Page 23

Ivy

M y lungs didn’t burn from the exertion like I thought they would.

Being pushed to the back of my own consciousness gave me time to think about where I—we?

—were going. Focusing on the physical became easier.

The cold rock beneath my paws that seemed unending.

The weak whispers of a breeze as we ran through the barren landscape, seeing nothing for miles other than rock and ocean.

Just…rock and ocean.

If it weren’t for the fact that I felt the bonds clearly in my chest, I would think I was utterly alone. I knew my mates were somewhere near, maybe not close, but they were okay.

But even after hours of running, they were still asleep.

Which meant wherever they were, they were being held captive.

The wolf slowed, and we came to a small stream cutting through the chilled lava. My beast sniffed it and reared back. The salty brine of the ocean still wafted over us, telling me we hadn’t made it as far from the ocean as I’d hoped, and the little stream was a branch of it.

My wolf huffed and lowered herself onto her belly, resting her head on her front paws.

Internally, I screamed for her to get up.

To keep moving. But as much as I tried, I realised just how exhausted my poor beast was.

I wasn’t the only one desperate to find them.

She had a particular connection to Elias’s wolf, and she so desperately wanted to be reunited with him.

Frustration built within me as I looked through her eyes at the landscape.

It was a muddy picture of everything I’d already seen from my own eyes.

Endless sky and nothing else. The ocean at our backs, and barren terrain ahead.

When I’d first thought about hell, I’d thought about a place like this.

A place lacking hope or life. But meeting creatures from here, learning more about the Underworld and demons, I realised I was wrong.

But maybe I hadn’t been. Because this sure as hell felt like a hopeless wasteland.

Maybe we’d gone in the wrong direction. Should I have walked the other way around the volcano? Would that have changed anything?

Goddess above, what had I done?

My wolf whimpered, closing her eyes, forcing me to stop taking in the world around us. Somehow, though, being trapped in my own mind was worse.

What if my mates had put blocks on the bonds to keep me from realising anything was wrong?

For the first time since I’d given into the wolf, I decided to prod the bonds.

I first went to Rowan’s golden-yellow thread, which looked almost the same as it had the day we completed the bond.

I touched it carefully, reaching for some kind of impression of what he was doing—even thinking—but nothing came back.

It should have scared me, but it wasn’t the same dark nothing when Dante blocked our bonds. I still had no idea how he’d done that, and neither had the others.

But that wasn’t the case here, at least, not with Rowan.

The more I tested, the clearer it became that he was sleeping.

There was a hazy, almost filmy barrier between us.

It reminded me of a gauzy sheet, and when I pressed against it, the film moved with me.

But it gave me some hint of what was happening in his mind.

A small part of me didn’t like the idea of prying, but the larger, more concerned part pushed through the discomfort and into the dream.

For a moment, I saw nothing but darkness. Then, I heard soft laughter. My stomach knotted as I pushed my way through the darkness towards the sound.

The scene came fractured at first; Rowan on a bed, lying on his side.

There was clearly a body beside him, and based on the movements, I was pretty sure it was me, but the film over the moment stopped me from being sure.

Rowan spoke, voice low, moving to almost hover over me, but I couldn’t make out what was being said.

Only the soft murmur of his voice came from his end.

How had Orion managed to break into my dreams? I tried pushing my way into Rowan’s, but the barrier between us remained steady—unbending no matter what I tried .

“Rowan!” I called out mentally, his name echoing in the darkness. But it only repeated in my own head. Dream Rowan didn’t move, instead speaking like I wasn’t there.

It could have been because we were so newly bonded. I wanted to chalk it up to that. We hadn’t had enough time to explore the bond between us, and it could still be strengthening, even now.

So, I retreated from his mind, back to the different threads of life connecting me to my mates.

I considered Maeve, but had a feeling trying to enter her dreams would result in something far worse than not breaking through.

Maeve had secrets, ones she clearly wasn’t ready to divulge.

Who knew what would be going on in her dreams now?

I moved to Elias, instead. After Ry, he was my longest bond. The strongest, if I had to guess.

Still, there was a moment of hesitation as I considered the one mate I would likely be able to push through to.

