Matter of Truth, A (24 page)

A scream shoots at us from the near north. I pull an arrow
out of my quiver. “Four’s nothing, right?” I whisper to Will. “With this many
on our team?”

He smiles easily. “Child’s play.”

“You should go back to the plane. Stay where it’s safe.”

“This shite again?” He clucks quietly. “I’m here, Chloe.
Okay? I’m staying right where I am.”

Kellan’s hand on my arm sends such a strong shock through
me, my knees nearly buckle. “Chloe,” he murmurs, but my fingers go to his lips,
stopping the words I want to say, too. Words I won’t say, not even now.

The Elders attack simultaneously, surprising us with two
extras that somehow eluded Lee. If I’d thought their forms were creepy before,
they’re beyond terrifying now. More humanoid than ever, with more developed
weapons jutting from their limbs, these monsters are the epitome of boogeymen.
Both Blazes instantly go on the offense, sending streaks of fire at the shape
shifters, and Lola yanks lightning down from the sky while Flip twists thin
tornadoes from the clouds to herd our prey, but the deft movements of these
killers leave them unscathed.

I’m shooting arrows as fast as my fingers allow me. Kellan
has one of the Elders cowering before him moments after it hurls itself at me.
As Karl sets off another round of sonic booms and Will’s sword flashes before
shrieking nearly strips the trees bare, I launch myself at the Elder Kellan’s
got subdued. It swings its dagger like arm right at me, driving deep into my
recently repaired shoulder, but I manage to will it out of existence fairly
quickly.

Too quickly, because once more my chin hits the ground. When
will I learn? Even still, I got this one down within a matter of minutes.

Kellan’s immediately at my side, hauling me up and stripping
the pain from my arm. There’s no time to thank him, though, as another sonic
boom nearly sends us sprawling. I scramble over toward the downed shape
shifter; Karl bellows from nearby, “Five seconds, Chloe!” And five seconds is
longer than I have, because the Elder rouses and immediately charges me. I
fumble for my bow, but it’s on me before I can slide the arrow out of the
quiver. A pair of quick slashes to my right arm knocks my breath right out of
my chest and my bow right out of my fingers. Dammit! I messed up the
Elder-proof suits again! And then the Elder is squealing, twisting in agony as
it writhes before me. I thank my lucky stars that Kellan is behind me, even as
another sonic boom sounds. My hand slams down against the Elder, and within a
split second, I’m once more diving toward the dirt.

Or not, because Kellan catches me this time right before I
hit the ground. “Will’s got one staked nearby,” he tells me, and before I know
it, we’re darting across the clearing as fast as we can. Fire blazes in and out
of our path as the four remaining Elders lead the team on a grim chase.
Lightning strikes the ground fast and hard, but nobody other than Karl and Will
are making sufficient enough contact to be useful.

Only Kellan has been able to get to them from a distance.

One of the Elders hits Will from behind, sending him
sprawling. I yell at Kellan to cover Will as I collapse over the pinned shape
shifter. It gnashes what looks like smoke fangs at me, and I recoil just long
enough for it to stake my leg to the ground.

OH MY EFFING GODS DOES THIS HURT.

I slam my fist against its quasi-solid body, but the pain in
me is so intense that I can’t—I can’t—

Stars dance before my eyes. I’ve lost the ability to
breathe.

Worse yet, I think the screaming I’m hearing is coming from
me.

And then Kellan is there, my face in his hands, as the Elder
is swinging its free arm at him, and he’s saying—he’s saying—look at him, I
think. He wants me to look at him. Listen to him. And the pain, it subsides
enough that the moment I see the monster below us make contact with his arm,
I’m able to make it disappear.

Shrieking so ear piercing it leaves my ears bleeding
surrounds us, and then the remaining Elders disappear.

“You’re bleeding,” I tell Kellan. My voice shakes just as
hard as my limbs do.

He closes his eyes and drops his head against mine. “I’m
going to make you sleep now, okay?” he whispers so quietly that surely nobody
else can hear him, not when our ears are bleeding like they are. “You’re going
to sleep until I get you to the Shamans back at the plane.”

I don’t argue with him.

Surprisingly, Zthane deems the mission a success even though
I only managed to take out three Elders. The entire plane ride back, the team
was fairly subdued. I think the Blazes and Elemental knew that they’d not even
come close to helping contain our enemy. A non with a sword proved more
effective, and that must’ve smarted, although nobody had the balls to say it
out loud around us. Kellan was on edge the entire time, this time sitting on
the other side of me rather than across. To make matters worse, Jonah called
him not ten minutes before we landed in Novosibirsk.

I tried not to listen to the call. I really did. But it
basically came down to Jonah knowing that Kellan was freaking out, and he
wanted to know why and if it was about me. I guess Kellan had been pretty
successful at blocking his brother for the most part of the mission, but when I
was pinned to the ground and nearly killed (or so Will said, when claiming the
Elder’s other sword-arm came perilously close to going straight through the top
of my skull before Kellan subdued it), he lost any control he had over
shielding the situation from Jonah. So I got to listen to Kellan argue with
Jonah about why he was blocking his memories, thanks to the promise Karl
extracted earlier, and then flat out lie, claiming it had nothing to do with
me.

Relief had nearly melted me straight to the floor of the
plane. Jonah was worried—Jonah was calling! Angry as he is, hurt as he is,
after everything I’ve done . . . it was a good sign, right?

I tried to hold onto this during the debriefing back in
Annar, even when my eyes threatened to shut me out of coherent conversation.
Even after having the thrill of seeing my good friend Etienne Miscanthus again,
who came to help share Elders histories with Zthane. It was a success, the head
of the Guard kept saying to all of us. The Council can’t know yet (outside of
the members in this room, he clarified). The Council will never sanction having
their Creator go out and repeatedly get cut up, risking her life. Kellan argued
the validity of this point, sounding much like his brother, but in the end,
Karl and I overrode him, siding with Zthane, and agreed to meet in a few days
to set up the next round.

