CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

“How long do I have to hold my breath?” Noelle tried to make herself more comfortable on Tamatsu’s back, but the Mississippi River was shockingly cold, and her arms were trembling too hard around his neck to do much good for long. The least she could do was hold on. He’d taken off his shirts to maximize skin contact with her, and his was plan was to walk to some prescribed spot deep enough to put them both underwater. He was going to open a temporary shunt between realms to divert the rising water out of sight. If she’d been a plumber, she might have understood the logistical mumbo-jumbo he’d tossed at her, but she’d been cold and tired, so she just nodded and smiled at him in an adoring, ‘Uh-huh’ way.

“Less than thirty seconds, I hope. I won’t be keeping track, but nudge me with your knees if you’re suffocating.”

“You can breathe water?”

He raised a brow and tightened her arms around his neck. “I don’t always have to breathe. I’m simply more comfortable if I do.”

“Oh.” She snorted. “Carry on, then. I want to be long gone before those weather games get underway. Am I making enemies by helping you with this?”

“Probably, but they won’t bother you if you’re with me. Many are afraid of offending Tarik.”

“Good to know. I’ll just stick with you then.”

“You’d better.”

As he stepped farther away from the riverbank near Baton Rouge, her body reflexively shrank in, lungs seizing as the cold water climbed up her chest.

“Try to cling tighter,” he said. “I know that’s hard with the wings in the way.”

She adjusted her grip and held on as the water touched her chin.

Thirty seconds, he’d said. She waited to take a deep breath until he’d swum into position.

Without warning, he dropped like a cannonball. A hundred and ninety feet, he’d warned her, and it felt like it. She wanted to take a breath so badly.

When his feet touched the river bed, she nearly did just because of the jolt, but he shook his head as if knowing she was pondering it and he spoke something into the water.

She couldn’t understand him, but whatever words he was speaking were making pressure in her head build and her ears ache. The pounding hurt so bad, and she needed to breathe.

No. She slapped her hands over her ears and squeezed him between her thighs to hang on as the current violently shifted, and suddenly the river bottom gave out from beneath him. Fish and plants and debris swirled in the water around them like it was all being sucked down a bathtub drain, and then she realized they were being tugged down with it.

She let go of him and tried to swim up, but he grabbed her by the ankle—chuckling, she thought, and pulled her down into his arms.

He teleported them the hell out of there just before a massive catfish swam open-mouthed into her face.

Standing dripping wet on the doormat at the Coyote alpha’s house, she coughed and sputtered as he pounded her back.

“Starving,” he said, calm as he could be. He was smiling, though.

When she stopped hacking and spitting out river water, she said raspily, “Did you enjoy yourself?”

“The relief that I could do it … it’s euphoric.”

She was feeling a little of that euphoria, too, just from looking at him smile so broadly with his wet hair dripping into his face.

She sighed and wrung water from her hair. If there was a way she could make him smile like that all the time, she’d do it. He needed his voice back. He had work to do, and wasn’t always going to be able to carry an elf on his back.

Gently touching her chin, he whispered something in what must have been angeltongue because seconds later she was dry.

“Now, you’re warm,” he said, looking very pleased with himself.

“Warm and probably looking a fright.” She nudged him into the house, feeling unbalanced and needing to clear her head. “Go eat. I need to make a couple calls.” Perhaps Jenny had rooted up some scholarly angels who knew about elf magic.

He went.

Blue and Willa were still quibbling in the dining room as Noelle squinted at her phone display. She didn’t recognize the number the text message had originated from. The message had to have come from someone very familiar with her circumstances, though:

She assumed “here” meant to Clarissa’s. She glanced over her shoulder and through the kitchen doorway at Tamatsu.

He saluted her with his sandwich, looking far too gleeful, and she sighed again.

“He’s so fuckin’ adorable,” she muttered.

Willa looked her way. “Huh?”

“Ignore me.” Noelle passed through the living room and out the front door. On the porch, she texted back:

She wanted to see what the solution was before broaching it with Tamatsu. She wouldn’t be able to live with herself if she got his hopes up again, only for the so-called cure to be untenable.

