The Waning Moon Page 29

  “I can’t see auras at all unless I concentrate really hard.”

  “Really?”

  “Really. Do they?”

  “Yes. Kind of. Vampires, being dead and all, don’t really have an aura. They do, however, have a reddish black glow in both their chests and their heads, which I believe signifies the fact their ‘life’ is centered in those two areas. If they’ve recently fed deeply, vamps temporarily have a weak aura that matches that of the person they drank from.”

  “Nice use of air quotes,” I congratulated her.

  “Thank you. Shifter auras come in a variety of colors, but the primary color is always a deep, verdant green. Then, depending on the animal they shift into, there is another color spiking it. Isaac’s is green and silver, like all wolves. Of course, they’re not all the same. For living creatures, an aura is like a fingerprint, but if you see a rich green aura laced with silver, you’ve got a werewolf on your hands. Green and gold mean a type of cat shifter.”

  “What about mages and the Fae?” I asked.

  “Mages all have a primary color of blue, and the secondary color depends on how they get their power. Earth mages, like me, are shot through with green. Those that get their power through religious belief or ceremony have silvery-white accents to theirs. Witches who practice blood or death magic have red or black streaks in their auras.

  “Fae are the most difficult for me to identify. There isn’t one color specific to all Fae. If I had to guess, I’d say the main color depends on the classification the Fae identifies with. Arduinna is a tree Fae, correct?”

  “I believe she’s the Green Man, or Woman, rather.”

  “So she, and all other tree Fae we’ve seen have a woodsy green aura, but hers is laced with the deep red of power. She’s more powerful than she’s let on, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Murphy, who has a similar green in her aura but much less red, is answering to Arduinna and not the other way around.”

  That gave me something to mull over for a bit. “Interesting. Maybe she is on our side, after all.”

  “Or on Arduinna’s side.”

  “I’m beginning to wonder if her side is my father’s side,” I said.

  “Didn’t she say it was?”

  “I can’t remember exactly what she said. And without an exact wording, who knows? That woman is really, really good at verbal misdirection.”

  “And are you sure your father’s side is your side?”

  “I’m absolutely sure it’s not, but I do think we’re currently aligned, as long as I don’t make too many waves.”

  “And how long is that likely to keep up?” Florence grinned at me.

  I stuck my tongue out. “Probably only until I get these gates opened. Once I can cross over myself, I’ll be making all kinds of waves. I’ll have missions! And things to do! Mates to find!” I glanced over at Isaac who hadn’t said a thing for our entire conversation. He hadn’t said much of anything for the last week. He still refused to talk about anything having to do with his plans to take the bait Michelle was dangling. I’d tried serious conversations, waiting for him to come to me, and now, light-hearted jokes about the inevitability I’d be coming Underhill, metaphorical guns blazing, to save his idiotic ass.

  He looked up then, “Idiotic?” he asked.

  I rolled my eyes. Sure and that was the one thing that’d get him to talk. Him catching a stray thought through our bond.

  He smiled at me, but the smile didn’t reach his eyes. He always looked at me that way now. Love, tinged with sadness and regret, and with an intensity that made me believe he was trying to drink me in, memorize me. It gave me the creeps and pissed me off. It was like he believed this was it but yet refused to do anything about it.

  It wasn’t quite the time for this to come to a head, but we didn’t have too much time left. Soon, I’d need to push him hard enough to make him understand. He might get to make this sacrifice of his own free will. It’s possible I could stop him, although since I’d have a gate opening to worry about, I’m not sure I could do that on my own, but he was not going to be able to stop me from coming to his rescue when I had the chance.

  “Idiotic ass.”

  It was two weeks until the solstice. Two weeks until the next gate opening. Two weeks until Isaac walked away from me.

  It wasn’t enough time. I wanted to nail down the calendar pages. I wanted to revel in the days we had left, to spend them laughing and frolicking and taking comfort in each other’s arms. The more I tried to pin time down, to force it to go slowly enough that I could wring every last drop of pleasure from it, the faster it sped along.

  Fucking time.

  There weren’t any distractions. I’d almost welcome the interruption of a band of hostile supernaturals, determined to take me down, but no one had shown their faces since the President’s announcement on Thanksgiving. We still hadn’t found out who’d set the bounty, and since no one seemed to be in a hurry to try to collect it, it didn’t seem likely we’d find out any time soon.

  Fucking cowards.

  I was trying to stay positive and upbeat and glass half fucking full, but it was difficult when I knew that in two weeks, I was losing the man I cared about—the idiot wolf I’d only known for less than half a year.

  Fucking noble werewolves.

  For some reason, Florence started avoiding me. I told myself it was because she didn’t want to interrupt any of my planned frolicking, but it might have been because my mood was darker than my dragon skin. Isaac didn’t avoid me, but he wasn’t participating in my plans to laugh and frolic and take comfort, either. He barely spoke, and his mood was even blacker than my own.

  In other words, we were a joy to be around.

  Raj hadn’t done more than pop by for brief news exchanges since Thanksgiving, and I had begun to wonder if that was my fault as well. This had to stop.

