paden and me.
I had a second to realize how ridiculous it was that I was thinking about horse names before Paden and I fell into the darkness. He shouted something, but I must have blacked out.
I groaned and the sound of my own pain woke me. I was flat on my stomach, head pressed into the hard ground. I lifted my head. Where was I, and what was happening? Next to me someone else moaned, then it all rushed back to me.
The Earth had opened, and Paden and I had fallen in. I crawled over to him, every muscle and bone in my body hurt. Somewhere the sound of a caw resonated above us. I couldn’t see well enough to know where that was, but we weren’t dead.
I’d start with that and be grateful.
“Paden.” I touched his cheek, and my powers surged through me. I gasped. He was really hurt. I was sore, but he must have somehow, again, taken most of the hit for me. Tears filled my eyes. This was the problem with having guards. They could be hurt, and it was entirely the Sister’s fault. Paden would never have fallen through the ground if it weren’t for me.
I shook my head. I had to pull it together. My powers soared. That meant he wasn’t dead, yet, and I could keep him from getting that way. This was what I’d been made to do. Forget the demons, I liked saving human lives. Period.
And I wasn’t going to let Paden suffer another minute.
I closed my eyes. The power flowed through my fingertips directly where I wanted it to go. I infused his cells with energy. His body could heal itself. I just had to tell it to do it. I lost track of time. Images flowed through my eyes. His heart beat. His lungs breathed. I made sure of it. There were scars on him that had nothing to do with this event. Someone had whipped his back. I told his body to heal those.
He had stories he hadn’t shared in the five minutes we’d gotten to talk on the horse. I wanted to be a person who knew his life. I hadn’t earned it, but I wanted to know. There was more. Did his knee ache? I could…
“Stop.” Hands gripped my shoulders and shook me, hard. “Krystal, please, stop. I’m okay. Stop.”
I sucked in a breath, coming back to my body. “Paden?”
“Krystal.” He tugged me into his arms, tightly. I could hear his heartbeat. It was nice after watching it beat from inside of him. He was strong enough to call me back, then he was going to be okay. “Stop. You scared me. I am okay. Better than that. I have never felt as well as I do right now. Don’t do that. You’re breathing is shallow. You’ve hurt yourself helping me.”
I stroked the side of his face. “We just met. But I care about you. I wanted to save you. It’s all I wanted. To take care of you.” I realized I was in some ways throwing his own phrases from earlier back to him. “That’s all.”
“Damn it.” He pulled out the nuts. Were we going to do this again? He held them up. “You need to eat something, and you need to rest.”
I wasn’t the least bit hungry. “I don’t think I can stomach it. I’m so glad you’re okay.”
His mouth met mine. I hadn’t anticipated his kiss. My mind was fuzzy. Maybe I should have. But there it was. My very first kiss, and Paden, with his gentle eyes and serious nature, was giving it to me. I closed my eyes and clung to him. There was fire between us. Warmth. I wanted more. Needed it.
I didn’t need air, just Paden.
We kissed and kissed. Finally, he pulled back, and when he did, I wasn’t the only one breathing shallowly. Paden panted, like he couldn’t catch his breath. He drew me close to him but didn’t try to kiss me again. Instead, he lay back, bringing me with him while he wrapped his arms around me.
“Don’t ever drain yourself to save me.” He kissed my cheek. “Lie here for a bit. Then you’ll be hungry and you’re going to eat.”
My head was clearing and the reality of what just happened slammed into me. “Did you kiss me because you felt sorry for me?”
He lifted his head. “I kissed you because I can’t think for wanting you. Since we spotted you. Fuck. Sorry for you? No. Not that. We might die down here. Because, to be honest, I don’t have the slightest idea how we’re getting off this ledge. Or even where we are underground. There was a flying demon that may have killed the others.” He took a long breath when he said this and a muscle ticked in his jaw. “And our Sister almost died saving me. I kissed you because I have to kiss you, Krystal. I have to kiss and kiss and kiss you. Right now, I’m working on being a gentleman and not kissing you until we’re both naked.”
My whole body caught fire from his words. I loved the sound of both the naked and our Sister part.
