Shadow Touched (27 page)

“I saw my dad beat one up once,” Michael continued. “She hits harder.”

Or maybe Cam needed therapy.

“I could’ve handled it, though,” Michael said. “My granddad said all you have to do is get the wraiths to chase you into Twilight and then they’re done for.”

Adam and Talia would need to have a word with Shadowman when he returned.

“How’d you get out here anyway?” No way his parents would let him out at night.

“Cole sometimes sleepwalks. I follow him to make sure he’s okay.”

“Why don’t you just go to your parents?”

“Cole doesn’t like that. Being like a baby. Ellie’s shadow comes with us most of the time, anyway.”

Adam and Talia needed a wake-up call. A big one. Cam was pretty sure Ellie had no idea what her shadow was doing at night. The constant babysitter.

The building was in full view now. They were walking around the garden when a group of men broke from the building and ran toward them, Adam at the lead. The side of his face was skinned and scabbing. His eyes were worried and wet with relief; his jaw twitched with some other emotion.

“Oh, thank God.” Adam grabbed Michael up and held him against his chest.

“How’s Cole?” Cam asked.

Over Michael’s shoulder, Adam spoke. “Unconscious, a hard knock on his head. Ellie’s with him.”

“She would be,” Cam said.

Adam shook his head. “No. She got hurt, but it’s not bad.”

Ellie
and
hurt
in the same sentence made the Segue building flash silver for a moment.

Ellie couldn’t get hurt. Her shadow
always
instinctively protected her. “Her shadow was out there—” Cam pointed into the trees.

“The wraith we were tracking made it up onto the veranda,” Adam said.

Cam looked at Segue, his heart rate doubling. He’d left her on the veranda when he’d made a run for Talia and Cole.

“She bought Talia a second to get Cole inside,” Adam explained.

Ellie against a wraith?

No.
“Her shadow was beating up a wraith
in the woods
,” Cam said. “I saw it with my own eyes. If Ellie were in any kind of danger, the shadow would’ve protected her.” Ellie’s innate will to live trumped everything. Even, long ago, when she’d tried to commit suicide, her shadow simply had grown stronger. No harm could come to Ellie while she was lucid and her shadow was capable of protecting her.

Except—Cam flushed with emotion, his throat going tight.
Oh.

Her shadow, her deepest self,
never
would’ve left one of those boys in danger. Ellie loved them. And she wanted kids of her own. Had been fantasizing about how she wanted to be as a mother. Her shadow had chosen the boy over herself. If that wasn’t a mom thing, Cam didn’t know what was.

“Where is she?” Because she was never leaving his side again.

“In the infirmary by now,” Adam said.

“Two bodies in the woods,” Cam told the soldiers. “One a wraith, the other a mage. I need my knife back.”

He and Adam started back toward Segue at a fast clip, with Michael, a mini Adam, jogging at their side.

Cam was coming to some conclusions. So what if Zander had set up the meeting with Gunnar for his own ends? Cam didn’t care. This had to be stopped.
Now.

Seemed Adam felt the same. “Are you going to end this?”

“Oh, yes,” Cam said. “I’m done.”

“Y
ou shouldn’t be here.” Cam stood beside Ellie at the edge of the Castle Hill’s terrace-like roof.

She looked out at the view of the river. The expansive, hilltop villa where Gunnar Martin was soon to arrive—where he would soon be murdered—was very lovely. The scope of the vista was amazing, the gray water far below moving like fast, liquid silk.

“Too late,” she said. Her fiancé was a very smart man, but he couldn’t seem to grasp the futility of arguing against her presence when she was already there. She wasn’t leaving, either. Nor would she point out that of the two of them,
he
was the one at risk.

Her shoulder throbbed and her ribs were taped, but she’d refused anything stronger than ibuprofen so that she could be alert. She wasn’t about to tell Cam that. She’d already won the argument; there was no need to fight it out again. There were going to be times during their marriage when they didn’t agree. This was good practice.

They’d walked up to the place on foot in the small hours of the night, her shadow leading, making certain the house was uninhabited and unwatched. At present it was empty, the grounds overgrown with shrubs, holly, and rhododendrons. With all the uncertainty in the world, keeping up a vacant property was not a priority. The owners were selling, hence Martin’s visit. They’d come armed only with the basics—her shadow, Cam’s Martin blade—to resolve this.

The sun’s rising heralded Gunnar’s imminent arrival. Both she and Cam thought that Zander would conveniently be in attendance as well. Ready to hand her a poker?

All they knew for sure was that last night the mage Cam had killed in the woods had compelled four soldiers to set the wraiths free. The men had died in the containment facility shortly thereafter, their souls eaten. The wraiths had then taken to the grounds.

Unknown to everyone, the Thorne children had been using their fae gifts to sneak out at night. Cole had a concussion, and at first had been unable to even recall his name, but word from Segue was that he was now doing much better. Michael, whom her shadow had protected, was unharmed and cheerful about the gruesome display he’d witnessed.

“You can’t trust your shadow anymore,” Cam said.