 “Let’s not be hasty, here,” she muttered, and then typed:

 “Oh.” Noelle furrowed her brow.

She scratched her head, trying not to think about what kind of river creatures she was giving entry to her scalp.

She wouldn’t dream of saying no. That angel could have all the answers she needed.

She descended the stairs to the walkway and then strode to the sidewalk, looking to get her bearings. She texted:

A minute later, Claude texted:

 “Ten minutes …” She checked the time, and then glanced back at the bungalow’s door. Tarik was standing in it. She gestured him over.

“I know better than to ask since favors are a dangerous currency in our world,” she said, “but could you do me one?”

“Depends on the favor,” he said wisely.

“I need to go talk to Gulielmus. His son says he has information.”

Tarik cocked a brow. “Gulielmus does?”

“That’s all I know.”

He nodded gravely.

“I hope to pop there and pop back. His son John is supposed to come fetch me.”

“Hmm.”

She didn’t know if she liked the sound of that flat “Hmm,” but she didn’t have time to press. “Can you, you know, keep Tamatsu occupied for a bit? He’s so hungry from the work at the river that he should be easy to distract, but if he asks where I’ve gone, can you cover for me? I don’t want him to follow until I know what Gulielmus has to say.”

Tarik shoved his hands into the pockets of his slacks and stared down the street, likely at the honking cars in the intersection. She didn’t think he was going to respond because he was quiet for so long, but then he looked down at her, his face a neutral mask.

“I’ll do that favor,” he said.

“In exchange for?”

“Nothing so dire, simply your honesty.”

“I’ve seen firsthand how dangerous honesty can be.”

“Understood. Hear my request, anyway?”

“Of course. Go on.”

He nodded, but was quiet for long enough to unsettle her more, not that she’d needed any help with that.

“Gods, Tarik.”

“Fine. Upon your return, I’d like the truth of Gulielmus’s condition. Objectively observe him to the best of your ability. I can’t always rely on Clarissa for that. She’s too …” His cringe was almost too fast to see before it disappeared. “Entrenched.”

She waited for the rest, but no more words came. “That’s all?”

“He is my friend,” he said simply.

“Oh.” Noelle’s taut shoulders fell down to their natural position. She hadn’t even noticed how tense she’d been standing. “Your friend.” She nodded, and took off for the middle school. Looking over her shoulder once more, she said, “Thank you.”

He bowed slightly and returned to the house.

• • •

For the men around her to have supposedly been on the side of the good guys—or at least, the neutral side—Noelle was unusually agitated. She felt like she needed to put a knife in each hand and one between her teeth, too, and get ready to fight. The only thing that prevented her from running to the barn’s doorway and grabbing the pitchfork propped there was Clarissa’s expression of utter calm. She’d apparently become inured to the choking amounts of magic swirling around, but Noelle couldn’t ignore it. It reminded her the days she’d spent around capricious fae and how whenever she felt so suffocated, there was likely a fight about to happen.

John’s breathtakingly pure aura had nearly put her on her knees. Before she’d been able to right herself on the other end of his gentle teleporting, Claude had appeared. The magic he had was different than his brother’s, but easy enough for Noelle to recognize. She knew witches. Claude had to have been born of a powerful one.

And then there was Gulielmus, leaning against the tractor, arms crossed over his chest, scowling.

The scowl wasn’t for Noelle. He was looking over her head toward Clarissa.

Gulielmus’s power was pulsing like a heartbeat, and it was hot. Sultry. It made her ache to be noticed, to be recognized, to be … touched.

The worst part was that he didn’t seem to be casting out the power on purpose. He simply thrummed with it.

She rubbed her hands up her arms and forced down a swallow. “What the hell is happening?”

His bottomless blue gaze flitted toward Noelle. He took a deep, rasping breath, and some of the energy in the space abated. “Apologies.”

“I didn’t feel that the last time I was here.”

He rolled his shoulders slowly, making his dark wings ripple. He looked back and down at the right one, staring at it as if he’d forgotten the appendage was there. His bemused stroking of the feathers near his waist seemed to lend credence to her theory.

