Tethers (21 page)

I refused to answer. I had been alone for so long that losing my friends and returning to a solitary life had become my biggest fear. I didn’t want to be that lost soul ever again.

He slid one of his hands upward until his fingertips touched the bare skin on my neck. “I had to leave, but I’ve been having trouble figuring out some things. Things to do with you. Feelings that I… I’m very
confused
, Ava. I had a life I don’t remember, and when you touch me, I wonder how I felt before. I’m not sure I’ll ever recover enough to share my life with another person. Not again. Not after everything that happened.”

I turned to face him. “I know that. It must feel crazy for you, but I told you that you could see my old memories of Helena if you wanted, and I’m sure Lucia is willing to show you more memories about how much you loved your wife.”

“But nobody can show me how I
felt
,” he said, looking frustrated. “Seeing isn’t the same as feeling. Nobody can help me feel that way again.”

“No, they can’t. And I’m sorry for that. The only thing that can fill in the blanks is your imagination.”

“But I don’t even know how to picture it,” he said mournfully.

“If it were me, I’d imagine the perfect love, something that couldn’t be broken. If nothing will compare to that, then there’s no point trying to make anything else the same, so it’s okay when whatever comes next is different.”

“Is that what you do to yourself? To get over your ex?”

The one whose memory you took away at my request?

“I used to,” I admitted. “But that love was perfect for a different version of me. You said it yourself—I’m strong, and I can take it. But I wasn’t strong
then
, and I needed somebody to help me see that people could be trusted. Now I know that there’s a good mix of all kinds of people in the world, and none of that matters as long as I’m comfortable being me. And I am. This is who I am, and I’m glad of it. But I get lonely, too.”

“Yes,” he said. “It is lonely. But the thought of burdening another with what goes on in my head is even more terrifying than being lonely forever.”

“So don’t do that part,” I said. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t share a little comfort sometimes.”

“A woman kissed me while I was away. It was a surprise.”

I grinned at the tone of his voice. He sounded like a teenage boy after his first kiss. “What was that like?”

“Nice.”

“
Nice
?”

“Pleasant.”

I couldn’t resist the giggle that popped out of my mouth. “My surprise kiss was better,” I teased before I ducked under his arm and walked on.

He gripped my arm and pushed me against a tree, his body pressing against mine. My heart raced so hard, he could probably hear it. I could hear
his
pulse, after all. His hand slid across my cheek and into my hair, tilting my head upward. I couldn’t break away from his gaze. I gripped his shirt, unable to do anything else. I wasn’t sure what I thought about what was happening, but my body was ready to go with it.

He ducked his head and dropped a soft kiss on my lips before pulling back to give me a questioning look. I pulled him to me, and he moved eagerly, his other hand around my waist to move my body closer to his. He was too tall for it to be comfortable, but that was okay with me.

His mouth was surprisingly warm, and after a moment of me taking the lead, he grew hungry, his tongue slipping against mine as if it had just remembered to dance. I leaned against his chest, feeling the comfort that only another lost, lonely person could provide. I didn’t have to think about anything but the need and warmth and—

Icarus howled in the distance, but there was something angry in it, a warning. Then someone screamed.

Phoenix and I instantly broke apart. My hands moved to my lips, and I felt a note of horror. We had been basically making out like teenagers against a tree while a poor human was being attacked by… Icarus?
Or something even worse.

To my surprise, Phoenix held my face in his hands. “You were right. Yours is better.”

I actually cringed.

He brushed his nose against mine. “And thank you, but we have to go.”

I ran after him, bemused that he’d thanked me for a kiss. But I supposed he was thanking me for a kiss with no strings attached. Icarus’s second inhuman howl totally turned me off that line of thought.

We rushed through the forest, but we couldn’t find Icarus anywhere.

“Either sound travelled, or he’s chasing something,” Phoenix muttered. “He’s farther away than I thought.” He took a GPS tracking system from his pocket.

“You put microchips into the werewolves?”

“It was a concession in order to give them their freedom,” he explained, taking long strides back in the direction we had come from. “And it’s a good thing, too. Or we would never find Icarus in time. Back to the truck. It’s too far to walk.”

We made it to the truck and set off, neither of us referring to what had happened before.

“I’ll wash your hanky thing,” I said to break the silence as he drove at breakneck speed.

“Keep it,” he said dismissively.

I felt a little dismissed myself, but I was too eager to find Icarus to worry about it. After about fifteen minutes, Phoenix had to slam on the brakes when a woman ran out into the road in front of us, screaming for help. Her top had been ripped to shreds, and claw marks stretched from her shoulder to her breast. We couldn’t make sense of her words because of the hysterical sobbing, so Phoenix put her in the truck between us while I called Shay for help. The woman cried harder when Phoenix warned her she would have to stay in the truck alone. When Phoenix stopped the truck and we both got out, the woman curled up on the floor like a child.

“Poor woman,” I said, hurrying to keep up with Phoenix’s long purposeful strides. “Shay shouldn’t be long. Where’s Icarus now?”

He pointed away from the woods and toward some kind of farmland. There was a barn in the distance. And when the barn door appeared to explode away from the building, I knew that was where he meant.

I squinted as a ball of fur rolled out of the barn. Icarus’s form flew out afterward, then they both disappeared inside again.

