Chapter Eight

Nyla

I woke with a gasp. Hot and sweaty and so turned on, it was hard to breathe. The things Kian had done to me in my dream, the fact that I’d heard him, even if only for a moment. The way he made me feel. He was everything I could have asked for if I’d dared believe I’d find the mate of my dreams. I wanted him, and I would figure out a way to have him.

Dawn had bathed the little valley where my house stood in a peach light that matched my happy mood. There would be no more sleeping for me, not after that dream. Not after the way Kian had made me feel. I hopped out of bed and headed to the shower instead, ready to start the day. I didn’t have long to plan. I needed to figure out a way to tell him everything. The mating call, the shadow of insanity hanging over me, exactly how to find me along the Dragon. Deals Gap was a small town, and the clans who lived in the area were secretive and insular. Getting to me without invoking the rage of the MacDonald clan elders would not be an easy feat. But it would be worth it. As long as we ended up together, the means didn’t matter.

Antsy after my shower, I grabbed my running shoes and took off into the woods. I needed to burn off some energy. I also needed to stop thinking about the way my mate made me quiver with his mouth. We weren’t safe yet. Already, flashes of the distorted night before clouded my memories. Pictures of him turning me away. Of a fight that never happened between us. Of mistake after mistake made by me, ruining my chance with him.

But I pushed through them, my body still tingling with the aftereffects of our night together. A happy sort of soreness between my legs. I could not give in, could not doubt him or us. We had possibility. And yet, our time was short. If he didn’t claim me soon, I’d be lost. I should have told him my situation already, should have done it the night before when he could hear me in his mind, but it’d felt so good to be in his arms. I hadn’t wanted to spoil that.

A man stepped out onto the trail in front of me without warning. I skidded to a stop, twisting my ankle, scraping my hands when I clutched a tree to keep from falling. A chill ran down my spine even as I glared at him. This man was not unknown to me. He was also dangerous.

“You’re up early,” Secor signed, watching me. Evaluating. As he was one of the elders of the MacDonald Council, it had always surprised me that he’d taken the time to learn sign language. No one but my mother had bothered, the clan expecting instead that I would learn to read lips and communicate through the written word. But Secor had learned and learned well, and I had never understood why. He hated me, was disgusted by me, and yet he used my language.

I shrugged, going against my own habits and avoiding his eyes. “Couldn’t sleep any more.”

He nodded and looked up into the trees as I stood, my stomach in knots, waiting for the blow I knew was to come. I’d never left a conversation with Secor without a scar or two, whether physical or mental.

“Your mating call has begun.”

I opened my mouth to protest, but he silenced me with nothing more than a look.

“It has come, and you tried to keep it a secret from the Council. You and your mother both.”

“My mother is not at fault.” My fingers shook, my nerves showing, but I kept my head up and locked eyes with him. “It was my decision to withhold the information. I have control of it and am not a danger to the clan or the secret.”

Stoic and emotionless, Secor stared me down. “Liam has come to inquire about becoming a secondary mate for you, did you know that?”

I nodded, my head jerking and my stomach churning.

“He’s weak, but he would make a good match for someone like you.”

I bristled but kept the words I wanted to sign to myself. He’s weak…meaning the other women in the clan would be too much for him. The Tallan could wipe out a woman’s mind if uncontrolled, which was the purpose of the true mate, to help share the power load and balance the psychic energy. When the true mate couldn’t be found, to survive, a woman would take a secondary mate. A man from within the clan, preferably someone a bit stronger than her, someone with a powerful personality to compete with her innate strength. Secor saying Liam was weak had little to do with Liam and everything to do with me. This was Secor taking a shot at me, insinuating my Tallan was not strong enough for the clan. That I wasn’t enough of a psy to warrant a strong partner.

“He’s not my true mate.” My signing was harsh, movements staccato, my irritation showing.

Secor paused while he watched me, lips turning up at one side in a smirk that made my skin crawl.

“If your Tallan was strong enough, you would have found your true mate already.”

My fingers twitched to tell him the truth, but I held back. Something about the way he’d happened into my path seemed too deliberate, too unusual to be chance. He wanted something from me, probably something I wouldn’t want to give, and I had a feeling telling him about Kian would not be a good idea. He would use my true mate against me in some way. I could sense it.

