Broken Promise (The Broken Ones Book 3) (2 page)

Fine. Then I’ll come down,
she grumbled.

He laughed as she carefully descended.
When she wobbled in the air attempting to land next to him, he reached out to
steady her. Strong hands grabbed her waist and shifted her to the side.
Startled at the movement, she grasped his arms.

Careful, you don’t want to crush it.

Crush what?
She looked up
at him in surprise and then followed his gaze to the ground beside her feet.

A small spot of green brightened the
dark, otherwise barren earth. Stepping back from Garen, she knelt down to look
at it more closely. A spindly little brown stick poked up, topped with three
little bright green leaves.
What is it?

Garen crouched beside her.
A tree, I
would guess from the stem. Plants have lighter, softer stems. I think.
He
shrugged.

She peered at the leaves but didn’t
recognize them.
What kind of tree?

He shook his head.
I don’t know. Baby
leaves can be different though.

She looked over at him, eyebrows raised.
How do you know so much about plants?

He flashed her a wry grin.
I pay
attention in the forest. You should, too.

She snorted and turned her attention
back to the little tree.
How did it get here?

This is your mind. You tell me.

I have no idea,
she said in
exasperation.
What do you think?

He stood and crossed his arms, staring
down at the tree thoughtfully.
It could be a manifestation that you are
healing from all that has happened. It could have something to do with your
growing powers. Or…
He looked at her thoughtfully for a moment.
Perhaps
it has something to do with you and Prince
.

What about us?

Your growing…relationship. You love him,
and he has admitted his love for you.

She shook her head. No, he hadn't.
And
so a tree grows in my mind? That doesn’t make a lot of sense.

When it comes to magic, things rarely
make sense.

Well, she could certainly agree with
that. Straightening, she worried her lower lip between her teeth, eyes still
locked on the little tree.
So…do I have to water it or something?

He let out a deep sigh.
Listen to
your instincts. If you pay attention, you’ll know what it needs.
He cocked
his head to the side.
Bo and Kei are awake.

Good, I’m hungry.
She glanced at
the tree one last time. Seeing it there gave her a little feeling of hope.
Perhaps that was what it meant.

Chapter 2

Gifts

As they walked back to camp, Aro thought
about what Garen had said. When it comes to magic, things rarely made sense.

It bothered her she knew so little about
it. Growing up on the western continent, magic had only been vaguely referred
to in children’s stories. The west was only home to humans, but…it must exist
there. Kei, the only Fey in the west, had been able to use his fury. Humans,
however, did not have magic. They were different from the other races. They
hadn’t come from the same place.

She shuddered at the thought. Thinking
about how none of the races originated on this world hurt her head. Rhee-En had
told them how dark, evil creatures called the Vor had been imprisoned on this
world. The other races were sent here to make sure they never returned to the
home world. The humans…no one knew how or why they’d come.

They must have used some kind of magic
to get here, so she didn’t understand why humans didn’t have any now. Maybe
they did but just didn’t know it. Perhaps she was just the exception.

Her strange abilities hadn’t started until
after Kei used binding magic with her on the slave ship. Had the Fey magic
triggered something? Yet, her coming to the east and saving the Fey had been
prophesied. Maybe she’d had it all along. Not knowing only frustrated her more.

Everything had changed. She had changed.
The future held much more in store for her. The prophecies she hated made that
clear. Learning all she could gave her a better chance at survival. The other
races and the Vor were dangerous, especially to a mortal human like her.

Kei grinned at her as she approached the
fire, running his hands through his messy hair. "Morning."

"Good morning to you. You slept
well."

"I did," he admitted ruefully.
"How did you sleep?"

She shrugged. "Well enough." She
began digging through the packs to find something to make for breakfast.

"I’m going to check on the horses."

"I’ll find a bit more wood,"
Bo offered.

Turning, she saw the low fire and lack
of a woodpile. "Thanks. That’d be great."

Busying herself with cooking, she let
her mind wander again. With Prince gone, she’d lost the person most likely to
answer her questions. Kei had grown up in the west and lost his parents when he
was young, so he didn’t know much about magic or his history. Garen mostly
spoke in riddles. She wondered if he just didn’t know either. He’d left his
pack at a young age when for some reason he’d lost the ability to shift back
into his human form.

Bo dropped an armful of wood beside the
fire. "Anything else you need?"

