Page 65 of A Touch of Gold and Madness

Chrome chuckled. “We trained together a bit. He used to be such a cocky asshole, but I saw the pressure he was under. He never veered from his orders, always playing exactly by the book. The perfect soldier.”

I nodded, never having thought of it like that before. I wondered if Scarlett had.

“Cardinal, though,” Chrome said as he cracked a smile. “He’s my age, so I spent more time around him during my teen years. He was a bit more rebellious,” he explained, his grin wistful. “But with flattery and innocent denials, he could pretty much get away with anything.”

That sounded similar to Scarlett, but she didn’t even try hiding her rebelliousness. I struggled to imagine Cardinal the way Chrome described him, almost like they were friends. Perhaps they were. “He’s changed a lot.” I never realized he’d been anything besides the stoic statue he was now. “I’ve worked with him before on occasion. He’s an assassin like me, but he’s never struck me as having much of a personality.”

Chrome’s brows furrowed, and his shoulders dropped more. He finished cooking the piece of meat, then held it over his lap to cool. “Well, I guess, like the rest of us, that rebelliousness caught up to him.”

I swallowed and looked back at the fire that bathed the piece of turkey I held. “I suppose so.”

A heavy silence filled with the weight of our pasts sank over us. We sat in the pitch dark with only the light of our campfire illuminating the surrounding space.

I thought about the version of Cardinal I knew. To learn he’d once been a vibrant and youthful kid, that sounded so similar to Scarlett, disheartened me. I wondered what had changed for him. What had stolen his light?

I thought of Scarlett’s give-no-fucks attitude. Surely by now, my father had discovered her and Cotton’s involvement in my escape. And that meant one of two things: they were dead, or they were being tortured into submission. I prayed to the gods that neither was the case, and they’d listened to me. But we lived in a world orchestrated by a madman, and I no longer believed they’d get out of there alive.

Chapter 25

Chrome

The night sky blanketed me overhead as the stars peeked through the trees’ canopy. I lay with my fingers laced together at the back of my head, breathing in the dying scent of fall. The temperature chilled me, but it was nothing compared to the icy numbness I’d been living with for the past year.

The moment Gray drifted off into a deep slumber, I rose from the cold, hard tundra, sneaking back into the thicket to meet with my contact regarding the information surrounding Forest and his plans. They also needed to be informed about the portal and the beastie-bear.

Afterward, I found a small clearing in the woods, and sprawled on the leaf covered dirt, basking in nature. Serenity nestled deep within as I meditated, feeling whole and content. Gratitude expanded my chest as I felt the best I had in years.

Time seemed to suspend as I lay in solitude, unsure how long I’d been there. I took this time to just…be. To be myself again with my own thoughts and emotions. I knew it could be ripped away at any moment, and I wanted to cherish the moments of lucidity I had been graced with.

I felt her before I heard her.

“You make it a habit to lie in the woods alone?”

I didn’t say anything as I patted the spot beside me in a gesture for her to join me.

Gray’s steps were careful as she sat down on my left before reclining onto her back. For several minutes, neither of us spoke. I rolled my head to the side and caught the silhouette of her side profile. Her glamoured white hair glowed from the moonlight, and for once, she bore a relaxed expression.

“What woke you?” I asked.

A long pause strung out the silence, leaving only the crickets and frogs to respond in her wake. Finally, she said, “Nightmare.”

An ache in my heart had me almost lifting my hand to cup the side of her face, but I refrained. “They don’t ever really go away.”

A nod. “I figured.”

“I know where we’re going goes against everything you’ve been taught about Elementals, but you won’t be alone anymore. You’ve never truly been alone.”

Gray shifted to meet my eyes, then rumpled her brows with a slight pinch. “What do you mean?”

I offered the smallest of smiles, wishing I could tell her the whole truth about everything. She deserved to know, but I couldn’t bring myself to flip her world over again just yet. “You’ll see.”

“You’re so fucking cryptic,” Gray retorted with an eye roll. “Do you have any guesses as to how that beastie-bear came here? Or where it came from?”

“Beastie-bear?” A chuckle slipped out at the nickname I bestowed upon that thing.

“Yeah, that’s what you called it, right?”

I mulled over her question, then nodded. “I’ll claim that as the official term. It’s settled.”

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