“I have never changed anyone in the way I will change you.”
He spoke with such conviction, and the thing about his belief that he would change me was that I knew it was true too. But I needed time to process that I had become something I’d never planned for, a shifter.
“You once said these monsters who seek blood were creations of Asha,” I said. “Are aufhockers any different?”
“No.”
I was quiet, considering.
“Then is it possible that the aufhockers’ behavior changed because of her?”
I could not see Adrian’s face, but I could feel his body against mine, and as I spoke, he grew tense. He did not like what I was saying.
“Asha has no power on earth,” he said, his voice tight.
“Dis does not either,” I said. “Except for what she does through you.”
Adrian did not respond, but he did halt Shadow, and as he dismounted, I scanned the snowy woods, frowning, seeing no sign of the grave he had spoken of.
“I wish to walk you there,” he said, watching me. “It isn’t far.”
He helped me to the ground, my boots sinking into the snow as I landed. I let him lead, following in his footsteps, which made navigating the woods far easier. Now and then, I noticed how he would touch the trunk of a tree as we passed, fingers lingering as if he were collecting memories. Perhaps he was, or perhaps it was part of the way he remembered how to find the clearing that opened before us.
As I stood at its mouth, I was taken aback.
I had been unprepared for its solemn beauty.
A range of mountains created the backdrop to what Adrian had made my resting place. They sloped gently behind a forest of naked trees. These had thicker trunks, perhaps because they were older, and they seemed to reach endless heights, disappearing into a thick ethereal mist that nearly blocked out the red sky.
I stared so long at this otherworldly place that I almost missed the grave.
It was so simple—a large stone at the base of a tree—but it stole my breath.
I walked past Adrian, making my own way to the grave, and though I knew I no longer rested here, I touched the stone that had guarded me for so long. But the longer I stayed in this place, the more violated I felt. Knowing that someone had come here and disturbed our grave was even more painful.
It also made me sick to think that someone—possibly Ravena—was in possession of my bones and those of my coven. We had learned early on as witches that any parts of a body, be it hair or nails or skin, were powerful conduits—they were links to the dead, to their memories, to their power. With them, she could siphon our magic, and while it would not be nearly as powerful, it was still dangerous, especially because she possessed The Book of Dis.
I looked at Adrian, whose gaze moved from my hand on the stone to my face.
“Why did you choose this place?” I asked, and I could tell by his expression that he was remembering something long ago. Then he looked away, toward the mountains, and I followed.
“There was a cottage here long ago,” he said, and as he spoke, something took root in my mind, and I thought I could see it and the way this place used to be before it had been drained of life in the same way my sisters had been drained of theirs—a forest crowded with commanding and verdant trees so lush, light only slipped through in pockets of gold. They made it nearly impossible to see the mountains, which grew rich moss and wildflowers in fertile crevices, and within that flora, I could see the cottage, a collection of stacked and varied stones, a thatched roof, and a door made of oak.
I knew this place because it was where Adrian and I had fled when Dragos had made the decision to kill me. It was here we had spent our final night together, and it was here where we’d been captured. Where he had been beaten and I had lost my voice screaming for it to stop.
It was where Dragos had violated me, and Adrian had watched and raged.
It was where we’d witnessed the place we had called our home for a few short hours burn to the ground.
As the memories of that day came back, moisture gathered in my eyes and tears rolled down my cheeks. When I looked at Adrian, his face was haunted.
“Why did you choose this place?” I asked again, not understanding how he could come here when the terror had gone so deep.
“Because when I am here, I remember our final night together,” he said, holding my face between his hands, thumbs brushing away my tears. “Do you remember the details of that night?”
I shook my head, and he smiled, though it was faint, and it quickly disappeared.
“We made love,” he said. “It was different from all the other times…and it has never been that way since. I never want it to be because I knew that you were only saying goodbye. I knew it even when you spoke of our future.”
“What did I say?” I asked.
I had no vivid memories of this night, but that was likely because it had been drowned in the trauma that had followed.
Adrian held me so close, I could no longer feel the cold around us, only the heat between us.
“You wanted a quiet life with me at the base of this mountain,” he said. “We would have a farm and you would teach magic the way it was meant to be taught.”
“How quaint,” I said, managing to laugh despite how much I cried. The irony wasn’t lost on me—the life I had wanted then and the life I had now.
“You named our children,” he said, and the silence that followed his statement shattered my heart. They were the children we would never have.
“What were their names?” I whispered.
I knew he remembered, knew he clung to the memory of them though they never existed.
“Cora, for a girl,” he said, and I swallowed something sharp and jagged in my throat, only to have it land uneasily in my stomach.
Cora. I thought the name was so buried, I could hardly recall where I had heard it, but once the seed was planted, a woman formed around the name. She had a proud face and stood stoic and still. Her eyes were dark, both humble and fierce. She was beautiful, and an ache settled deep inside me at the fact that I did not know what had happened to her in the aftermath of my death.
This was Yesenia’s mother.
My mother.
“Cora,” I repeated, and my brows lowered as I searched for the other name. Finally, I met Adrian’s gaze. “Alek. For a boy,” I said. “After you.”
A ghost of a smile touched his lips but could not dim the pain in his eyes, and after a moment, he spoke. “I am sorry I could not give you what you wanted,” he said.
“Adrian,” I whispered. His words broke me in a way I hadn’t been before. It had not been he who had taken away the future I had once dreamed of. It had been men. It had been Dragos.
I took his face into my hands, gaze falling to his lips as I spoke. “You are what I want.”
He took my mouth in a searing kiss and gripped my hips, and though it was cold, it seemed important that we come together here within this place that had stolen so much from us. I did not protest as Adrian lifted my heavy skirts, seeking the heat between my thighs.
His fingers were cold at first but soon warmed, and as he moved inside me, his mouth devoured mine, trailing along my jaw and neck and over my breasts. There came a point when I could no longer stand, and I dragged him to the snowy ground with me, laughing as he hovered over me, the snow freezing my back.