Page 1 of Snag (Conduit #2)

ONE

ZAYA

“No threads connect us,” I repeat numbly, listing toward Rought. He’s still gently holding both my hands, and I’m not fighting him over it.

All the fight has drained from me.

I trace my eyes over him, anchoring myself in all the little details because everything else, each revelation tumbling down over the next one, is too much.

Dark-blond hair, curling at his temples against naturally tan skin.

Even barefoot, he’s easily eight inches taller than me.

He hides an intricate web of tattoos under his black T-shirt, including a memorial tattoo of a floral anatomical heart for his lost childhood love.

Marrow.

Me.

“No threads connect us …” I whisper again, my gaze on the feathers peeking out from the collar of his shirt, kissing his neck. More tattoos decorate his forearms and the backs of his hands.

Feathers because his inner beast is a gryphon. Half- eagle, half-lion. A guardian of the divine. Which is ridiculously appropriate because I’m … I’m …

I’m the aspect of a goddess myself.

That power is still unsettled within me, though.

As if it hasn’t infused itself on a molecular level yet, hasn’t completely permeated my soul.

I press my hand over the necklace tucked under my sweater — a massive pink-diamond amulet caged in threads of gold that teem with power separate from my own.

That artifact, heavy with metaphorical weight rather than actual physical mass, appeared around my neck at the moment of my aunt’s death.

It’s supposed to help me navigate … well, all of what it means to be the Conduit.

Rought tightens his hold on my left hand and draws it against his chest, so I can feel his heart beating. Steady and sure. His body heat radiates through his shirt, warming my chilly fingers.

And I know now … I know the other reason I haven’t felt wholly realized in a very long time. One of three reasons, at least.

Including the male staring at me with concern, in wonder, with the burnished gold of his gryphon ringing his blue-green eyes.

Rought.

My soul-bound mate.

Mine.

I’ve been … rudderless, aimless, reckless. I thought that was just my nature. Because I was destined to be the next Conduit, pulled back from death numerous times because I had a duty to the fucking universe. Not truly a person, just a vessel-in-waiting.

And also … banished, I now realize, from the property, from the intersection point my aunt held — one of only se ven active secondary anchors for all essence.

Though once there were nine intersection points in total.

Energy, or life force depending on various belief systems, is first anchored in the Conduit, then woven around the globe through the intersection points in a protective boundary.

I’ve been banished from the family that could have been mine.

“Thirteen years ago …” I murmur, starting to piece it together. Thread by thread. Maybe I can weave it all back into place? First in my mind, and then … gathering the missing pieces of my soul?

Rought swallows harshly, drawing my gaze back to the tanned skin of his neck. “Yes. Almost thirteen years now …” The Southern drawl to his accent is tinged with old grief. “We had part of that summer together.”

His gaze flicks to the black-and-white photograph on the wall behind me.

One of the numerous photos I’ve just discovered in the second bedroom of the caretaker’s suite in the workshop-barn.

Taken by Mack, the former occupant of these rooms and my aunt’s recently deceased chosen.

The space is just white-painted walls, worn wood floors, and at least twenty identically framed eighteen-inch photographs.

All taken without our knowledge, according to Rought— and to my still-hazy memories of the time I spent at the Gage estate, from childhood through my teenage years.

I don’t have to turn to recall the photo that’s captured Rought’s attention over my shoulder. The moment immortalized within it, of which I have no actual memory, is already burned into my brain.

The three half-brothers and me by a campfire on the beach in monochrome. Rought, Rath, and Reck. Starlight overhead. And anatomical hearts tattooed across all our chests.

“I died … that summer,” I say.

“Yes.”

“I don’t remember that either.”

“I do.” Rought’s thumb brushes against the back of my hand still pressed against his chest. His caress is tender, comforting.

It was my instinct only a day ago now to reach for him, to lay my hand across his chest, to touch him exactly like this at our first meeting.

Or what I thought to be our first meeting.

I stopped myself for a multitude of reasons.

Because I don’t touch easily. Because anyone remotely aware of what the energy roiling around me portends, or what the vibrant violet of my eyes indicates, is wary of my touch, of my mere attention.

I am a power in this world. And not by choice.

But even without the threads that should connect us, I felt that urge, that need to touch him. To connect us. I felt it, questioned it, and tried to ignore it.

