Oh, this was fucked.
Abelaum was fucked. Earth was fucked. We were absolutely fucked. But I wasn’t about to stick around and wait for maximum fuckery, no sir. I was getting Juniper and myself the hell out of there and putting as much distance between us and that thing as possible.
I should have come looking for her sooner, but damn it, she liked having time alone and I wasn’t trying to fucking smother her. My mistake — I left her alone for a couple hours, and I found her in the midst of the Libiri, watching Jeremiah-fucking-Hadleigh get possessed by a God. I wasn’t leaving her alone for a second from here on. I was going to chain her to my goddamn wrist.
We reached the car, and I rummaged through her pockets for the keys. “Get in. Get in now.”
She looked shell-shocked, her eyes wide. She was far more confused than afraid, and I needed her to understand what the hell she’d just seen. I needed her to understand why we were running.
“I couldn’t save her,” she said, her voice monotone, deceptively void of emotion. “I couldn’t…I wanted to…”
“Save who?” I pressed the gas pedal to the floor the moment we were off the dirt road. I felt far too tense to be driving. It wasn’t fast enough. God, the smell in those woods. Rot and brine, blood and terror — a deep and ancient terror, the kind of thing that built up over centuries, the residue of hundreds and thousands of suffering souls.
“Victoria,” she said. “Jeremiah killed her. He made the second sacrifice, Zane.”
I slammed my palm against the steering wheel, wincing when it cracked beneath the impact. The God was too close to getting out, far too close.
Juniper’s eyes were on me, wide and uncertain. “What the hell happened back there? What happened to Jeremiah? Did you see it?”
Oh, I’d seen it. I’d seen the God’s essence leech out of the dark and seep inside Jeremiah. It was a mere piece of the Deep One, a fragment and nothing more. There was no way a mortal body could contain a God. Jeremiah was likely already rotting from the inside out. But the God’s power would keep him moving, talking, killing. He was a zombie to the Deep One’s will, strengthened even as he fell apart.
I hoped Leon had Raelynn far from here by now, hidden away. If Leon had any goddamn sense, he’d have that woman locked in a bunker somewhere. The only thing standing between the Libiri and unleashing the God was one final sacrifice: Raelynn.
“Zane.” Juniper’s voice was firmer now. She’d gone from shock to determination. “What the fuck just happened?”
“Part of the God is in Jeremiah,” I said. “Those sacrifices gave It enough strength to get a little bit of Its essence out of the mine and inside his body. It can live inside him like a parasite, using his body to get around. His body will break down, eventually — mortal flesh isn’t built to hold power like that. But he’ll be very, very dangerous until he does. Who knows how long the God can keep him alive?”
She gulped. “He’ll go after Raelynn.”
“All his focus is going to be on achieving the final sacrifice,” I said. “And I’m not going to let him do that.”
“How the hell are we supposed to fight him? What’s his weakness?”
“Not we, Juniper. Me.”
She was silent for a moment, her eyes blazing as she looked at me. “What the fuck do you mean?”
“You’re not going after Jeremiah, not now. I will. I’ll finish it.”
Shock…then fury. The threads binding our beings together trembled with how angry she was. “Like hell you are. Not without me.”
“You’re not winning this argument, Juniper. Not this time.”
I pulled into the yard at the house. The rain was coming down hard, and I paused as I noticed the cluster of pale mushrooms near the front door. I crushed them underfoot before I followed Juniper inside.
She was laying out her guns, checking her ammo. I shook my head. “Juniper, I mean it. You’re not coming.”
“Yes, I am,” she said firmly, reloading her pistol. I took the gun from her hands, set it down, and grasped her shoulders so she had to look at me. Her jaw was set, her gaze hard.
“Jeremiah isn’t just a mortal man anymore,” I said. “He has the God’s strength. He’ll be strong enough to rival me.”
“Then you shouldn’t go alone.”
“I don’t want to put you in danger, Juniper —”
“I’ve always been in danger!” she yelled, thrashing away from my hold. “I get it, the risk is higher now. I don’t care! I’m not weak. I’m not…I’m not a fucking liability.” Her fists were clenched, but her voice was shaking. “I’m not going to let you run off and do this alone. I can help. I’m not weak.” Her eyes shone with tears she refused to let fall, and she growled furiously as she scrubbed her palm over them. “I’m not going to let you fight alone, Zane.”
I took her face in my hands, relieved when she didn’t try to pull away again. She closed her eyes, shaking in my hold as I kissed her forehead and said, “You’re not weak, little wolf. You’re not a liability, or a burden, or any other fucked-up self-deprecating shit your mind can come up with. But I need you to listen to me. Please. When you’re with me, my first concern is always going to be to protect you. Always. I know you can handle yourself. I know how strong you are. I know you got by for years without me. That doesn’t change my priorities.”
