Page 79 of Witchbane

“Tricksters eat too much power to remain, even if I wanted to play with him for a bit.” She ran a hand over my hair and face. “You remind me of him. In small ways. I’d almost forgotten the wily smile of my fox.” She let out a soft sigh then stepped away. “Take him away.”

The unyielding hand lifted me, and I thought we’d go back down the stairs, but the ground vanished and I was dropped into darkness. One of thoseAlice in Wonderlanddrops into the floating abyss, but only for a few seconds, a few heart-stopping seconds.

I landed in the middle of a forest. The trees seemed normal rather than the terrifying zombie gnomes of the incarnations of Underhill’s creation.

I rolled over, feeling aches in every part of my body. Then lay, blinking up through the tree canopy, branches barren and giving me the clear pinpricks of starlight. Was I back? The cold air stung my lungs and chilled my bare flesh though I could feel the heat of the kitsune.

Was it odd to feel wrung out? Like I’d run a couple marathons? Or, had the entirety of Underhill’s power pulled from me, after devouring the last dredges of that living world. I gulped, trying to control the tremble that began at the thought of leaving Liam behind.

Voices drifted through the trees.

For half a second I thought it was the wolves, come to find me, sensing me, though I felt too raw to define the pack bonds at that moment. The sound of people, humanity, gave me a glimpse of joy and hope. Maybe they would have Liam with them already and I could be home and safe. Only it wasn’t our pack that appeared through the trees like dark, slinking demons. It was vampires.

The scent hit me first, a weird, musty, old fabric sort of smell. As though they still wore the clothes they’d died in. The lack of defined shadows, and the presence of only black masses creeping through the trees, told me instantly they weren’t wolves or friendly.

I tried to get up, thinking I’d run, but one was there, fist smashing into my face before I could breathe. I vaguely recalled the familiar blond hair and snarl of a vampire Liam had feared would come for me. Then thankfully, there was a blessed moment of unconsciousness that arose.

* * *

For a whileI floated between nightmares and sweet dreams. The nightmares were of a fight. Battling monsters my brain refused to fully visualize, and the dreams, slow and sweet. A few times the sweet dreams would start, but then quickly fizzle to a stop. Like I could see Liam for a second, and then he was gone, plunging me back into a nightmare.

I sat withApafor a bit. He sang one of his old songs, this one a bit sad, but not the bitter tunes I could recall from times of old. Twice, the memory of him changed into some sort of dragon thing locked within obsidian stone, knocked me out of peaceful dreams and into nightmares, dropping me into a spiral of falling, illness, and pain, and then an upward climb to find peace again.

Always, the battle. Liam bleeding.Apa’sterror filled face. Too much! Fear and grief overwhelmed me. I felt like I was curled into a ball, trying to hold myself together even while I sobbed.

Then sweet warmth descended again. A tiny trickle of it at first, like drops of rain on a warm summer night after I’d spent months on a frozen tundra. Bits of comfort sliding across my soul like water, leaving trails of happy memories and hope.

I worked hard not to grasp for it, or struggle to hold it in place, letting it settle and wash over me gently, easing the nightmares away. The rain rinsed away the darkness, and with the lifting of the fog, suddenly Liam and I sat in a courtyard. There were trees and grass, green and lush, and a small garden with the smell of flowers on the wind. In the distance there were stone walls, and the sky above appeared blue and clear.

Liam looked tired. Tiny strands of white peppered his beard and teased through his hair, almost lost in the blond, but silver enough to stand out. His smile was genuine as he reached out a hand, not for me as I was right beside him, but for the child who came running into his embrace. Liam caught the little one, wrapping his strong arms around them and squeezing them in a tight hug before he teased the child with kisses, peppering their hair and face with noisy smacks that made the child giggle.

The sound expanded in my heart with a blossom of warmth, home, and happiness I couldn’t ever recall experiencing before. I gasped at the intensity, sucking in deep breaths of air as the mate bond resettled over me, awakening me to a thousand thoughts and feelings at once.

It was a bit overwhelming, wading through all that. A sweet rush of peace and love eased around me, like it simply waited for me to accept it.

For a moment I wondered if we were all dead and that was why I was dreaming this. Death could be peace, right? Returning to those who loved us. I’d never much believed in an afterlife, preferring to have faith that death meant an end to all the pain.

That was before Liam. Before my heart had found a home. And as I gazed at Liam, I loved him madly, even with the small changes of age. Odd as werewolves didn’t normally age. Their regeneration abilities became a fountain of youth once they survived that first change. But there he was, looking beautiful and distinguished, but like he’d had a decade added to his life that I’d missed.

I touched his face, and he turned toward me, kissing the palm of my hand and rewarding me with a smile even while he still rocked the child and hugged them tight.

The child was young, perhaps little more than a toddler, maybe early school age? I hadn’t known enough people with children in my life to know for sure. It wasn’t Nicky. I could briefly recall him eating cookies at the shop and thinking he’d been younger then, younger than this child at least.

I felt momentarily lost. Missing information as the wash of rusty red hair on their head matched mine, not Liam’s.

“It’s the first time you’ve visited us and stayed for more than a few seconds,” Liam said. “This has to be good news.”

The child turned my way, their eyes huge and the bright, clear blue of Liam’s in the right eye, and my soft chocolate brown in the left. The gaze was a bit unnerving at first, like they were looking through me, seeing deep down into the very core of me. All those messed-up bits I tried to hide, bared for them. But they turned and flung themselves into my arms. I caught them, held them tight, suddenly surrounded by warmth, the scent of my mate and fresh honey, and the tie to the pack arising. It awakened a thousand sensations in me, reviving not only my tie to the pack, but to Liam and beyond to this tiny creature in my arms.

“There it is,” Liam let out a long sigh. “Time is really off here,” he muttered, looking past us. Kiran’s fox perched on a rock a few yards away, gaze intent on the little one wrapped around me. “Feels like forever.”

Worlds aren’t built in a day,Kiran’s voice trickled through my brain.The bond is open.

Liam nodded. “Does that mean he is only now awakening in the other world?”

Kiran’s fox seemed to shrug.Perhaps.

Nick sat some distance away, a book open in front of him, ignoring everyone in favor of whatever he was writing. Little things flitted around us with bright colors and excitement. It felt like a fairytale, back with Liam, even if nothing made sense. Was this a dream?