  “This has to stop,” I said out loud. Isaac and I were, once again, holed up in our motel room watching spotty television.

  “What has to stop?” Isaac asked. He didn’t take the trouble to add any inflection, and the depressed monotone was pissing me off.

  I waved my arms around to encompass him, and me, and the motel room, and everything. “This. This grumping around on both of our parts. We have two weeks minus three days left until you desert me, and we’re spending it inside a cheap motel room, barely talking and fully clothed. This is not okay.”

  “Deserting you? I am not deserting you.” His voice rose in both pitch and volume, and I felt a little relieved. Finally, the man was showing some emotion.

  “What would you call it? You’re leaving me to save your former lover at the request of the woman who had you tortured for decades. How else should I look at it?”

  There was a brief flash of yellow in his eyes, and I felt a stab of hope that we were finally going to have it out. Then it was gone. His voice returned to the same monotone I’d heard for the past week.

  “Call it whatever you want.”

  “What the everlasting fuck is wrong with you?” I yelled. I’d always been an incredibly even tempered person. Sure, I had my moments, but overall, I was cool, calm, and collected. This man knew how to push my buttons, though. “We have two weeks left before you willingly sacrifice yourself with the slim hope you’ll be able to save a woman you didn’t even know was alive for the last however many fucking years. And you’re basically ignoring me! We’ve only been mated for seven weeks, will only be together for two more, and you’re sitting over there sulking like a toddler who’s two hours past nap time.

  “We should be fucking like bunnies at this point, trying to grab every last second of pleasure and companionship we can from each other before you give yourself over to something you may or may not survive long enough for me to pull you out of! You look at me when you think I can’t see you, but the moment my attention returns to you, you glance away, like eye contact will burn you. I know you’re not tired of me. I know you still care about me. I know you aren’t looking for
ward to leaving me. And I know you don’t want to be Michelle’s prisoner again. I know these things because of our bond, but dammit, Isaac Walker, if you don’t start fucking acting like this is as hard for you as it is for me, you can spend the next two weeks without me by your side to warm your bed. Tell me what’s going on in your head. Why are you making this harder than it needs to be? Talk to me. Please.”

  He closed his eyes and tilted his head down to the floor. When he started talking, his voice was so quiet, I had to lean forward to hear him.

  “How can I be the kind of man worthy of you if I don’t try to save someone who’s in trouble because of me? I’ve spent so much time under the control of others. I don’t deserve respect—from you or from myself—if I don’t do something now.”

  I took a deep breath, framing my reply. “I can’t say I completely understand, but the one thing I do know is that this is a trap.”

  “I know it’s a trap, but I think I’ve got a shot at the Death Star, Admiral. Knowing what I’m walking into is the best way to mitigate the effects.”

  “I hate this so much.” I stifled a sob. “Please don’t.”

  He pulled me into a hug, and I buried my face in his shoulder. “I love you.”

  The left side of my mouth quirked up. I was certain my poor attempt at a grin wasn’t hiding my grief. “I know.”

  “Nerd.” He kissed me, but with none of the heat I was hoping for. A moment later, he turned back towards the television and started channel surfing again.

  I left.

  It was nearly dusk. It didn’t feel like December to me. It was disgustingly hot and humid. The temperature had been in the eighties for the past few days, and I was about done with the south. I decided it was called the Dirty South because any amount of time outside, no matter the time of year, left a body sticky and sweaty and gross and in desperate need of a shower.

  Ack! I couldn’t even enjoy the nicest winter weather I’d ever experienced because of that idiot shifter and my terrible, fucking mood. I decided to go for a walk to sweat the bitchiness out.

  I’d spent a fair amount of time over the last month familiarizing myself with Savannah, and I was comfortable I could wander without getting lost. I was dressed in jeans and a tank top. I considered finding a light shirt to put on over my tank to conceal my throwing knives and rapier, but the world had changed enough in the past weeks that no one would likely even notice I was armed, much less look twice.

  I headed towards the cemetery that housed the gate. I chose a bench as far away from the pulsing energy as possible. Even this far away, the tendrils of power reached out to me. It fed me, but fed from me, making me believe that if I lost control, I’d be trapped until it opened and spit me back out.

  Someone was watching me. Without turning, I patted the bench next to me and said, “You might as well sit down.”

  There was a whisper in the air, and Raj sat down next to me.

  “You disappeared.”

  “I went for a walk,” I countered.

  “Without telling anyone.”

  “I’m an adult. Also a dragon.”

  “There are other concerned parties who worry when you wander off.”

  “Were any of those concerned parties Isaac?”

  His silence spoke louder than words would have.

  “That’s what I thought.”

  “He loves you, you know.”

  “That doesn’t excuse him acting like a jackass.”

  “He believes that if he shuts himself down, it will hurt less when the time comes.”

  “Will it?”

  “No. It’ll hurt as badly then and more in the interim. He is acting like an idiot.”

  “You should tell him.”

  “I did.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said, and I quote, ‘Mind your own business, you stupid, fucking bloodsucker.’” Raj did a credible imitation of Isaac’s voice.

  “Rude.”

  “It was.”