I couldn’t stop touching his face. “I hate to tell you, but if we get out of this somehow, I’m sure that Anne or whoever is determining these things will recognize you guys are really strong, and they’ll find you a more appropriate Sister for you to guard. I will probably not be your Sister.”
He rolled onto his side, and we faced each other. “Unless you want me to go away, I am always going to be your guard. Okay? I can’t speak for the others, but I can all but guarantee they feel the same way. Tell us to go away if you can’t stand us, but I don’t want any other Sister.”
“You’re just saying that because I fixed you. It’s probably some sort of attachment thing post healing.”
He groaned. “Close your eyes and rest. I felt this way before you saved my ass. Oh, sorry, bad language. I know better.”
“Sometimes the language works better than anything else. It doesn’t bother me.” Exhaustion hit me, the adrenaline of his kisses finally fleeing. I lowered my head onto his chest. His heart beat. I loved that. I’d seen to it that it kept doing that.
He kissed the top of my head. “You’re my Sister. You deserve better than me. But I’m yours if you want me. You are so strong. Come on, sweetheart, take a nap. We can figure out how to get out of this cavernous mess when you open your eyes.”
“You really do want to see me naked?”
I didn’t know what he would have said. My eyes didn’t want to stay open. The world went black.
Titus
“We need a tree limb. There was one down a little while ago. Strewn over the road. Ryland, Zeke, Jett—snap out of your horror—go get it. Drag it here somewhere. Come on. We have to hope they’re alive and they can be pulled out. I’m going to shout until they answer.” I poked my head down into the hole that had swallowed a man who was close enough to me he was like my brother and a woman who was mine to protect and love.
I didn’t know how I knew those things about Krystal, but I did. Ever since the tree had taken the two of us to that other place, I’d been filled with the knowledge that she was mine to love. I refused to contemplate that they were hurt.
I’d run away from the flying demon to get it to leave them alone, and I wasn’t too proud to admit to having done so.
“Hello?” I called, but no one answered.
A raven swept down. Another one? What was going on with these birds?
The man transformed. “Titus.”
He knew me. They all seemed to, but I only knew the one called Reed and even he was basically a mystery to me. This ma
n wasn’t Reed. He was tall, blond haired, and I supposed he’d be called pretty if it wasn’t for the long scar that started on the side of his face and traveled down, covering most of the left side
“I don’t know who you are.”
He looked away and then back at me. “What fucking purpose does it do to send you all down here like fucking babies?”
Well, that was a hell of an introduction. “I’m assuming you’re friendly, but if you’re not, you should know I used to hunt birds to eat, and I’m not above doing it again.”
He smirked at me. “You can call me Stone. My friends all do.”
“We’re not friends, and despite the fact you are doing that shifting thing I’ve seen twice now, I’m a little busy.”
Stone crossed in front of me. “We are friends. Or we used to be. You were closer to Reed. Still, you’re right. It doesn’t matter now. They’re alive. Paden will stay that way because Krystal will keep him that way.”
I let out a breath I hadn’t known I held. “Good.”
“Get them out and for Divinity’s sake get her to Anne. Everything is dependent on that.”
My temper rose. Knowing they weren’t dead reset me in some way. I wasn’t going to fall apart. I didn’t need to be told what I already knew from this—creature—that had simply decided to pay us a visit.
“Are you under the impression that I’m doing something else?” I did shout by the end of that statement, and I didn’t even feel bad about it.
He shook his head. “The thing is that I shouldn’t tell you this, but I’m off grid anyway. I have to hurry. If they see me talking to you, they’ll remove me. No one up there where it matters believes that Krystal can make it. Teagan doesn’t see a future with her. Mika doesn’t have a prophecy. There is just one vision. One that a previous oracle had about her. And in that one, things went differently because she lived. Asp… Someone is able to have her future because Krystal lives.” He visibly swallowed. “Titus, get her to Anne. Divinity thinks she takes on the Darkness. They will kill her if that happens. They will send everything and everyone to kill her. Save your Sister. Above all else, the future of everything depends on her. The only time we win is in one vision.”