Secor stepped closer, close enough for me to smell his overly-sweet cologne. “Do you want to accept Liam as your secondary mate?”

I shook my head and signed a single word. “No.”

“Then I give you one other option, Nyla MacDonald. I offer myself as your secondary mate.”

I blinked, not moving, too shocked by his words to let them sink in. I had to have read that wrong. Had to have confused the symbols for something else. Secor was a powerful man, one respected by the clan for his place on the council. I was nothing to him, and he’d always made sure I knew it.

“I don’t understand.”

Secor rolled his eyes. “It’s easy, Nyla. You mate with me. Come to my bed, and you stay alive. You’ve already refused Liam, and there certainly isn’t anyone else in the clan who would be willing. I am your best option.” He stepped close, too close, leaning over me. His hands heavy on my shoulders, demanding in a way that turned my stomach.

“Mate with me, or die. Which will it be?”

I shook my head. This could not be happening. Secor had never shown an interest in me. He’d treated me like dirt, like something less than human. Other than learning to sign, he’d never—

And that’s when my stomach crashed to my shoes. He’d learned to sign…to speak to me. He’d been waiting for this day for a long time. Since I was a child.

“I do not accept you as secondary mate,” I signed, fear churning within me. “I will wait for my true mate.”

Secor laughed and clapped his hands before signing, “We’ll see about that.”

Four men walked out from the trees, surrounding me. Secor spoke to them, his head turned too far for me to read his lips. Directing them while ignoring me. But then he looked right at me and said, “The cave.”

For any MacDonald woman, the words “the cave” were ones that instilled a fear like no other. For when we lost control of our Tallan, when the power bleeds sucked the rational thoughts out of our heads and left us in a fog of false visions, the Council would send us to the holding cave. There, your final choice was made for you. Mate to whomever the council assigned, or die. No one walked away from the cave, and only one MacDonald psy had ever escaped, though she’d needed her true mate’s help to do it.

No, the cave meant the end. Being sent there meant my time was up.

I signed fast and furious, desperate to make my point. “No, I don’t need the cave. I’m not out of control.”

My actions were ignored, my argument unseen by Secor as he turned to lead the way down the trail. One man grabbed me, ignoring my smacks of protest as he picked me up and tossed me over his shoulder. Carrying me to the cave like a sack of potatoes.

Carrying me to what would certainly be my death.

My stomach stayed tied in knots all day and into the night. My mind stuck on the bastard that was time. My gift didn’t strengthen until my mating call came. But I needed that gift to find my true mate and convince him to claim me before my mating call ended. Otherwise I’d be lost to madness and put down like a rabid dog. Time earned did not balance time spent in my life. And time had become my biggest enemy.

I paced the small, dirt-floored cell within the cave, the one I’d been thrown into hours before. I’d been working at my Tallan, trying desperately to connect with Kian, but my soul was shaken and my power depleted. I’d need to wait for sleep to try to dreamwalk to him. Unfortunately, sleep didn’t feel close at hand. My mind was too shattered, my fear too bright. And so I paced as time ran away from me and I cried and I fought off the false visions and the lies being spoken from within.

He doesn’t want you.

I grabbed my ears, the noise inside my head horrible and grating. Other than with Kian the night before, I hadn’t heard a sound since I’d almost drowned. And yet I knew that voice and those words were wrong. Dark and powerful, booming through my head like an avalanche, they made me crave the silence. And the pictures that came with them. Oh, the pictures. Images of Kian pushing me out the door of his sweet cabin or turning away from me, rejecting me, all brutal and too real not to at least begin to believe.

No, no, no, I chanted in my thoughts. Kian wanted me; he wanted to claim me as his. He said he was coming for me. I tried to focus on the positive things, what I knew as reality. Poster boards and markers, an open book on American Sign Language. That smile as he said my name for the first time.

He lied.

I paced faster, desperate to find my reality, no matter how shitty it had become. Trying hard to ignore the hate-filled voice wreaking havoc in my mind. Trying and failing to block the visions I didn’t want to believe.

He doesn’t want you.

He thinks you’re damaged.

He will never come for you.

He will allow you to be claimed by Secor.

He has abandoned you.

He has left you to die of your mating call.

He is gone forever.