"No, this is good. Unless you want
to cook?"

His loud laugh echoed through the trees
around them. "I want to be able to eat the food."

"Good point," she said with a
smile.

She concentrated on getting breakfast
going. Prince had given her and Bo each a horse. The Elven seer apparently saw
him coming home, what he would have gifted them, and prepared everything. She
wasn’t sure how much to trust the seer. Hopefully the packs weren’t full of old
socks. At least they now owned two beautiful Elven horses.

She glanced over at Garen. Prince gave
him an Elven glamor rune. It somehow hid his size, having him appear to be a
large dog, and encouraged others to stay away and not look. He could now safely
go into the cities with them without causing panic in the streets.

Elves didn’t change forms like the Were
or shift into killing beasts with claws and fangs like the Fey in their fury.
Their magic consisted of spells. The only Elven magic she’d ever seen had been
the glamor rune. Prince wore one when she’d first met him, hidden on the back
of his neck. It made him appear human, hiding his pointed ears and softening
his beauty. She hadn’t even known it was there until Damon showed them and tore
it off. Magic was power though, or something like that. While with them, Prince
had been too weak to ever use any.

Did all their magic use runes? Why had she
never asked?

From now on, she’d have to ask more
questions. She ground her teeth in frustration at the opportunities wasted with
Prince. She’d learned to build a fortress in her mind to protect her thoughts
and memories from people who would try to read them. But she’d never learned
how to enter another’s mind like Prince and Garen did with her. She didn’t know
how to read someone’s thoughts and could only speak to other telepaths like the
Were and Dragos. She paused, wondering if she could speak to Elves. She’d only
been able to talk to Prince when he touched her, but that had been before the
pack bond, and back then, she’d known even less. Perhaps he’d been too weak to
speak and hear her without touching?

Mulling that thought over, she finished
cooking. "Time to eat, boys," she called.

They gathered around and ate quickly.

"You’re quiet this morning,"
Bo commented between bites.

"I’ve been thinking," she
admitted. "About magic. I have a lot to learn."

Bo sat back. "I don’t think that’s
something you want to meddle with."

She nodded her agreement. "I know.
I need to find someone to teach me, like Prince was doing." Looking over
at Garen, she grinned.

Don’t give me that look.

"There must be something you can
teach me."

The Were don’t have much magic, and I
can’t see you learning to shift.

She snorted and choked on a bite of
food. "No. But you can come into my mind like Prince did. I don’t know how
to do that. Or how to pick up others' thoughts, I can only speak to them.
Things like that."

We learn when we are young, surrounded
by our parents and elders. Leaving your own mind is dangerous. Things can go
terribly wrong.

Aro bit her lip at the tenseness of his
voice. "Is that what happened to you," she asked quietly.

Not…quite. I at least had my wolf. If
you became separated from your body, you would simply be lost.

The thought sent a shiver down her spine
and left her breakfast feeling like a hard, cold lump in her stomach.

Bo cleared his throat, startling her.

"I know," she muttered.

"Promise," Kei said softly. "You
won’t try on your own."

"I promise," she said quickly,
meaning it. The thought of losing her body still gave her chills.

If you remain with the Were and can find
someone to teach you, I will help. I just wouldn’t know what to do if something
went wrong.

"I understand. Thank you, Garen."
She appreciated his honesty and concern for her safety. "So," she
said into the silence. "What’s the word? What do we do now?"

Bo slapped his hands on his large
thighs. "I think I’ll see what Prince sent us while we talk."

She looked over to Kei as Bo fetched one
of the two large double saddlebags and hauled it over. The Fey stared into the
fire, chewing his lower lip.

"Well," she said into the
silence. "I’m tired, and sore, and think wherever we go should have nice
soft beds. And lots of food."

"And warm," Bo added, with a
smile. "What is in this?" He grunted and thumped back down to sit
next to the bag he’d dragged over.

She grinned, remembering how often
they’d been cold the previous winter when they’d run out of fuel to burn. "Warm
would be nice."

We are welcome with the Were.

"So they said," Bo answered. "But
I don’t know where they’d keep us. I don’t want to overstay our welcome."

"Prince said if we were to stay in a
city to go to Westport. It’s the one north of this one." She jerked her
head at the city beyond the hills. "He said they have the largest port."

"We might hear some word of home then,"
Bo said, pulling bags from the pouch. Opening one, he peered inside and
whistled before setting it to the side and starting on another.