Orion’s bond flickered ominously. It appeared as strong as the others, but where my team’s bonds pulsated with light, Orion’s remained still.

All the damage it had endured during his time away could be seen in the slight fraying of the bond.

Since reuniting, we hadn’t done anything to mend it.

I wasn’t even sure what could be done. Emotionally, I was exhausted by the idea of him.

Logically, I knew I had to work it out. Otherwise, we were doomed.

I hated feeling like our connection was an obligation. It was how I felt with Hawk, too. It took the love out of it. And my heart still loved Orion, despite everything—for everything.

I moved to Orion’s bond and pushed myself into it.

Like Rowan’s, Orion was clearly asleep. But where Rowan’s mind—and dream—had appeared almost calm, that wasn’t the case with my Fae mate.

His was a storm. There was no haze, but rather rain that came down in sheets, pummelling me until I felt like I was drowning.

The pressure behind it almost made me retreat, but I couldn’t.

Despite the heaviness of his mind, I forced myself through it. I searched for some kind of indication that he was in a dream. It was his power, after all. Surely, he would be locked in one like Rowan, trapped behind a gauzy film, so close yet trapped in his own mind where I could not reach.

But as I pushed through his storm, I came to an unending darkness. The rain stopped, leaving me in what looked like a small cave. Had I made it into his dream, or somewhere else? A memory? Orion had managed to push his memories into my own mind at the ball. Had I reached them on my own this time?

Surely not. Someone like Orion would have blocks to keep me out. Or he’d have had Blythe do it for him. His mind witch friend was capable of some serious mind-fuckery, having witnessed it first-hand.

But the further I moved into his mind, the less certain I became. The darkness remained a thick, heavy pressure weighing me down. But somehow, I managed to drag myself into what appeared to be a chasm.

And down I went, like Alice did Wonderland.

I knew immediately I was in a memory. The idea that we looked upon our past with rose-tinted glasses should be thrown out. Because what I was looking at was blood tinted. Painful. Rage inducing.

I was a ghost in the corner of Orion’s darkest thoughts.

Maybe his worst memories.

I felt like an invading presence. Not just mentally, but physically.

It was like I’d fallen through time and had been spat out in a different place.

I wasn’t the wolf anymore, trapped in a barren landscape where my only chance of survival lay in the paws of my beast. I was Ivy again, but this time caught in something I was never supposed to see.

And there was nothing I could do to stop the scene unfolding before me.

Horror and rage pulsated through me. The darkness was gone, replaced with a room. A small cell, really. It would be an insult to rooms. But it was tiny, designed for something small.

Like the thin boy huddled in the corner.

My heart faltered as I stared down at the trembling creature.

He had his arms wrapped around his knees, which were brought to his chest. The boy rested his forehead on his knobby kneecaps, with bloodied, dirty silver-white hair brushing his bruised skin.

Even though the room itself held no light, I could make out the wounds scattered along his flesh clearly.

From the bruising to the welts and I was certain, scars along his back.

I wanted to reach for him. But as I did, I fell again, stumbling through darkness until I came upon another memory.

This time, sunlight shone through the trees of an eerily familiar forest. A lump formed in my throat as I stared up at the canopy of leaves.

They rustled in a warm, summer breeze. The scent of rain tickled my nose as I lowered my gaze to the old hunter’s cabin.

A couple of years ago, someone tore it down.

I distinctly remembered the devastation I’d felt when Kerry told me about it, like it was last week’s gossip.

Some local kid had set fire to it first, and the old man who owned the land decided to get rid of it for good.

One weekend, without telling Kerry I was coming by, I walked the forest and found the cleared earth where it once stood. That had been the day I’d finally said goodbye to Ry.

But there, sitting against the trees, was the cabin. Younger me had seen it as a haven. Something beautiful and safe. Now, I looked at the leaning walls and rotting wood and saw something dying. Something dangerous.

“It won’t hurt you. ”

I whirled around at the sound of his voice. But it wasn’t Orion’s voice. It was Ry’s. Softer, a weak drawl to his words, like he’d rarely spoken aloud before now. I’d just thought he was shy.

But I knew better now.