Tasting Darkness

Turning my attention back to the chicks in the crate I watch as they squirm, wondering what they have been feeding them. Yet as they got louder, the others began to wake, and Lycus g****s before climbing out of bed and stumbling half asleep over to the crates. He tips the crates up, making my eyes widen before he starts removing his clothes.

I wonder what he is doing when he shifts abruptly, giving me a view of his a*s in my face before he flops onto his stomach

and lies on his side. The squirming chicks rush to him, bouncing on the floor, and I laugh as they burrow into his fur. He puffs out a loud wheezing breath while the chicks get lost in his fur.

“About time he made himself useful. If only he would sleep in this form every night, we may get some sleep,” Tobias says, brushing his fingers through Lycus’s fur. The chicks squirm in his fur, popping their heads and chirping quietly while snuggling into him as if he was their personal warm nest.

Tobias carefully steps over him and falls heavily onto the couch beside me. His hands reach for me instantly as he drags me up his body and lifts his legs, turning slightly, so I am lying with him behind me.

“Where did Darius go?” he murmurs, his l*ps in my hair as he speaks. “No, Idea. We had an argument,” I tell him.

“About you shredding and not being able to mark him?” Tobias asks, tucking me closer. I nod, watching Lycus wolf form, worried he would roll on them and crush them. But he remains still as a statue.

“He’ll come around, Aleera. He is just scared,” Tobias says, and it made me wonder if it was to do with me at all or if he did something to one of them without knowing. My eyes flick to the mantle where Ryze was perched and to the photo of Thomas, Tobias’s brother. It was a sore subject, and I never mentioned him or how I recognized him, and I know Tobias thinks I abandoned him, but I didn’t. I just couldn’t get back to him.

“Your brother..” Tobias tenses behind me. “Aleera!” he breathes as if he doesn’t want the reminder I am to blame for his death.

“I’m sorry that he died because of me. And I’m sorry he died saving me,” I whisper. Tobias moves behind me, his arm draped over me, pulling me tighter against him.

“He shouldn’t have gone alone. We told him to wait for us,”

“Your brother had gifts similar to Kalen,” I tell him, and he nods.

“How do you know that?”

“Because when he appeared, he knew what I was… he said, “Well, don’t you burn brighter than the sun, the first time I have seen a rainbow aura? I knew there would be something special about you,” I repeat his brother’s words. It was also what Kalen had said while manic that my aura was a rainbow of color.

“He sensed your power,” Tobias tells me. “That’s how he knew where you were,” I swallowed, knowing my using my magic trying to escape is what got him killed. Guilt floods me, and the pain emanating from Tobias saddens me and makes me feel cold and empty.

“I tried to get back to him, Tobias. I swear to you, I never abandoned him. I tried to open the portal after he shoved me through it,”

“What do you mean?” he asks, tugging me back so I am forced to roll onto my back.

“The hellhounds kept coming. I was running out of power. Your brother sensed that and opened up the portal. Told me you would come for me, shoved me through, and I was thrown into the forest. He had closed the portal before I could run back through to him,” I tell him.

“Why didn’t he step through with you?”

“I don’t know, but it was as if he knew there was something worse out there

than the hellhounds. I could feel your brother’s power. He was strong. He could have taken them out,”

“That was one thing that never made sense to me. He could manipulate those beasts, change their thought pattern, so when we showed up, and I saw his writing _”

“His writing?” I asked, a little confused.

“Yes, he used his b***d to write on the pavement but died before he could finish. It said AL,”

“You thought he meant I killed him?” shame washes through the bond, and I know I am right.

“No, we thought you abandoned him. Left him for dead,” Tobias answers. He doesn’t say much after that. Instead, we watch the fire burn for a while before he

gets up and tells me he is going to have a shower. I watch him slip into the bathroom, closing the door behind him. Yet I was still thinking of that night and how everything went wrong when I thought of Darius and him leaving.

His words over the past few weeks whenever I mentioned marking him. It didn’t seem like he was worried about what I would know so much, but more about how I would feel about him and what the others would find out. Yet I tried to wrap my head around what they could possibly find out that scared him.

Unless it was to do with them? It suddenly clicked, and my eyes darted to the bathroom door where Tobias had disappeared to. Feeling for Tobias, I knew he was close by. Almost as if he was beneath us somewhere. I pull on the sensation of his bond, trying to feel sensation of his bond, trying to feel where he is.

The more I pulled, the stronger the urge to go to him got when suddenly a portal opened up beside me. I blink, wondering where it came from. Standing, I stick my hand in before jerking it out when I realize I pulled on his magic from here.

Wherever he was, it was cold. The air felt different, icy cold. But it was definitely his power I could feel, and it was his power that I used to open it, my bond searching for his before it latched onto him and his location. Glancing around the room, I step toward the portal, pushing my hand through it and shuddering at the cold draft. The suction of the portal pulls me in, and I step into a dark concrete room.

I blink, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the darkness, when I notice lighting coming from the other end. Just glimmers of light. I move toward it, my feet aching from how cold the floor was down here. Reaching the arched concrete doorway, I peer inside to find Darius leaning up against a bed.

My eyes scan the room, wondering where I am when I hear a giggling noise making me look at the wall to find the glimmering light is actually images projecting onto the wall as if it were a movie.

I watch, making sure to remain quiet, not wanting to alert him I am here, when I see a little girl’s face popping up only to abruptly cut out. The room goes dark, and his thunderous growl makes me jump. I step closer to the door, peering in, when his voice suddenly sounds behind me, making me jump.

low did you get in here?” he snarls, and pin around to face him. I don’t answer s question. Instead, I ask my own.