The Shadows

FIFTY-TWO

iAm had not intended for Trez’s words to sink in any more than the cold breeze had when they’d been standing in the courtyard. He had planned to go inside, eat something fast, and forget that whole interaction had occurred. Go about his night. Head over to the clubs and the restaurant. Push papers, take control, make some decisions that were concrete and solid.

Instead, he was stuck in the foyer, staring up at the three-story-high ceiling that had been painted by some great artist. The subject matter was, he supposed, inspirational: heroes on venerable steeds, fighting in the clouds, heavenly warriors who were brave and strong and on the side of the righteous.

But all that glory wasn’t why he’d gone into pause mode.

Trez’s destiny was a house of cards, a delicate, tricky thing that had had to be managed all of both their lives. Every move iAm took had to be careful, deliberate, and calculated with the goal of survival.

His brother’s.

He was a centuries-old virgin because of it.

Hell, he hadn’t even looked at a female, like, ever.

Whether Trez had been banging them in the clubs, or throwing porn up on the TV, or talking about what he’d done all over his desk, in the back of his car, outside in the fucking parking lot, iAm had never had any interest in any of it.

He’d been a flatline motherfucker.

Mother-not-fucker, as it were.

And yeah, he’d tried on the whole gay thing for size, wondering if maybe he was attracted to men and males.

Nope.

It had gotten to the point where, if it weren’t for the fact that he washed them every night, he’d have wondered whether or not he had any balls.

Ask yourself what’s going to be left for you after I’m gone. If you’re honest, I don’t think you’re going to like the answer any more than I do.

Without being aware of having come to a decision, iAm turned on his heel and went out through the vestibule. On the front stoop of the massive gray mansion, he stood in the wind . . .

. . . and then took flight.

On the journey to his destination, flashes of the past battered at him: Trez escaping from the palace. iAm being held until he promised to bring the male back—which had been the last thing he’d actually intended on doing. The mad hunt.

The cabin on Black Snake Mountain.

As iAm resumed his form, he had a moment of straight-up nausea as he took in the ragged, weathered structure with its rough vertical siding and its cedar shingles and that rock chimney which extruded from the roofline like a bad tooth. It was . . . exactly the same. Not even kind of the same, with different windows or shrubbery growing or trees that had fallen or overgrown.

No, for a split second he wasn’t sure whether this was years ago or right now.

Shaking himself, he walked to the front door. The hinges creaked as he opened things up, and at least he was better prepared for what he saw.

Precisely the same. From the placement of the no-frills furniture, to the old-fire smell, to the drafts that wheedled their way through the walls.

He closed the door behind him and walked around, his boots making the rough-cut floorboards clap and groan. Over by the river-rock hearth, he found a generous supply of wood—guess the last hunters who had used the place had been good little helpers and ready to pay shit forward.

His hands shook as he laid logs on the andirons and shoved pine needles underneath. Taking out the lighter he kept on him thanks to having worked with a lot of temperamental gas cooktops, he lit things, fanned them, got the flames up and rolling.

He told himself it was a waste of time and heat. She wasn’t going to come. There was no way she was going to come.

He was just going to hang here for a half hour or so, play witness to his brain sinking into some dark, dangerous territory, and then put out the fire and head back to Caldie.

The clubs. He would go to the clubs first, and then—

The sound of that creaky door opening made him stiffen.

maichen’s scent flooded the interior.

Cranking his head around, he lifted his eyes. There in the doorway, she stood in the flesh, her robes flapping in the cold wind rushing in from behind her.

She was both a ghost . . . and soul-shatteringly vital.

And as he looked at her, he knew exactly why they had both come.