Yes, thank God, she could. She finally could. Her shadow had protected what was most important to her. It’d protected Michael, and forced to choose between herself and Cam, it would probably protect Cam. Ellie wouldn’t have it any other way. After a lifetime of fighting with herself, she and her shadow were of the same mind and same heart on the important things. And knowing this gave her strength and hope. She could face the future like this.

“Can you at least keep hold of your shadow when they show up?”

A while back, the barb would’ve hit low. But she was absolutely certain of her control. And certain of Cam, too. “Sweetheart, quit trying to pick a fight.”

His expression went from mean to agonized. “Sorry.”

Poor guy. She smiled at him. “S’alright.” She looked back out at the river. “Some sweet digs, huh?”

The house was beautiful, jutting out of the hill’s rocky face over the water to the east. But the levels of the house also offered a view of the valley to the west, the town of Green Valley to the south, and the checkered farmlands to the north. All of it was laid bare to the eye from here. The structure itself was modern in its lines, but included natural materials—stone, fat wood beams—with its metal and glass.

“The property looked more scenic on the real estate sales profile,” Cam said. “But it’s clearly defensible.”

Ellie had been thinking the same thing. “No one can approach without being seen.”

“Gunnar is staking out his territory. If he buys this place, clearly he intends to dominate for fifty miles in every direction.”

“Everyone is staking out territory, Cam,” she said. Segue wasn’t so different up on its mountain, a fortress armed and preparing for darkness.

She watched Cam pace to the other side, to view the farmland. Every muscle in his body was rigid. The lines of his profile betrayed his exhaustion. His beard was coming in—no time to shave. His dagger was in a sheath on his belt. He would use Martin House’s war magic against them.

If blood spilled today, she’d have to contend with what would happen to Cam after. It was one more reason she was glad they were so far away from other people.

On the horizon, an orange gleam of sunlight burned like molten metal ready to spill onto the world. They sat in lengthening silence, shoulder to shoulder, too low to be seen from the long, gravel driveway leading to the main building, listening to the water below.

It was mid-morning when Ellie’s shadow twitched inside her. Five minutes later, two cars climbed the road, slowed, and parked out front. Doors opened and slammed shut.

“He brought bodyguards,” Cam said, without even looking behind him.

Their odds of survival narrowed.

Ellie heard a familiar voice, saying, “We’ll have to fix the road right away.”

“Zander’s with him, too,” she told Cam.

Footsteps scuffed the dry earth, approaching the house. They were coming inside. Eventually they would make their way up to the roof to assess the view.

“I love you,” Cam said.

“Not what I want to hear right now,” she told him. His just-in-case good-bye. She wasn’t about to say it back. They had a plan of sorts. It might work. “Just do your thing.”

 

Cam let go of the last of his reservations and allowed himself to
see
.

In the past, the umbras of the mages had hinted at what they were about to do, and Cam had used the juts and rushes of shadow to anticipate their immediate moves—mostly during a fight. But what if he
allowed
Shadow to completely inundate and overwhelm his sight? How much would he see then?

From the beginning, he’d been bracing his soul against magic, afraid of what the darkness would do to him. Now he didn’t care; couldn’t afford to care. If Shadow made him a killer, then he was right where he needed to be. If he were lost to Twilight, it wouldn’t matter—magic would rule regardless.

It’d been Ellie, beat up and bruised in the Segue infirmary, who’d said, “This would be so much easier if you could see how a
whole
fight would go down, not just bits and pieces.”

He’d never considered that before.

She’d faced a wraith without her shadow. Cam would
see
today.

He let Shadow come, left Ellie, the love of his life, vulnerable on a rooftop with the enemy approaching. It’d come to this. Deep down, they’d both known it would on that terrible day in the guest bedroom at Martin House when Mathilde Martin had died.

His sense of color shifted first, the hues growing vibrant and true, layered with intensity. The pale yellow-gray of the sky lifted even higher into space. A hint of forest surrounded them, the omnipresent Twilight trees. He’d been this far before many times.

He looked harder.

The structure of the villa shimmered and changed with every blink—one moment he and Ellie were on top of the empty house; the next, it was Martin’s fortified outlook; and finally, the place was in ruins, a burned-out hull with bodies lying facedown in the fields below. While his mind rebelled, his heart swelled to see the world this way—so much death to come—a war, obviously. Magic everywhere, its victims mage and human alike. The anger and glut was such a thirsty sensation that he drew his Martin blade to spill more blood.

Regardless of what he saw in the future, he
felt
the present-day upward advance of Gunnar and Zander Martin and the two guards coming to the roof.

The amorphous sound of the river flowing below formed into words of warning. The scent of it told him how old the earth really was—ancient beyond his understanding—and how insignificant was this moment in time. He and Ellie were nothing. He couldn’t sense her at all anymore, but then he’d expected that this might cost him everything. Still, he’d had to try.

Babbling up from the water and hazed in red on the horizon was the knowledge that Martin House, too, would fall. No lookout place like this could save it.