  “Do you think he’ll snap out of his funk before Solstice?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Raj, I’m afraid losing him will break me.”

  “You’re unbreakable.”

  “I don’t think I am. This is the first time I’ve ever allowed myself to feel this deeply about anyone. And not only is it ending too soon, and not by my choice, but he’s not giving me—giving us—the chance to part with happy memories. Whenever I look back at this time, I’ll have these weeks of sullen hell in my memory bank.”

  “I know, my sweet.” He wrapped an arm around me, and I leaned into him.

  “Why can’t he leave me with something better?”

  Raj pressed a kiss into my hair and pulled me tight against him. We sat like that until the last of the light faded from the sky and the air cooled. “We should head back,” I said.

  “If you’d like.”

  Raj and I didn’t speak for the forty-five minutes it took to walk to the motel. My stomach growled and I hoped there was food prepared. I was getting tired of our standard fare of heated-up tinned food and sandwiches. Most of the restaurants and fast-food joints were closed now. Other than the curfew that started at ten every night, I hadn’t paid much attention to what was going on in the city. I had noticed a significant lack of fresh food options.

  “At least you always have fresh food available,” I griped to Raj. “I’m sick of canned soup and canned beans and canned meat products.”

  “It won’t be long before there are more options again,” Raj said.

  “What do you mean? Without refrigeration and transportation, how will we get this magical food of which you speak?”

  “Key phrase is magical, of course. In a few years, there will be transportation and refrigeration again. The ley lines will open for travel as soon as the magic spreads far enough across the country, and there are ways of keeping food preserved that don’t require modern technology. Some of what will happen will be magic, some will be a return to an earlier way of doing things, and some will be a combination of the two. You may not have Taco Bell any more, but there will be restaurants. Farming will continue, possibly even spread as the infrastructure of the cities begins to crumble without maintenance, and there will eventually be a way to preserve and transport food to market.”

  I felt better. I wasn’t dooming the world to a pre-stone age existence.

  “You really didn’t think of that?” Raj asked.

  “I hadn’t.”

  “Huh.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Nothing.”

  He was teasing me now, and I stuck my tongue out at him. “Watch where you point that thing. A less gentlemanly creature might take advantage of such a blatant invitation.”

  I laughed and started to answer in kind when he stopped. I had knives in my hands in a moment and looked around for the source of the attack. Nothing jumped out at me—literally or figuratively. We were on the edge of the parking lot directly across from my hotel room. The door to my room was open a crack and a sick feeling crept into my gut and built a nest.

  “What is it?” I whispered to Raj.

  “You can put your knives away,” he answered in a normal tone of voice. “No one here will attack.”

  I resheathed my knives and looked up at him and then over at the open door.

  “Raj, what’s going on?”

  He didn’t answer, but grabbed my hand before he started moving again. Whatever large bird had moved into my gut was now laying eggs and making a general nuisance of itself. This couldn’t be right.

  “Raj. Please.” I tried to tug my hand out of his, but he wouldn’t let go, and unless I wanted to be down a hand, I had to cede to his iron grip.

  Time—and Raj and me—marched inexorably on. We were far too close to the door for my comfort, and I kept trying to slow down. I didn’t know what was on the other side, but I knew it wasn’t good. I couldn’t even speculate because I couldn’t come up with a possibility tha
t would leave me sane. I decided clinging to Raj’s hand was the far better option than trying to get away again, and I hung on for dear life.

  We crossed the threshold of the room and I saw Florence sitting there. There was no blood or viscera anywhere, and for a second, I felt a great whoosh of relief. No one had died. As long as everyone was still alive, we would get through this. Florence held out a piece of paper. I took it in suddenly numb fingers. The eggs that had been laid in my stomach started hatching, and I was host to a flock of large seabirds, all clamoring for space and food and attention. I looked around for Isaac. I hadn’t missed him on the first pass. He wasn’t here.

  I looked at the folded piece of paper in my hands. Raj guided me to the bed and helped me sit down. The numbness in my fingers was spreading, but unfortunately, it wasn’t spreading to my stomach. Things there were still in an uproar.

  I stared at the piece of paper again, trying to divine its purpose.

  “I should probably read this.” My voice was as free from inflection as Isaac’s had been earlier.

  Raj sat next to me and put an arm around me. This was going to be bad.

  I opened the piece of paper. There weren’t a lot of words on it. It couldn’t possibly be enough words to break my heart. Heart-breaking should require reams of paper, or at least something legal sized, crammed full of script front and back. This was barely enough to qualify as a paragraph.

  I tried to focus on the words, but they swam in front of my eyes. I shook myself. This was ridiculous. Regardless of what I’d told Raj earlier, I was not going to break, no matter what happened. I was strong; I was independent; I didn’t need a man to complete me. And I was a motherfucking dragon in my spare time. I was unbreakable.

  “Eleanor,” Florence said. Her voice sounded like it was coming from a long way away. “You should read it before you burn it.”

  I looked down and saw smoke rising in delicate tendrils from the corners of the note. I gathered my will and tamped down the angry heat flaring through my body.

  I focused and stared at the writing until the letters came to attention and formed orderly ranks and files of words.