“It’s good to see you, peacock,” Etienne murmurs when he
hugs me goodbye. “Let’s have tea soon?”

I tighten my arms around him. I’ve missed him. “Of course.
Tell Mac he must come, too.”

Etienne pulls away, his hand going to my cheek. “We wouldn’t
have it any other way. See you soon, pumpernickel.” And then he goes over to
where Zthane is so they can discuss the situation further.

“I should get you home,” Will’s saying as we exit through
the HQ doors. “Dad’s probably out of his mind with worry. At least this time,
he won’t have to worry about patching us up.”

I laugh, but Kellan doesn’t find this humorous at all.

I’m just about to do something incredibly stupid, like ask
him to come back and maybe have dinner with us because I can’t resist him and
the feelings I have for him one second longer, when Sophie Greenfield
materializes. And I stand there, shock coursing through every vein, every nerve
when she leans forward and presses a kiss against Kellan’s cheek.

Is it my imagination that he flinches when her lips touch
his skin? That his entire body shrinks away from hers in visible disgust? Or is
that wishful thinking?

“There you are!” she says, and I swear, an ugly sense of
triumph is what curves her mouth and softens her voice. “I was hoping you’d be
free for dinner.”

Before Kellan can say anything, she turns to me and Will.
“Look who’s crawled back to Annar. And is this the non that everyone’s talking
about? The one you dumped Jonah for?”

“Who the fuck is this?” Will practically barks at Kellan.

But me, I don’t even know what to say. Think. So I do the
only thing I can do in this excruciatingly awkward, torturous moment—I turn
around and walk away without another word. Kellan’s voice, raised and angry,
fills the background, but I close my ears to the particulars.

It’s none of my business, I tell myself with every step.
He’s free to do whatever he likes with whomever. And then—I need to get the
hell out of here before I fall entirely apart.

I resent that thought, resent that even after everything I’ve
gone through, everything I’ve decided, Fate still shows how it can screw with
me by manipulating my heart this way.

“Who was that?” Will asks, jogging the last few steps to
catch up with me.

“Sophie,” I say tersely, because anything else would be too
much.

“You realize that helps me in no way.”

I focus on the sidewalk in front of me.

He sighs, knowing I won’t—or perhaps can’t—elaborate any
further. “Well, whoever she is, she just got her ass ripped off and handed to
her by your boy there. It was rather embarrassing for her, although I’m not
sure it fazed her one bit.”

I smash the fierce pleasure that comes with this back into
the box it came from.

“Chloe, wait.” It’s Kellan’s turn to jog to where we are. He
reaches out to grab my arm, but I deftly move it away from his hand. There is
no good in our touching in this moment. None at all. Not if I’m going to stay
strong in the moment and do the right thing for both of us. But if he can’t get
through to me physically, he plants himself in front of me and attempts to stop
me with his words. “Please—just . . . let me explain.”

I force a bright smile upon my face as I finally stop.
“There’s no need for an explanation.” Because there isn’t, I tell myself, even
though it hurts like hell knowing it to be true.

It’s Will’s cue to dismiss himself, telling me, “I’ll meet
you at home, yeah?”

Before Kellan can say anything further, I dig deep and cut
him off at the pass. “Look. If you haven’t forgotten, I abandoned you—I
abandoned everyone. I left Annar and moved away for over half a year. It is
completely reasonable that during that time period, you . . .” I force myself
to say it, even though it’s shards of glass coming up through my throat, “That
you would do whatever you like, with whomever you like, including Sophie.”

All of his panic transitions to fury. “There is
nothing
between me and Sophie, Chloe.”

Two fists reach inside my chest and grip my lungs so hard I
can barely get out, “The point is still the same, Kellan.”

“Why, hello,” his heart says to my dagger that slides so
easily into it. “Fancy meeting you here.”

I can’t escape his touch now as he angles us to a nearby
alcove. Oh, gods . . . tingles zip up and down my spine, my arms, my chest, my
legs—everywhere, everywhere, and it’s like a drug, and I have to yank my arm
away lest I relapse in ways I may never recover from. “Why are you doing this?”

To let you go, I think, even though it breaks my own heart
into tiny pieces. And the thing is, Kellan Whitecomb—not so much his actions,
but what he means to me, how I feel about him—has always had the ability to
render me senseless. I can’t let this be how it is anymore. No matter what, I
need to get a grip and act fairly.

Even still, this moment here hurts more than I can
articulate, but I need to do it. He’s nobody’s second best. Not even mine. He’s
too wonderful for that.

And because I’m not hiding anything from him, he must feel
this, since he snaps, “Fine. You can think you’re being noble,”—
ouch
—“or
self-sacrificing or whatever the hell you think you’re doing, but I
know
you. And I need you to understand right now that . . . yes, while you were
gone, I found ways to deal with the pain of your loss.” He steps closer to me,
viciously twisting the leather band around his wrist. “Gods. She’s relentless.
Whatever happened with her, I regret that more than anything. There is nothing
between her and me, no matter what she thinks. Nothing. She’s—you can ask
Jonah. She’s . . . unbalanced.”

I’m not surprised to hear he’s slept with other women during
my absence. It’s an agony I’m quite familiar with. But the one that hits me out
of left field, the one that has me leaning back against the wall, is the
thought that maybe Jonah did the same.

And Kellan must know I’m feeling this way because the hurt
in his eyes nearly sends me back to Alaska.

I whisper words so familiar to the both of us, words that
have defined way too much of our relationship together. I tell him I’m sorry.

He walks me home in silence. I do not offer to have him stay
for dinner.