Clarissa moved slowly toward Noelle, keeping her eyes locked on Gulielmus as she moved. At her side, she tucked Noelle’s arm around hers. “I believe he was triggered,” Clarissa projected telepathically.

“In what way?”

“He must have saw something or heard something that made his memories begin to cascade back. I’ve been suspicious for the past few days that he was regaining his memory. He’d say things in passing about events he shouldn’t have remembered, but since he didn’t dwell on them, I didn’t query further. Apparently, the trickle turned into an avalanche.”

“Why is he angry at you?”

He was staring at them, or at one of them. Noelle couldn’t tell, specifically. Like many angels of his power tier, he was so hard to stare at straight on. Tamatsu had been hard to look at when she’d first met him, too.

“I believe he’s angry because he realizes I did nothing to help him remember.”

“Are you going to be okay?”

Clarissa scoffed, and laced her fingers through Noelle’s. “I’ve dealt with worse, remember?”

Suddenly, Noelle wasn’t so sure if Lorcan counted as “worse.” Lorcan had been a predictable sort of villain. The angel was far from that.

Clearing his throat, Claude joined their huddle and then took a deep breath. “Ever since he woke from his coma, his magic has been different than what I was formerly familiar with. My brothers and I have been trying to work out what, specifically, is different about him. Without him being able to help us make the comparisons, we didn’t accomplish much.”

“Is he much different than Tarik and Tamatsu, then?” Noelle asked.

“They were all different, even before my father decided to accept the incubus magic from the demons, but I suspect now that he simply took the job because he would have been good at it anyway.”

“I don’t understand.”

Gulielmus blinked then. He’d been staring for so long that she hadn’t noticed how still he’d been.

“They all fall for different reasons—they were all unsatisfied for different reasons. His flaw was lust.”

“So he and Tamatsu are similar in that way?”

“Yes and no,” came Gulielmus’s disconcertingly flat voice. “Tamatsu doesn’t seek power from sex, or at least, he didn’t when we last roamed together. It’s a hunger for him.”

“But not for you.”

His lips twitched at the corners. “I wanted it for different reasons.”

She wanted to know those reasons, but he wasn’t her concern. She’d visited because she needed to make Tamatsu whole—the world needed Tamatsu whole. Gulielmus was a distraction. “Listen. Claude said you had an idea of how I can dislodge Tamatsu’s voice from me.”

He smoothed the feathers of his wing again, and said nothing for a minute. When he looked up once more, his gaze was on Claude. “Did you tell her the solution is imperfect?”

“Yes.”

“Then I won’t draw out the suspense.” Gulielmus strode over, wings disappearing as he moved, his shoulders rolling.

“Why’s he hiding them now?” Noelle projected to Clarissa.

“Likely because he simply can. He’s such a vain creature. He’ll show off at any chance he gets.”

“If the past thousand years have taught me anything,” Gulielmus said, “I’ve learned what an efficient medium sex can be in transferring things.”

“Things such as …”

“Energy. Magic. Will.” He smiled, and he was devastatingly handsome, but … he probably knew that.

Clarissa let out an annoyed huff and rolled her eyes, likely thinking the same. Noelle had never seen her do that before.

“At the moment of release,” he said, ignoring Clarissa’s disdain, “you can give or you can take. The trick with either is to get away before your partner notices.”

“I don’t follow,” Noelle said, furrowing her brow. “Why would I want to get away if I’m giving him back something that’s owed to him?”

“Because what you owe to him can’t be separated from what belongs to you.”

Can’t be separated?

The full implication of his statement settled into her in bits and pieces, and that didn’t make the truth any easier to digest. They were right that there was nothing perfect about the solution. She could give Tamatsu back his voice and therefore restore to him the full arsenal of his angelic abilities, but she’d lose her own ability to speak.

Clarissa gave her hand a hard squeeze. “Noelle, before you decide—”

Noelle tugged her hand free and took a step back. There was no decision necessary. “But I don’t really need mine, do I?”