I tear my gaze from his neck, from the wretched sadness in his gaze, and look at his hand.

His right hand holding my left. I twist that hand, maintaining contact with his chest — and uncertain as to whether I can actually pull away right now.

I brush my thumb across the scar on the pad of his thumb.

My teeth marks.

He shudders under my touch.

A sliver of warmth cracks through the grief that has numbed me from within. I’ve lost so much … and the framed photographs lining the walls of this otherwise empty room are a visual map of all that loss … yet …

Rought is standing here now, with me .

“You … loved me.”

“I love you,” he says, utterly intent.

The word, the steady assertion, fucking tears through me, taking the rest of my breath with it. And I welcome the sensation. I can’t remember a single person other than my mother who ever said those words to me. And truly meant them.

Then grief-fueled pain streaks through my head, through my eyes, and more tears take my sight.

No one loves me. No one truly can love me.

Because I’m not a person. Not really.

“I’m the Conduit now,” I say dully. “I’m not the girl in the pictures. The girl you loved.”

“Tell me about the threads,” he rasps, speaking through whatever emotion clogs his throat.

Confused by the topic change, I blink up at him. I’m still holding his hand. I should let him go. I know I should.

I don’t.

I don’t let him go.

It’s possible that I’m suddenly and irrevocably unable to let him go, not ever again.

“Do you mean threads that should bind us?” he asks, clarifying because I can’t find focus, can’t find my voice. “Actual essence that you can normally see? Tell me about those. And how we create new ones if those have been taken from us.”

My chin trembles as I struggle to not be overwhelmed by the magnitude of the loss he’s describing.

“It’s not that … that’s not … it shouldn’t be possible to take those sorts of bindings.

Even death … even the death of our physical vessel cannot …

shouldn’t be able to snip those threads, those soul-deep connections …

we should … if we’re … soul-bound mates are … ”

He brings his free hand to my cheek, brushing away a tear while still barely touching me. “I will never, ever be dragged away from you again, Zaya. Half dead myself or banned from the property, I will never —”

“What do you mean?” A chill slithers down my spine, my tears drying in an instant. “Banned from the property?”

Rought snaps his mouth shut, grimacing.

“All this time,” I say, feeling as if I’m clawing through a thick fog that I can’t actually shift, can’t actually find clarity within. But still piecing it all together bit by bit. “You thought I was dead.”

“Yes.” He shakes his head. “No. I knew … my beast knew you weren’t.”

“You didn’t say anything.” My voice cracks. “Why?! Why wouldn’t you … and Rath … he … he must have recognized me?”

He exhales shakily. “You didn’t know me, Zaya.

And I didn’t know why. I didn’t want to force anything that might cause further damage.

I thought if I could show you, spend time with you, that maybe you’d remember me …

” He swallows again, then shakes his head.

“And Rath. That’s not for me to say or even to know. ”

“Did you … were you involved in my death that summer?”

He blinks at me, slightly taken aback.

“Aunt Disa banned you from the property,” I say, clarifying.

“I tried to protect you,” he whispers. “I failed. I was … some of it is still hazy for me. I think I blacked out a few times. I didn’t have my beast then.”

“You saw me die.”

“Heard it … felt it …” His chest heaves under my hand. “Wish ed I’d gone with you when I woke up in the hospital a week later.”

I take a shuddering breath, still not processing things at the same pace they’re being revealed. Rought takes a deep breath as well, his chest expanding under my hand.

“I was banished too, I think,” I say. “But I didn’t know it.”

He nods his head reluctantly, thoughtfully. “Maybe this is too much right now … trying to figure that part out right now.”

“The part where I died?” Anger flushes through me, making me even more shaky and a little lightheaded. “Then my aunt, my mentor, my protector, did … what? Did she just decide I would never cross paths with my soul-bound mates again? Why? Why would she …”

I shake my head. My chest hurts from all the emotion I’m trying to navigate, to contain, to process.

“Yeah,” Rought says, offering me a completely inappropriate grin. As if he finds my anger delightful. Though maybe anger is better than the numbness I’ve likely been radiating. “Maybe we figure that part out later.”

I laugh involuntarily. It’s a harsh, ragged sound full of disbelief. But it is a laugh. “You want to just be here in the now ?”

He tilts his head in that shifter way, lots of eagle in the mannerism, grin widening. “With you, yes.”