Cam shook as he took in more Shadow, faster, to see what was to come.

The climb of Gunnar, Zander, and the guards slowed, the mages hovering mid-step, as their individual umbras continued forward, their forms made of dark, trembling smoke.

The smokeman of Zander directed the smokeman of a guard up the final staircase to the roof.

The smoky persona of the guard powered up the steps. He opened the door, though Cam knew perfectly well that the door itself remained closed.

The guard seemed to spot Cam and Ellie—he shouted back down the stairs over his shoulder. Zander took the stairs next and, when he got to the top and crossed to the roof, smiled slightly in surprise and stepped to the side to allow Gunnar and the second guard to join him.

Cam blinked, and he found himself deep in Twilight woods. He blinked again and was back on the roof.

Gunnar was saying something, but no sound traveled from his smoky mouth.

Zander tilted his head to look beyond Cam, probably at Ellie. And as if on cue, one of the guards shifted his position so that there was now no escape, except off the roof and down onto the rocks next to the river.

Cam blinked again to find Zander holding Ellie’s shadow immobile—Mathilde had been able to do that. Why was Zander doing it now if he was on their side? Unless he wasn’t. The second smoky guard stood by Gunnar, who looked on with amused interest. Cam turned to find Ellie, but of course couldn’t see her. She didn’t have an umbra, but only flesh and bone, which was a handful of dust in the great scheme of things. The first guard, however, was mid-strike in the empty air, so Cam could guess where Ellie stood.

Zander had betrayed them.

But there was a way to win the fight: The second guard had to die. If the second guard fell, the one fighting Ellie, then Cam would be free to attack Zander directly.

Twilight surrounded him again, the forest so sweet and peaceful, offering him a respite from the madness.
Breathe deep, and rest
, the trees seemed to say
. There is no fighting here.
It was a lie, Twilight rattling his sanity. Fine, he was going to go crazy—he’d never doubted it—but he’d first give Ellie a fighting chance and kill Zander.

Cam forced his attention back to the real world.

Gunnar, Zander, and the guards proceeded up the steps to the roof. Their smoky umbras flickered like fire and dissipated as the lever on the door angled downward.

Cam raised his arms, ready to fight, and was momentarily startled to find a gold band on his left hand’s ring finger. The band faded, then glowed, and then gleamed in the shadowy world—rooftop or Shadowland trees, as if it had its own magic. And yet the ring seemed confused as to what time—today or tomorrow—it belonged in.

Symbols had their own indelible power, and this one was hope and love. And dear God, family. It’s what Ellie had wanted because she’d already fought her darkness and had won. But he’d been pushing back the inevitable so hard, he hadn’t really understood what it was costing him. Hope.

If he’d allowed himself to
see
before, he might’ve found what he’d lost sooner. The fae who’d altered his sight had intended to give him a gift. And that’s exactly what it was.

When the roof door finally opened, Cam felt the fiercest snarl of a grin cross his face. If there were any possible future in which he might exchange rings with Ellie, he would fight even a House of War to make it happen.

 

Ellie’s heart broke when Cam’s expression went scary, his eyes full black. There was a sense of disorientation about him, though he didn’t seem lost, which had been his fear. He seemed . . . changed. And yet her shadow wasn’t fighting to get loose; it was cool and watchful within her.

The guards spread out on the roof, isolating them in the far half, over the rocks and water. This would’ve bothered her, except they’d been backed into a metaphorical corner ever since they’d faced Mathilde Martin months ago. Corners just made a person fight that much harder. Ask Mathilde.

Since Cam obviously was pretty far gone—she wasn’t even sure if he knew where he was—she addressed Gunnar. “Your house has been making war on my people, and it needs to stop. I killed your daughter. It was self-defense. Your fight is with me alone.”

But Gunnar only smiled. “You,
pathetic thing
, could never kill my daughter.”

Ellie wouldn’t let him pass the blame along to anyone at Segue. “I clearly remember shoving a poker through her chest. It was all me. And now I am here to end this, one way or another.”

“You did it all by yourself?” He was mocking her. “Slayed the great Mathilde Martin, heir of Martin House. Do you brag about it?”

She hadn’t been by herself, and because of that, she fought the impulse to look at Zander.

Gunnar sighed. “You humans will learn your place, and with it humility. I tried to tell you before: you have no real power. If anything, you’re mules. At most, you’re tools. Some of you take a skilled hand to manipulate; others are blunt hammers. You’re the latter.”

This was the same kind of thing he had spouted upon her and Cam’s arrival at Martin House. That mages would rise up like old gods to rule them. Zander had asked Adam Thorne if he’d come to swear fealty. Had told him Adam would beg on his knees. It’d been quite the performance, right in line with Martin’s views.

Ellie glanced at Cam, who’d ranged a few feet closer to one of the guards. Still, her shadow didn’t struggle to get free. No danger here? She couldn’t believe it. Could one of the Martins be controlling her shadow, as Mathilde had? Didn’t feel that way either.

“If I didn’t kill your daughter,” she asked, “why are you attacking Segue?”