Fangs of Fate (Untish #1)

Chapter 69

CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE

TATE

Aether fought the beast with surges of power, as he projected energy at the thing. It came in spurts of sparks, streams of black fire, and manipulation that suspended the beast in midair. The monster roared and went flying back, impacting one of the building’s remains. Sparks lit up the night and a plume of smoke and ash filled the air, momentarily blocking our visual of the seething.

“Tate, I know you want to shift, but doing so for your first time on this big of a scale without the power of the changing grounds is dangerous,” Aether spoke quickly, and quietly to me. He braced my shoulders and looked me over quickly, assessing.

Fucking perfect.

I smirked in response.

The smoke behind him began to clear and I could see the monster rising.

“I don’t know how else to stop it.” The admission hurt, but my pride could just deal with it. The itching was growing near unbearable, and my feet began to lift from the ground.

I locked eyes with dark chocolate ones. Pure admiration and trust.

I can’t control it.

I won’t let it happen.

Trust. He wanted me to trust him. Trust the male who had lied to me and manipulated my emotions. The male whose Fletch’s involvement with cost Fletch his very life. The male who’d burnt me alive and served me up on a platter to Arithi.

His eyes deepened.

Regret.

Those same eyes that locked with mine that night in the river, the ones who watched me from the chair as I found pleasure. This was the same male who’d saved my ass multiple times and who had, unconsciously, captivated my soul and somehow had a direct path into my mind.

The energy was building, peaking, I was hovering two feet off the ground. I could see steam forming in the air from the heat I was radiating. Panic seized me. The energy would be released.

“Channel it into me.” Aether pressed his forehead to mine.

I was now level with him. My hands began to shake, and my body brightened to brilliant rose gold. I could feel my hair rising from my back. Terror began to lace through me as the force I felt building was about to explode. I would hurt him. There was no way he could survive my temperature, the level of power demanding to be freed. Aether needed to get away from me, I didn’t want to release with him this close.

“I can’t. You need to get away, run. I can’t hold this...I don’t know what to do.”

I was beginning to violently shudder as tears poured out from my eyes. Even the emotional pull, the calmness that I now recognized as Aether, wouldn’t dampen the hysteria building within.

Aether grabbed my hands in one of his and began to stroke them. He wrapped his other around my waist and pulled me close. We both began to lift in the air, higher and higher, enveloped in a cloud of gold. A cloud of my own making, one of pure power. The very air around me sizzled. I could sense it crackling and reaching out. Sparks bursting in fire.

“Just focus on me,” Aether spoke slowly, drawing my chin up so I could focus on him.

A calmness was knocking on my mind’s door, asking to be let in.

I can take it.

Gently, he pried at the doors I had fused shut—the gate to the power that was overwhelming me.

“Just send all it to me. All the energy. Picture a river and just let it flow.”

“I can’t! I’ll kill you!” My heart rate increased even as my temperature rose and grew. I couldn’t hold it for long. Any moment and the power would erupt from me. Aether had to get away.

I wriggled in his arms, attempting to free myself from his touch.

I’m not safe! Save yourself.

There’s no world in which I exist, and you don’t. Aether’s eyes pierced my very soul. Trust me.

I could do this. I could trust him. The pride I’d been feeling moments before was gone. Channel into him. How the hell do I do that?

“You can do this. You’re more than capable.”

Aether’s words triggered images of Fletch. He had said that to me throughout my childhood. It was my mother’s favorite thing to tell me when I whined that I couldn’t do something.

The tugging at my mind increased and yet, it remained gentle. I allowed it in and instantly felt a calming blanket arrest my nerves. It was soothing and quieting.

“Send it to me,” Aether’s request was met with a gentle guidance that I could feel in my energy. I closed my eyes as a mental image of a river dominated my senses. It was a river of light and life, from me to this male who I now, somehow, trusted. I latched onto this image and opened the door, allowing a floodgate of energy to flow.