“I urge you not to be rash,” Claude said. “Tamatsu has gotten on for hundreds of years without his voice and he has adapted to not having it.”

“But the consequences aren’t as punishing for me. Will I be able to make phone calls? No. Will negotiating deals be harder? Yes, but I don’t need my voice to intensify my magic. My magic is conveyed through will and anger, not sound.”

“Yes,” Clarissa said, nodding, “but a voice is one of the best things a woman of five feet tall has as a weapon in this modern, human world. Would you really care to lose your ability to scream or to talk back?”

That’s what she did. She talked back.

Noelle tucked her hair behind her ears and stared down at the straw scattered on the floor.

Clarissa squeezed her arm. “Please. Find some other way.”

“The choice is hers, is it not?” Gulielmus asked.

“Stop,” Clarissa spat. “You don’t understand what you’re doing.”

“I understand perfectly well what I’m doing. I’m giving her the information she seeks. Whether or not she chooses to use it is up to her.”

Clarissa moved in front of Noelle, blocking Gulielmus only somewhat from her sight. He was so big, she couldn’t truly eclipse him. “As a queen, I was able to forbid you from doing foolish things, and you listened then.”

“Yes,” Noelle admitted solemnly. “I did.”

“I have no authority over you here and can’t expect you to obey me, but I implore you not to sever such an important part of yourself.”

“I’m trying to be good, Clarissa.” Noelle put on a smile for her, but she knew it was strained. “That’s what you wanted. I failed before. I was young and stupid, but I’m trying to fix things now.”

“But not like this. You can’t—”

“If my understanding of elf magic is as good as I believe,” Gulielmus said, “you’ll have a short period of time before the transfer locks. He can throw it back at you before then.”

“What do I need to do?” Noelle asked.

“Give it and go.”

“Noelle,” Clarissa warned.

“How long?” Noelle asked Gulielmus.

“Two weeks. A month would be better.”

“But he’ll be hungry. He’ll … He’ll hurt.”

He’d stray, and she wouldn’t be able to blame him. And then she’d hurt.

“There’s a balm for that,” Gulielmus said.

“What is it? Where do I get it?”

“You already have it.”

Clarissa gave her head a hard shake and whipped around to face him. “Noelle, do not—”

Gulielmus pressed a hand over Clarissa’s mouth and tugged her against his body. Swinging her arms and flailing her legs, she tried to break free of his grip, but if his was anything like Tamatsu’s, she was wasting her energy. Gulielmus wasn’t even straining.

“If you’re going into hiding,” he said calmly, “you won’t need it, anyway. Besides, you’ll sleep it off eventually.”

“What is the it you’re talking about?”

“Your life force. You may be less of an elf than you once were, but you’re still far more vital than most humans. A sip will sate him indefinitely. You’ll be weak afterward, but the good news is …” Clarissa thrashed against him harder, but he held her without so much as a flinch of his muscles. “While you’re asleep and adjusting to your faculties post-donation, he won’t be able to find you.”

“My … life force?”

“A sip.”

“So I’ll be a little dead, then.”

He shrugged. “A bit closer to human, I suppose. You’ll likely lose some of what’s left of your magic.”

Closer to human.

Closer to normal.

That wasn’t such a bad thing.

She hoped that some of her paranoia and anger would evaporate along with the magic if she had to lose it. If Tamatsu would be well as a result of the gift, she’d happily give it again and again.

She dragged her tongue across her lips, pondering pitfalls and traps and, thinking of none, she nodded. “Okay. Tell me what to do.”

“No!” Clarissa shouted in a muffle behind his hand.

“I’ll tell you exactly what.” He drew his hand away from Clarissa’s mouth and peered down at the blood on his palm. He growled and wiped the blood on his shirt. “Be advised, however, that you’ll need to be prepared to move quickly once you’ve given it.”

“How?”

Gulielmus looked to John who, with a grimace, took a step forward.

“He’ll be ready to move you. You simply need to know where you’re going.”

Noelle took John’s arm yet again, ready to go. She had to do this.

“Noelle,” Clarissa begged. “Please.”

“I’m being good. That’s what you wanted.”