Page 108 of Ulune's Daughter

I’m losing my mind. His scent is so thick and clear I can taste it, richer than the caramel cheesecake squares Carrie and Jane fed me for dessert. Fur and sweat and hot copper and the midnight breeze and just the faintest hint of Isla Cedros’ juniper and mist. I can smell him; I know it’s him.

He doesn’t answer. I didn’t see him when I came back from the bathroom, but he might have a way of hiding in plain sight. Barely anything’s known about the Cait. I have no idea what powers he has.

“Lawson?” I whisper again. My voice cracks and my eyes prickle. I want him so much I’m imagining things. I know human schizophrenics have auditory hallucinations. Do magi have olfactory hallucinations? Is that a thing? I rub my hands over my face. “I’m going crazy.”

“You’re not.”

I jump up and whirl around. He’s standing on the other side of the bed. Shadow cloaks everything but his gleaming eyes and bare chest.

“Are you really here?” I whisper.

The dark outline of his head bobs.

“Forgive me, Kellan,” he says softly. “I don’t mean to trespass. I wouldn’t have followed you here, only ... I’ve been worried about you.”

My heart leaps into my throat. I gulp, swallowing hard. I want to rush to him, feel him fold me in his strong arms, hold me the way he has ... many nights. I don’t know why I feel that, but I do. He’s held me, cared for me, many more nights than the one I remember.

But I can’t let him anymore. Not while this unknown power cloaks me, while this strange doom hangs over me.

“Thank you,” I say. The words sound cold in my ears and I struggle for something more. Something that better expresses how I feel. “I’ve felt very alone recently and having you come here, checking on me, it helps ... sincerely.”

He strides around the bed. “Then why aren’t you in my arms?”

I back up toward the bathroom door.

“I’m not—it’s not safe, Lawson. My power’s unstable. I could hurt you?—”

He grabs me, in the same sort of possessive, loving rage I sometimes see in Whitey’s eyes. He sweeps me up against his chest and holds me tightly. A deep, low rumble vibrates through him.

“I don’t fear you,” he murmurs into my hair. “Should you hurt me, I will heal. As I’ve healed from a hundred wounds suffered in defense of our people. Pain is nothing to fear. What I fear, what’s kept me awake at night, what’s brought me lurking in the shadows of this house uninvited, is losing you to whatever it is you fear. I waited for you to call me. But I was wrong in waiting a second time. I should have intruded as soon as I sensed your sadness.”

I shake my head, but wind my arms around his muscular, naked chest.

He strokes his hand over my hair and presses his lips to my crown. “Everything I have is yours, Kellan. Anything you ask, I will find a way to give you. Anything. Everything. Come with me. You need not depend on the Naga’s hospitality. Come with me to Cait House and be safe. Let me care for you, mate.”

Everything in me wants to go. My heart’s leaping, blood hammering in my ears. “I—Carrie and Jane, they’ve been so kind. I can’t disappear in the middle of the night.”

He lifts his head, coolness replacing the warmth of his breath in my hair. “One of the Naga is awake. We’ll tell her.”

A sliver of sanity chills the heat of being held. “You’re naked. And what about my cat? I can’t leave Whitey. This is a strange house. He’ll be confused and scared.”

“I’ll wear shadows. The Naga will see nothing she should not. And your cat is fine. He’s hiding right now. He won’t come out while I’m here, but I can smell him. He’ll be well taken-care of by your friends until we return.”

“I—” I’m out of excuses. And I don’t want to find any more. I want to be with him. Ineedhim. “Okay. Yes, please.”

He takes my hand and leads me through the dark house to Carrie’s office on the first floor. The door’s cracked and mellow light shines into the hallway. I tap softly before pushing the door open.

Carrie’s sitting at the double desk she shares with Jane, glasses perched on her nose as she types. She’s wearing a dressing gown embroidered with peacocks, bright splashes of color in the otherwise muted dove gray of the room’s décor.

When I poke my head through the doorway, she looks up, a smile quirking the corners of her lips. “Go with him,” she says.

I chuckle. “You could at least let me ask first.”

“I prefer not to waste time. I have a great deal to do yet and the hour grows late.”

Carrie’s nocturnal, so she’ll be heading to bed when the sun rises, unless she has a morning class.

“Thank you for everything. Please thank Jane too. I won’t be gone long.”

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