"We might," Aro agreed, her
thoughts turning to the home they’d lost, and to the family she’d lost when the
slavers captured her. Clearing her throat, she shook the dark, sad thoughts
away. "What are you finding?"

"Lots of coin so far," Bo
answered with a wide grin.

"We could rent a nice place then,
and should be able to afford food and anything else we needed." She
glanced over at Garen. "Would you be able to winter in a city?"

With the rune Prince gave me, it
shouldn’t be a problem. It is not uncommon for Were to live undetected in the
human cities for a time.

Her eyebrows rose. How many Were had she
passed in all the cities they’d traveled through and she hadn’t noticed? "What
do they do?"

Work. Make things that are needed for
the pack. Gather supplies.
His tongue lolled out.
Gather information on the
humans.

She chuckled and shook her head. His
words shouldn’t have surprised her. Glancing over at Kei, her heart sunk. He
didn’t look happy. "Kei? What do you want to do?"

"I’ll go where you go," he
whispered.

"No," she said firmly. "What
do
you
want to do?"

Lowering his eyes, he shrugged a
shoulder. "I want to help my people. Find them. Heal them." He shook
his head and smiled up at her sadly. "We’ve been through much. You need to
rest. The forest in winter is not an easy place to be."

Her heart went out to him. She didn’t
know what to do.

This far south the winters are milder.

"I still don’t want to tramp around
in the cold and snow," Bo said. He grimaced and rubbed a knee. "I’m
not getting any younger." He turned to Kei. "Is there a plan for
having Aro heal the Fey? Wandering through the woods hoping to come across them
could take a long time."

"No." Kei’s lips turned down
and he ran his fingers through his hair. "You’re right. We need to talk
about it."

"And what we’ll do once we get
started," Bo continued. "Will they stay with us or go on their way?
What is it you want to accomplish?"

"To return to Furia and make it our
home again," Kei said softly.

Aro reached out and rubbed his shoulder.
"Then we’ll make plans to do that."

He nodded and smiled at her faintly.

"I mean it." She let her hand
drop, unsure what to say or do to break his dark mood. "It's been a long
year," she continued quietly. "We just need some rest."

"I understand." From the tone
of his voice, he didn't.

She couldn't really blame him. Finally
the Fey had someone who could save them from being constantly locked in their
fury, and she wanted to take a break.

Clinking sounds turned her attention
back to Bo and the growing pile of small bags around him.

"We're good." A broad grin
split his face as he gestured to different piles. "Gold, silver." He
selected a bag and tossed it to her. "Gems."

Her eyebrows rose as she opened the
small bag. It wasn't full, but the shiny cut stones within could likely
purchase a small town. "You're saying we're rich?"

"Is there a word for more than
rich?"

She chuckled, her mind still not
grasping the wealth sitting on the ground in little bags. "What was he
thinking?"

Bo smiled softly. "He wanted you to
have everything you might ever need or want. We can buy a house now and fill it
with anything. We can hire servants to cook and clean. We can do anything.
There is enough here we can all live royally until the day we die."

"I can have a real bed," she
murmured. Looking to Kei, a huge grin split her face. The pensive look on his
face killed her smile. She wracked her brain, trying to figure out why he
wasn't happy they were all rich now. The realization struck her swiftly.
Reaching over she punched his arm. "Think how prepared we'll be for our
next adventure, Kei. We can buy anything we might ever need to search for the
Fey."

His eyes flicked over to hers and
finally, she saw a smile. He nodded sharply once, yet his shoulders relaxed.

"There's more," Bo said,
stopping her from trying to pry more out of Kei.

"More?"

He held up a large wrapped parcel, his
brows drawing together as he studied something on the top. With a grimace of
annoyance, he held it out to her. "There are three, each with a
note."

Taking the awkward bundle, she
understood his annoyance. Of them all, Bo was the only one who couldn't read. She
read the small note tied to the strings and held it out to Kei. "This
one's yours."

The next was for Bo, and finally she
held one with her name. They all sat for a moment, exchanging glances before
attacking the knots. Unfolding layers of cloth, she came across a leather belt
first, small yet with beautiful etchings in the leather of leaves and vines.
Glancing up, she saw the boys each finding their own. Next came a sheath,
mostly plain, yet studying it she marveled at the craftsmanship.