Page 69 of Reaper's Reward

He reached and cupped the back of my head before pressing a kiss to my forehead. “It means that they’re afraid of us.”

It sure as hell didn’t feel like it. Fenrir might have been afraid of me and my potential in the beginning, but a lot had happened since then. His power had only grown.

“Let’s go find this bastard so we can live out the fate that you wove for us. All right?” Maddox’s hand lingered on me as he pulled back.

I covered his hand with my own and breathed deep to prepare myself. A few breaths weren’t going to steady the nervous energy rocking my stomach. I had to get up and move forward regardless.

Outside, we followed an obvious trail. There were patches missing from the landscape. Fenrir had consumed everything from foliage to sidewalk. I gaped at the perfect circles of missing concrete even though it shouldn’t have come as a surprise. The man had eaten half a car in front of us.

I warned Maddox that Fenrir had come back here to devour Beryl. She would provide him with more power than these little snacks offered. If we were lucky, Beryl would be hiding somewhere far away from here. Still, I asked Maddox to prepare for the worst-case scenario.

The well of power inside me had been refilled, but I was still nervous to draw upon it after Fenrir proved that it could be emptied so easily. I couldn’t be selfish with my power. It meant little to Fenrir because he could drink it down the same way that Maddox could. My arcana was better in Maddox’s hands.

As if he could hear my thoughts, his stomach growled hungrily. He flinched, his upper lip curling in anger. Here, under the bright daytime sun, I noticed the gaunt shadows beneath his eyes.

“You’ve been starving yourself,” I realized.

Maddox gave a half shrug. “Is it starving yourself if you’re never truly sated?”

I took ahold of him by the front of his shirt and slammed my lips into his. With his mouth on mine, I shoved arcana into him. I gave and gave until I was afraid there might be nothing left of me.

That wasn’t the case this time. The sea of power remained infinite. No matter how much I poured into Maddox, my sea steadily replenished itself like I had a direct line into the void of death itself.

The color returned to Maddox’s face, but a scowl took up place on his lips.

“Together, we can do anything,” I told him as I gazed up into his dark eyes.

He let out a long-suffering sigh, and it seemed like he resigned himself to the truth of the matter.

“Don’t detectives usually have partners? I would have thought you’d be used to working with someone by now.” I smirked as I teased him.

He was solid and real beneath the hand I kept pressed to his chest. That was until my hand sank through his body. My stomach flipped. Eyes wide, I gaped up at my husband. His brow furrowed. He looked down and saw my hand inside his translucent form.

“No. No, no, no…” Panic hit my system and turned my blood cold.

I patted his form only to fall through him each time. Maddox backed up and lifted his hands to take in his own palms. When he looked back to me, there was a clear question on his face. Unfortunately, I could barely think through my own fear. I had no answer for him.

“What’s going on? What’s happening to you?” My voice hitched, rising before breaking completely.

Maddox kept fading. I could see the lake and the city through him. Any moment, he would vanish completely. I wrapped my hands with my arcana and reached for him to see if I could grab ahold of him. Once more, I went straight through him like he was nothing more than a ghost.

“No!” I damn near stomped my foot in defiance.

Maddox lifted his see-through hands as if to cup my face. He offered an easy smile, the same kind he might give to a distraught mother worried about her son’s fate at the police station. I wanted to shove him off and tell him that he wasn’t hiding the fear in his own eyes, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

“I’ll find you no matter what separates us,” he growled. There was a firmness in his voice that spoke of a promise. “Like you said, you and I can do anything together.”

“But we won’t be together! You…you won’t even be here.”

I had no idea what was happening or where he was going. Was he dying? Why? What washappening?

A scream filled my throat. I knew it would be raw and angry if I let it out. I was sorely tempted. We were back in Lakesedge, after all. But I had to keep it together for Maddox. It didn’t matter if we were in the washed-out landscape of Lakesedge. There wasn’t much time left. He was barely more than an after-image, an impression of light left where there had been a man.

I flung my arcana into Maddox’s fate thread and turned it into a chain the way that Hel had taught me. It snapped taut between us like a leash, but that didn’t stop whatever was happening to Maddox. I’d tethered him to myself, so his soul couldn’t go anywhere.

His soul…

It was already with me. I had it inside me, so the chain would do nothing to keep his body here.

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