Page 66 of Shrine of Fire

Nova told me she lost her pack. This specter sought to use it against her.

I bristled. Not when I was here. Not when the urge to push the spirit away warred with the grief that the creature was trying to leach out of me like a poison.

“Get back,” I snarled. I held my hands up, like the death spirit was a horse. Magic pulsed inside me and Hella Mora locked gazes with me.

“Your kind are an afterthought,” she chuckled. “Long gone into the dust.”

“Seems like you’re not the only thing finding its way back.” I held my hands up, trying to push the spirit away.

Kalahar rained fire down on the spirit. She dodged, but his efforts were only enough to keep her distracted.

Aki appeared next to me, and I jumped. I’d been concentrating so hard on the spirit that everything else had fallen away.

“Nova?”

“She’ll be fine if you push the spirit back out of our world.” He put a hand on my shoulder, and electric heat zapped me. I shuddered as sudden desire raced through me. All of Nova’s men were attractive, but I hadn’t allowed myself to fantasize any further than touching her.

The delta’s touch went straight to my cock, and I shifted away. “I’m trying to focus, not fuck you on the side of the road.”

Aki looked surprised, and then amused. “Iamhelping you focus. It’s not my fault your mind is in the gutter.”

I muttered, using the new burst of energy to center myself. “I have no idea what I’m doing.”

“Push her through the holes in the world.” Aki gestured in front of us. “You’ll see it much clearer than me.”

I grunted, trying to move my sudden erection so that I could focus. Aki had a severe beauty that made me want to throw myself against it, like a mountain I could never climb.

Pushing my thoughts away from climbing, I scanned the horizon past the spirit. Anguish pressed at me and dark thoughts—that this was pointless, I would be dead soon, we all would be dead—dragged through me.

I leaned against the delta, some of his energy snapping back against mine and buoying me up. I’d never been bonded, but I assumed this felt similar. It steadied me, sent some of the dark thoughts to the further reaches of my mind.

I growled, stalking toward Hella Mora. “You are not allowed here.”

Hella Mora wailed, her deathly pallor sucking at my soul, the sound leaching all color from the world. My beloved russet grasses and mosses went white, and I shuddered at the wrongness of her presence.

I tried to find the hole Aki had spoken of, but I didn’t see anything. Nova wailed, and a quick glance at her showed her deathly pale.

“Hurry up,” Aki snapped, still holding his knife to the spirit. “She’s draining Nova.”

“I’m trying,” I snapped, stepping closer to Hella Mora. No holes. No dark places, nothing but the open highland and a spirit making hope feel like a fool’s game.

The phoenix darted at the phantom, flying away only to snap back, but his movements were getting slower.

I scanned the horizon, suddenly wishing I was back at the Silver Lakes. I could have put her in the hole between the lake and sky.

“Yes, that, do that.” This close, Aki’s harsh features were as deadly as they were alluring. I hadn’t been able to understand why Nova wanted someone so sharp around her, not when she was wounded herself, but now I knew. She saw herself reflected in his eyes, like he would carry all her burdens himself.

I took a deep breath in. “I could do this at the Silver Lakes, but we’re not there.”

“Reach for how it makes you feel.” Aki’s fingers dug into my shoulder, and more of that pain-pleasure sensation at his touch raced through me like the finest whiskey.

“Give in,” the spirit whispered. It felt like she whispered in my ear alone but judging from the way Aki flinched and gritted his teeth, he felt the impact too.

Give in, I thought.Give in to the pain. Like when I practiced with the sword too long, and my body ached.

Pain was a tool, like anything else. The spirit wanted me to lay down in the grass and give myself over to the death that comes for us all.

I was fighting too hard. This time, when I looked for the place where the earth and sky kissed, I needed not to force it. It would simply be there once I quieted myself enough to see it.

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