She sniffed, shaking her head. I pulled her against me, wrapping my arms around her. I needed her to get it. I needed her to understand. I respected her strength, but regardless of her pride, I wasn’t going to risk her like that. I wasn’t going to let her face something that deadly.
“So what if he kills me?” she muttered. “My soul is yours. You’ll take me to Hell. Dying would just put an end to this crazy shit —”
“Fuck that.” My arms tightened around her. “Don’t you fucking talk like that. We’re not going to throw away your life.”
She pressed her face against me, burying it so I couldn’t see her, her words muffled. “My life isn’t special, Zane, don’t pretend like it is. I was never even meant to survive this long. I didn’t have a fucking thing until…” She drew in a shaky breath. “…until I made a deal with you.”
“Juniper —”
“I mean it!” She looked up, and she wasn’t hiding the tears now. Fuck, it was jarring to see her cry. Physical pain had nothing on seeing that. “You’ve made me feel like there’s a reason to even bother! You gave me eternity. You gave me hope that there’s a chance to start over! A chance to have a life that isn’t so fucked up…even if it isn’t really life at all. You showed me places where I felt welcomed, where I didn’t feel like everyone just thought of me as a freak. You…you wanted me. I don’t care about the bargain, Zane, I care about you. I can’t lose you. I can’t. You let me feel like I found home.” She sniffed, roughly rubbing her eyes again. “I love you, okay? You did it, you fucking did. You broke the wall down and fucking smashed it to bits. You said you wanted all of me, so there it is. You’ve got it. How the hell can I risk losing that?”
It was like she lit a fire in my chest, stoking the flames with every word out of her mouth. But before I could get a word out, she said quickly, “You don’t have to say it. You don’t have to, just because I did. It slipped out, I…” She shook her head. “You don’t have to. I don’t expect you to.”
I tucked her hair back, wiping away a tear before it could roll down her cheek. “Juniper Kynes, I fully intend to spend eternity showing you just how much I love you. I’ll dance in the rubble of that fucking wall forever. A demon won’t use that word unless we mean it.” I chuckled. “I let you lead when you need to, but I’ve been telling you all along, love.” She bit her lip, hard, but I eased it away from her teeth with my thumb. “Listen to me: there are things out there that can take you from me. There are monsters and magic that can rip us apart.” I took a deep breath, forcing myself to calm so I wouldn’t hold her too tight. “You’ve fought your whole goddamn life to survive. But I’m fighting this one for you. I swore an oath to have you as mine. I gave you my sigil. I gave you my metal. You won’t lose me. You can’t fucking get rid of me, get it?”
She nodded, but I knew some part of her mind wouldn’t let her believe it. She’d seen too much destroyed. She’d had too much taken away to accept that she had me, that she could keep me, that I was one thing she wasn’t going to lose.
I wouldn’t let it happen.
“You’re not alone anymore,” I said softly. “Let me do this. Let me keep you safe. And when this mess is over, we’ll leave this damned town and do whatever we please. You’ve fought for your life, Juniper. You deserve to live out the rest of it without having to fight another day.”
She leaned against my hand. There had been ecstasy in taking her soul, but this? This went beyond words. The magic that bound us together could never mimic this feeling; no bargain of the soul could ever come close to a declaration like love. And a mere word couldn’t encompass what I felt for her — it couldn’t describe the surety that she and I were meant to be entwined. The wild energy that made up our beings was magnetic, there was no pulling that apart.
I’d lived for hundreds of years, and I knew how rare that was.
I knelt down and kissed her hands. “Just this one time, Juniper. Lay down your weapons, and let me use mine.”
She took a deep breath, and let it out with a shudder. She looked at me like she was trying to find a lie, like she was trying to find a reason to deny me. But I wasn’t budging on this. No fucking way. I took care of what was mine.
“I’ll let you fight,” she finally said. “But you’re not going alone. I’m going with you. I’ll stay back, I’ll stay hidden. But if something goes wrong, I need to know. I need to be there.” Her eyes were desperate; they were pleading. “I’ll keep my distance. I’m not afraid of them, Zane. There’s only one thing I’m afraid of — and it’s losing you.”
I knew she wouldn’t budge on this. At least this way, if things went wrong, she’d know immediately. It would give her a head start to run.
I nodded slowly. “You’ll stay back. You’ll stay hidden no matter what happens. Agreed?”
She nodded in return. “Don’t you fucking die, Zane,” she said. “Don’t you dare.”
I smiled. “You know I wouldn’t disobey you.”
