Page 59 of Junk Magic

He liked this one.

And apparently, she liked him back, too, because the next moment, I felt the two heavily muscled bodies come into contact once more, this time pushing against each other, testing the other out. Their claws were sheathed, but that could change in an instant and they both knew it. Yet they apparently thought the reward was worth the risk.

She liked how big he was, how solid. Liked that she wasn’t sure she could take him. Wanted to try.

For his part, he seemed fascinated by her scent, butting his head against her, dragging it along her fur. She snarled a warning when he got too close to her neck, and he bared his teeth in return. Yet he backed off, unwilling to allow this to descend into a fight.

He liked her. He wanted her. He tried to mount her, but she growled and slipped out from under. She wasn’t having it, yet she looked at him over her shoulder, a come-hither look that could have been playful or a trap.

Or possibly both.

I wasn’t even sure, and he was just as confused, with the great face displaying an almost human-like puzzlement as he stared after her. Not that it lasted for long. Because Cyrus in either guise was a take-charge type of guy, in the habit of going straight after what he wanted.

And he wanted her.

He bounded after her, in whatever metaphysical plane they were occupying, and she evaded again—but halfheartedly this time. More as if she was putting up a show than genuinely trying to avoid him. But then, she didn’t have to.

“Lia—” Cyrus said, half strangled. And then stopped, as if he didn’t know what he was asking.

I did, but I couldn’t give him what he wanted, couldn’t release her, couldn’t manifest my alter ego and set us both free. Couldn’t do anything but shiver and shake against him, feeling his beast’s frustration as if it were my own. It wanted, it hungered, it liked this one, the darkly dangerous predator at its side. And that was rare among Weres, who often found that their beasts were not compatible even though the humans were.

It led to all kinds of trouble, including married couples breaking up because their beasts couldn’t get along. Or resulted in strange, blended families when the original couple wasn’t willing to part, and had to invite their beast’s preferred partners to join them, something that rarely worked out. It was why some clans required both prospective pairs to be compatible before a marriage was allowed, as there was often at least some disconnect that needed to be resolved.

But not here.

And it was tragic, because our alter egos didn’t understand. They weren’t human and didn’t think as humans do. They saw, they approved, they wanted . . .

And discovered that they couldn’t have.

I heard Cyrus’s wolf howl in my mind, a cry of pain-filled yearning. She was the one he’d waited for, hungered for, ached for; why wouldn’t she come to him? Why wouldn’t she Change?

And she didn’t understand any more than he did. Syndromes meant nothing to her, just human words for the cage she had never been able to escape. But she tried suddenly, as she hadn’t in years, throwing herself against the bars, battering them with her anger, her loneliness, her pain. Gouging them with claws she’d never used, because they weren’t real, any more than she was.

Just a phantom . . .

“She’s real enough,” Cyrus whispered against my hair, but it didn’t help, wasn’t true.

Neuri was an evil, wicked thing, destroying my other half before she was even born, but leaving her spirit to haunt me. And now she would haunt him as well, with the knowledge of what we could have had. A perfectly matched pair, so rare, so prized, and so not to be.

“You deserve better,” I told him shakily, because it was true. Better than a fucked-up war mage with PTSD who didn’t even know who—or what—she was.

A finger tilted up my face. “There is no one better,” he said savagely. “There never has been. There never will be.”

I searched the strange, whiskey-colored eyes. In sunlight, they were simply brown, with a bit of variation near the pupil with a brighter color that was almost, but not quite, gold. But here in the darkened hallway, where they made their own light as his power rose, they were burnt umber and deep copper, blending into an almost sherry-red, and appeared completely sincere.

Hell, they probably were sincere; he probably believed that this could work, as I once had. But it couldn’t. This was worse than when another Were’s wolf didn’t like you—far worse.

Because ours did, and now they knew it and so did we. And, suddenly, that half of a life didn’t feel like enough anymore. Not even close.

How could I say I loved him and condemn him to this? Our beasts were part of us in a way I hadn’t understood before, because how could I? I couldn’t share it.

But he could, and with another like him—

“There is no other!” Cyrus’s eyes flashed because I must have whispered that aloud. “There never will be!”

“So, you’ll live like this? A half life—”

“It’s not half!”

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