Fueled by a temporary infusion of energy.
Who knows how long it will last?
I can’t afford to lose sight of that.
No matter how tempting he may look under the glow of the moonlight, I have to stay focused, on track.
Have to use what little time we have left.
“Tell me about Phyre,” I say, the words coming out of nowhere, but somehow the question feels right. Lita and Xotichl don’t trust her. I don’t trust her. And just like Kachina needs to honor her instincts, I need to honor mine. “What’s your history? Why is she back? What does she want from you?” I lower myself to the ground, needing to feel something solid beneath me, if I’m to see this conversation through to the end.
I lean against a twisted tree trunk, and Dace does the same. Reaching for my hand, he grasps it for a moment, squeezes our fingers tightly together, then releases just as quickly. His touch leaving a trace of heat I attribute to his energy infusion. Which means I should be able to detect the moment it starts to run cold.
“Our history is we were together a few years back, for a very short time.” He exhales deeply, as though the statement required great effort.
“How together? Explain together?” The words came out a little more rushed and frantic than I’d planned. Causing my face to grow hot, my stomach to clench. But despite my horror at sounding like a jealous girlfriend, I need details—need to know what they shared.
He rubs a hand over his chin. Squinches his eyes until they’re reduced to mere slits. “You know, together,” he says, voice clearly demonstrating the full measure of his discomfort, which only seals my determination.
“Together in the way that we were together?”
“No.” He turns to me with a clenched jaw and a glacier gaze. “I mean, we slept together, yes, but it was nothing like us. Please don’t ever say that, Daire. Don’t ever think that.”
“So you remember us?” I ask, the words sounding pathetic, needy, and small.
He leans his head back against the tree and closes his eyes. “I remember all of us.” He sighs. “I remember everything. From the very first moment I saw you that day at the gas station, I knew my life was forever changed. You’re not just embedded in my soul, Daire. You’re part of my DNA. I even remember you from the dreams I had, long before I knew you were real.”
My shoulders sink at the mention of the dream that started it all. I had it too. It always started off well enough, with Dace and me enjoying ourselves in the Enchanted Spring, until Cade came along, turned into a demon, and killed Dace while I helplessly looked on. Only in Dace’s version, Cade killed me. And I can’t help but wonder if Cade made us dream the dream on purpose, or if it sprang up organically.
“As for why Phyre returned, I really don’t know,” he says, returning to one of my original questions. “Though I’m not sure it was her choice. Her mother’s been missing and presumed dead for years, and while her sisters, Ashe and Ember, went to live with an aunt, for some reason Phyre chose to stay with her father.”
“Why would she do that when everyone says that he’s crazy?”
Dace shrugs. His shoulders rising and falling in a way so languid, so elegant, I force my gaze away. “He is crazy. I used to think she did it because she felt sorry for him. But now I’m no longer sure.”
“Meaning?”
He licks his lips, runs a hand through his hair. Clearly hating every moment of this, but determined to appease me, he says, “Last time I spoke to her, on Christmas Eve, right before I followed you to the Lowerworld, she was spouting all kinds of nonsense about the Last Days.”
“Last Days?”
“Some Apocalyptic diatribe her dad’s been preaching for years. According to him, the Last Days are when the sinners all burn, and the righteous will either stay behind to enjoy the Shining Days of Glory or ascend into the clouds to enjoy the festival there … or, whatever. The guy’s nuts. A total crackpot. Who knows where he gets this stuff?” He brings his knees to his chest, wraps his arms around them. “Anyway, she claimed the burning sky was a sign. Said it was too late for any of us, and begged me to go with her to find her father. Said he’d know what to do. I told her he was crazy. That she should go to the reservation and seek refuge with one of the elders. And when I saw she was too far gone and nothing I’d said made a dent, I went after you. Oh, but before that, she also mentioned something about how she and I wanted the same thing.”
“Which is?” I lean toward him. Determined to ignore the enticing sweep of stubble along his jaw. The way his biceps strain against the fabric of his shirt.
“To see Cade dead.”
Not quite expecting that, I inhale a sharp, involuntary breath.
“At the time, I didn’t take her seriously. I thought it was just another fawning attempt to get back with me again. But now I’m not sure. Especially after her father came to visit me in the Middleworld.”
I balk. So many questions forming in my head, I’m not sure where to begin. “You’re actually saying that some self-proclaimed, self-righteous, religious zealot of a freak found you days before I did, and he didn’t even try to help you? He didn’t even try to bring you back so that you could seek help? And what the heck was he doing all the way out there, anyway? How does he know about it? How did he get there?”
“Which question would you like answered first?” Dace’s fathomless eyes meet mine, as his lip tugs into a grin.
I shrug, knowing that soon enough, he’ll answer them all.
“Among all of his other accolades, it seems he’s a demon hunter.”