Page 12 of Tamed By Air (The Nature Hunters Academy 4)

Tara shrugged. “You’re stuck with us now. Get used to it.”

Ra tuned them out and turned his thoughts to Gabby’s suggestion. As far as far-fetched plans went, it wasn’t too bad. There was the minor issue of him not being able to travel to hell. He nearly snorted at that. How many times did a person tell someone else to go to hell? He would be the only one to say, “Sorry, but I cannot accommodate your demand, literally. And I actually wish I could.”

“It’s a start,” Ra said. “Though there’s a lot to consider if we manage to get me into hell.”

“Like?” Tara cocked her hip to the side and crossed her arms in front of her.

“Like getting back out again,” Ra answered. “Remember? You don’t leave hell for free. There’s a price. Every. Single. Time.”

She nodded. “All right, well then figure out what you can bargain with. Obviously not your souls.”

“That’s the currency of hell,” Ra said. “Souls.” He watched as Shelly’s best friend’s eyes narrowed, and her jaw clenched.

“You’re not helping me feel real confident in our loose-as-shite plan, Ra,” Tara said. “I’m trying here, okay? But you keep shooting ideas down.”

Ra held up a hand. “It’s not my intention to upset you, Tara. It’s more of a reminder to myself that I can’t just worry about gettingintohell. I have to consider how to get us back out again as well. Forgive my abruptness.” His nostrils flared as he took several deep breaths and then pushed up to his feet. “I’m going to look into the demon portals and do some more research on the damn runes. You four work on how to get Aston and his witch out.”

Elias nodded and then stepped up to Ra. He wrapped an arm around him and pulled him in for a hug. Ra didn’t return it, but neither did he pull away. Elias gave him a single, firm pat on the back.. “You’re not in this alone. Stop trying to do it without us. Yeah?”

Ra met Elias’s eyes and saw the fierce love his brother had for him. They all cared for one another. They were a family, chosen to be so instead of born into it. And that meant more to him than any blood relative. “Okay.”

Elias stared at him a couple of seconds longer and then nodded. “You gonna let us out of here?”

Ra reached out his hand and opened a portal back to Terra Academy. “We will meet back at my room in two days,” he told them. “If we have no more information than we do now, we keep searching. By any means necessary, we don’t stop until we find something to help us.”

“That sounds extremely ominous,” Tara whispered.

“And also like there’s the possibility of getting to kick someone’s ass.” Gabby grinned. “I’m totally down for that. Let’s do this.”

“Damn, woman.” Liam looked his mate over. “Just when I think you can’t get any hotter.”

“And with that, I’m out.” Tara turned to hurry through the portal.

Ra watched them go and then closed the portal. He reached for the calm inside of him. Usually he found it effortlessly, even in stressful situations. Now it was harder to grasp. But he had to keep his head clear. Ra needed to remain focused. And most of all, he had to keep from developing the same sadistic streak Gabby seemed to have at the thought of torturing their enemies. Because if he allowed himself to find gratification in that, he knew he could give himself over to it completely. He could and would do anything to get Shelly back. That terrified him almost as much as not getting her back at all.

ChapterFour

“A person might think there isn’t much to do in hell. They'd be right. Give ’em a cookie. And make it shaped like fire with red, orange, and yellow frosting. Then somehow deliver me one. One of the postal carriers in the upworld must deliver to hell, right? They deliver everywhere, and neither snow, nor heat, nor rain, nor gloom of night will stop them. See? It says right there–heat won’t stop them. And besides, the devil must get his mail from somewhere, mustn’t he? Yes. I’m aware that I sound batcrap crazy. But it’s quite hard to remain sane in a place filled with insanity.” ~Shelly

“You realize that your creepy factor—which was already high, by the way—goes through the roof when you sit and stare at someone for longer than five seconds, right?” Shelly found it impossible to ignore Osiris’s stare. He sat on the loveseat across from her, leaning back, his arm across the top of the couch and one ankle resting on his bent knee. It was his typical way of sitting when he morphed into creepy, staring guy. She wondered if he somehow believed that if he stared at her long enough, she’d magically come to her senses and jump into his arms, then declare her love for him and promise to be his forever.Not even if hell was transformed into the most perfect paradise imaginable, making all the beaches of the Caribbean pale in comparison.Shelly continued to flip through the magazine that Osiris had conjured up for her.

“I’m pretty sure there isn’t anything I could do that would make me less creepy in your eyes,” he said. “I abducted you, demanded you choose me over your soul mate, and plan to keep you prisoner for all eternity, whether you learn to love me or not.”

She nodded. “You’re right. You’re at the very top of the creepy chart. Not to mention the sadistic asshole chart. Not to mention a whole bunch of other charts: cruel, vicious, barbaric, uncaring, unkind—”

Osiris cleared his throat. “I get the picture.”

Shelly looked up and met his straightforward gaze. “Has there ever been a time, in all of your long existence, when you grew tired of being this?” She motioned to him with her hand. “Have you ever felt a smidgeon of guilt?”

His face was unreadable as he answered. “This is my role, Shelly. My purpose. No one else was created to do it. Being created for a specific purpose means you were also given certain abilities to succeed.”

“You didn’t answer the question.” She pursed her lips and closed the magazine with a snap, setting it down next to her. “I didn’t ask you what your role was. I asked if you ever tired of it. Just because you have a certain purpose in life doesn’t mean you always like it. Sometimes, one may even fight against their purpose.”

He inclined his head to the right, his ear nearly touching his shoulder, and narrowed his eyes at her. Osiris seemed to study her, as if she was an interesting new insect he wanted to dissect. “If nothing else, you are persistent,” he muttered. Osiris took a deep breath and let it out in a slow, measured exhale. “There was one time … only one”—he lifted his hand, holding up a finger—“that I found myself wishing things were different. ThatIwas different.”

Shelly’s stomach whirled like a boiling cauldron, and she worried its contents might climb up her throat and spew from her mouth. She had a suspicion as to what he was about to say, and she desperately hoped she was wrong. Shelly could taste the bile at the back of her throat, burning as she swallowed over and over to stop from vomiting.

“Are you going to ask me when this time was?” Osiris’s eyes lit with amusement, and the sound of his voice cajoled her to answer him.

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