Suzanne Johnson - Elysian Fields

“I’m sure there’s more,” I said. “What about my elven skills. Will they change? Will you get power from me?”

“You’ll get more from it than me in terms of skills,” Rand said. “I won’t pick up any wizard’s magic, but if we’re bonded you’ll be immune to our mental influence, even mine. Your empathic and aural skills will be stronger. As for me, well, I’ll be able to communicate with you mentally—the way I did in Elf heim, only you’ll be able to talk to me as well.”

Oh, great. Rand would be able to annoy me from a distance.

Encouraged by my silence, he kept yapping. “This can be a good thing, Dru. You can stay here in your house. You can see your friends. You don’t have to give up your life to either the Elders or the call of the moon.”

Speaking of friends . . . “You’d have to break things off with Eugenie because I don’t want to see her pulled in the middle of a mess she can’t possibly understand. She cares about you, and you’ve just been using her as a way to get to me. And break up with her in a way that doesn’t hurt her or make it look like it has anything to do with me.”

“Then you’ll do it?”

I closed my eyes. I’d be stuck with some sort of contact with Quince Randolph for the rest of my life, which was disgusting. On the other hand, at least I’d have a life. I’d have my job. I’d have a future in New Orleans. I’d have the possibility of a future with Alex. The Elders might even get some political stability from it with the elves. In the end, maybe it was worth the tradeoff. It wasn’t like I had to live with the guy. Maybe I’d never even have to see him again.

Besides, with Mace Banyan and the Synod aware of the loup-garou exposure, what choice did I have? Put up with the pest, die nobly, and sign Jake’s death warrant as well, or be consigned to the Beyond forever . . . if the Elders didn’t find a way to force me back under their control.

Crap. This was too big a decision to have to make in this short a time, but Rand was right. Alex, if not Zrakovi himself, wouldn’t allow Rand to get this close to me again. “What do we have to do?”

Rand reached in his jeans pocket, pulled out a small, ornate silver knife, and lifted my arm to make a small incision near where the healed scratch from Jake had been. He lifted my bleeding arm and dropped his mouth to the cut, drawing my blood into him. I tried to pull away but he held it fast, sucking on the wound. What did he think he was, a freaking vampire?

He leaned over, his mouth just above mine, and whispered, “With your blood you are bound to me.” He kissed me softly, lingered over it, and I elbowed him in the gut as hard as I could. The metallic taste of my own blood was vile, and I had no sympathy as he doubled over in pain. I still had the growing strength of a loup-garou.

He smiled up at me, his eyes a glaze of glassy blue. He’d gotten off on that. Just gross me out already. “The kiss is part of the ritual. Now, you.”

I still had time to back out. Alex would be furious but I was doing this for him as much as for me. For us. For Jake.

I nodded, and Rand flicked the knife across his neck, just over the collarbone. I started to point out how much more intimate this was going to be and insist he cut his arm, but, really, I just wanted it done.

He tilted his head toward his shoulder, baring his neck. I pushed his hair aside and hoped I could do this without barfing. I don’t want to be loup-garou. I don’t want to give up my life to live in the Beyond and hide from the Elders. I don’t want to be put down like a rabid dog, and I sure as hell don’t want to be locked up in Ittoqqortoormiit. If I shift, Mace Banyan wins.

I touched my tongue lightly against the blood trickling down his neck, and was surprised to find it tasted rich and sweet and most un-bloodlike. I put my lips over the cut and sucked in a tiny bit, trying not to think about what I was doing.

“Say the words,” he whispered.

I had to think a few seconds to remember what words he meant. “With your blood I am bound to you,” I said in a flat tone. I wanted him to know I certainly did not get off on it.

He smiled. “Now, kiss me.”

Ick. “Do I have to?”

“Yes.”

Fine, whatever. I leaned in and lightly touched my lips to his, then shoved him as hard as I could when he tried to slip an arm around me. He slid off the bed with a tumble and landed hard on his fine elven ass. If Quince Randolph thought being bonded to me would be a day in the park, he had a few surprises coming. “I hope that hurt.”

“It did.” He grunted as he climbed to his feet.

I stood up too fast and had to catch myself on the nightstand to keep from falling over. The energy that had been building in my muscles disappeared, and the achiness returned with a vengeance. The cut on my arm continued to bleed. I was no longer recovering like a loup-garou. Hallelujah.

“Now get the hell out of here, Rand. Go home. Think up a way to gently break it off with Eugenie. And keep your freaky Synod away from me.”

“I’d suggest you listen to her unless you want your ass handed to you again.” The low, hard sound of Alex’s voice preceded him in the doorway by a half second. He must’ve heard Rand hit the floor. “Eugenie’s downstairs now. I’d rather not kill you in front of her, but I will. Don’t doubt it.”

“Talk to you later, Dru.” Rand limped past Alex and disappeared into the sitting room. A few seconds later, his boot heels echoed on the stairwell.

I guess some part of me—the part that sneaked an occasional romance novel home from the grocery store—wanted Alex to rush over and hold me, make sympathetic noises, and generally make me feel safe. I didn’t remember going back to Rand’s in the transport, but I vaguely recalled Alex carrying me across the street and up the stairs of my house. Taking off my boots. Washing blood off my face from the nosebleed I always seemed to get around the heavy use of elven magic. Talking to me in a gentle drone.

Now he stood framed in the doorway with an expression I could only describe as bovine. As in the angry bovine being teased by the clown right before he spears the cowboy’s butt with his horns.

“Don’t you dare blame me for getting kidnapped by elves.” I stood up and waited for the wave of dizziness. The room swayed on cue.

“I don’t blame you.” Alex pushed himself off the doorjamb and wrapped his arms around me. “I’d kill Quince Randolph if I wasn’t afraid it would start an interspecies war.”

I rested my cheek against his warm chest and his grip on me tightened. This was what I needed.

“What did they do to you?” His voice was soft. “What did I just walk in on?”

I didn’t think I could go through it all, not yet. A lot of the experiences I’d relived, especially from my childhood, weren’t even things Alex knew.

I spoke into the dark fabric of his shirt, keeping my eyes focused on one little loose thread next to a buttonhole because I knew if I closed my eyes, I’d see death and loss. “They took control of my mind, my thoughts, my memories. I was helpless to stop them. If I’d been there much longer, I don’t think I’d have lived through it.”

Alex’s arms tightened around me, and standing this close, his fear and anger and sorrow were impossible to keep out. “It’s over now. What they did had to be illegal, and I’m going to make sure Zrakovi doesn’t slide it under the rug. They have to pay.”

I pulled away from him. “There’s something else I need to tell you—about why Rand was here.”

Alex led me to the bed, and we sat facing each other. “Trying to make excuses for tricking you into a transport, I’m sure.” His jaw clenched. “Tricking both of us.”