“He’s fighting something,” I said.

“Yes, but what?” Phoenix upped his speed across the muddy field. The pickup wouldn’t have made it.

“I don’t think it’s a werewolf,” I gasped, at least a couple of feet behind the fae prince.

He ignored me and kept running, but closer to the barn, he stopped and held an arm out to keep me still. “Wait,” he whispered. “They’re right at the door.”

And then the pair barrelled out of the barn again. Icarus gave a triumphant bark as he drew blood, but if the creature was still standing after ten seconds in a fight with a werewolf, then it was doing better than pretty much anything else I had ever seen. They drew apart and circled each other.

The second creature was smaller than Icarus and had a more human shape. On its back two legs, it stood about as tall as Phoenix, and compared to a werewolf, it was a runt, yet it was holding its own. Its grey hair was long, shaggy, and matted, and the hair at the back of its hind legs dragged along the mud. It smelled like death, poison, and rot. I coughed a little at the stench, and the creature looked at us for an instant.

It had golden eyes with huge black pupils, and its claws were even longer than its weird paw hands. Its back was hunched, and somehow, that made it seem more intimidating. And it was fast, way faster than Icarus. He could barely get a hold on the thing, and looking closer, I saw that the werewolf was covered in bloody strips where the creature must have scratched at him, or maybe bitten. The new monster had a bitten leg, likely from attempting to leap out of Icarus’s reach, but other than that, it looked mostly unharmed. The creature opened its mouth impossibly wide. The fangs were long and wiry, like barbed wire fashioned into the shape of teeth.

I shuddered, horrified by its appearance. “What the hell is it?”

“I have no idea,” Phoenix said, to my surprise. “But I wouldn’t try to stake it, Ava.” He flinched. “Watch out, Icarus!”

But the creature’s great big leap at Icarus turned out to be an escape route over the werewolf’s head. Icarus looked slow next to the nimble creature, and right then, I realised it was running straight at me. Phoenix shoved me aside, and the creature went for him instead. Claws first, it ran into him, lifted him in the air, then flung him away. The creature sprinted away faster than any werewolf could have.

I hesitated, waiting for Phoenix to get up, but he remained on the ground, and the scent of his blood quickly filled the air. I scrambled over to him. “Icarus! The woman’s in the truck!” I shouted.

Icarus wavered for only an instant before chasing the fleeing creature. His howl a few seconds later sounded furious, and I realised the creature was probably going to get away.

I knelt by Phoenix. His T-shirt was soaked with blood. I tore apart the fabric. The wounds slicing his chest looked deep. Burgundy blood flowed freely.
Too much blood.

“No, no, no,” I whispered, checking his fading pulse. “Wake up, Phoenix.” I slapped his face then realised I was going to have to do something fast. I pulled off my jacket then yanked my shirt over my head, ripping away a thick strip of fabric. I somehow managed to get it under Phoenix and across his chest, pulling it tight in an attempt to slow the worst of the bleeding. I tried holding the wounds together, but my hands were too slippery. Panicked, I pressed the remainder of the shirt against the bleeding wounds, but even if Shay arrived, help wouldn’t come in time. Phoenix’s heartbeat was fading, and he had a deathly pallor.

I had no choice—I had to try something drastic. He was going to die anyway. I bit my wrist, opening the veins with an awful tearing sound. I knelt on the shirt to keep pressure on the wound then forced Phoenix’s mouth open with one hand. I laid my wrist against his lips and let the blood trickle into his mouth. I concentrated, willing my blood to help him. Blood trickled down the sides of Phoenix’s face. He didn’t respond, but I kept trying, unwilling to give up. I couldn’t just let him
die
.

I prayed it would work, prayed it wouldn’t hurt. I had done the same thing for Carl once, but I had fed on blood myself beforehand. The incident had strengthened our old unwelcome bond, but Carl was just a human while Phoenix was powerful in his own right. I remembered how powerful fae blood had tasted, and I hoped mine would do even a smidgeon to help him.

But perhaps I alone wasn’t enough. I reached out for another, more recent, bond. I sought out an untapped part of the world around me, that connection with the Eleven. They had come to me; maybe I could bring them, too. I didn’t sense their presence, but I pulled on their energies, their power, and I tried to push it all into my blood. If I was a conduit, then balance could at least help me save a life.

Phoenix’s lips had turned blue, and I was feeling weak myself, completely drained. But suddenly, he coughed, then his eyes flickered open. They were filled with confusion, surprise… and disgust before closing again.

I couldn’t worry about that yet. Icarus bounded back over, whining as he nosed Phoenix’s face.

“He’ll be okay,” I said as the werewolf licked my wrist. “But I need to show them the way, to make sure help gets here. They might get scared off if you go, but I need to put pressure on the wound, or he’ll bleed out first.” My voice had grown high-pitched. The werewolf nudged me out of the way and planted a heavy paw on top of the bloody, crumpled shirt on Phoenix’s chest.

“Try not to break him,” I said breathlessly then grabbed my jacket and ran. I pulled my jacket on over my bra as I ran, trying to remember the way we had come. I reached out with my other senses, and suddenly, a bunch of human energies came into view. I kept running until I saw the ambulance and Shay’s car.

“Help!” I shouted. “We need help!”