Runebinder (The Runebinder Chronicles #1)(100)

Leanna didn’t scream when Tenn dug his fingers into her throat. She couldn’t.

Her flesh gave way as easily as burned paper, crisping and collapsing. He jerked his hands, and her throat caved in on itself as ash. Leanna’s eyes fluttered wide. Then they rolled back in her head, and her body paled to ivory white.

“You have done well, my prince,” Tomás whispered into his ear. The man knelt beside him, wrapping his arms around Tenn’s chest and stomach, holding him tight to the inferno. Tenn burned in bliss. “Now, to take care of your other half.”

The monster kissed the back of Tenn’s neck, made fire swell across his skin. Tenn shivered with sudden cold. His eyes shut on their own accord. Other half? Jarrett’s face fluttered through his mind, along with the boy he’d seen in the vision.

His heart panicked as Tomás drained his heat with the press of his lips. But it was mild, distant. None of it mattered, not so long as Tomás was there. So long as he had the heat. The heat and the life and the power. Then his heart slowed. Stopped.

Before he could wonder if it would ever beat again, the world went dark and numb.





CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

DARKNESS EVERYWHERE.

His ears filled with screams, with people calling his name. Pain, so distant. The constant jumble of motion.

He spun through it all, blind, blissful, floating in a torrent of fire that racked his body with cold. But he didn’t mind. He barely noticed.

Because in that void, Tomás was ever at his side. And together, they ruled the nothingness as kings.





CHAPTER FORTY

“YOU’RE AWAKE,” CAME a voice.

It cut through the haze of dreams like a knife. Tenn opened his eyes. Jarrett looked down at him.

“You’re alive,” Tenn whispered. His voice cracked. It hadn’t been a dream. It hadn’t been a delusion.

Tomás hadn’t lied.

Jarrett smiled. “Thanks to you.”

Tenn tried to sit up, but he was tired, so tired, and so damned cold. Blankets piled atop his body, and fires flickered magically in the air, but he still shivered.

“What happened?” he asked, remembering Tomás’s embrace. “Where are we?”

“A guild,” Dreya said. She stepped out from the shadows. “East of Leanna’s compound. We brought you here, after you killed her.”

Clearly time had passed. Dreya didn’t look tired anymore. Neither did Devon, who was leaning against the wall, Fire smoldering in his chest as he fueled the flames dancing around the ceiling. But Tenn’s gaze kept going back to Jarrett.

Jarrett, whose skin no longer looked bruised and sallow. Whose smile looked as natural as sunrise. Jarrett, whose eyes looked at Tenn the same way they had in Outer Chicago, when their shared history had knit itself into the present.

Jarrett, who felt like a part of him.

Who would always be a part of him.

“You did it,” Jarrett said. “You saved me.”

“Of course,” Tenn replied. He smiled. “You still owe me a milk shake.”

Jarrett laughed. Then he leaned over and kissed him.

It was warmth and light, gentle and strong, and it filled Tenn’s chest with a sensation he hadn’t felt in ages: love. He thought he would never use the word again, but there it was, gossamer and shining as Jarrett kissed him, deep and powerful, and the rest of the world melted away. For a while, he floated there, in Jarrett’s kiss, in the embrace his whole body had ached for.

When Jarrett pulled back, reality inked in with a dreadful rush.

He had killed Leanna. He had saved Jarrett. He should have been floating. So why was his heart hammering? Why did it feel like a terrible setup?

Then he remembered Tomás’s parting words.

Now, to take care of your other half.

He looked at Jarrett, who stood there, smiling, safe. He looked to the twins, who watched him with silent eyes.

His other half was here.

Tenn’s heart pounded. He fully expected Tomás to appear then, and murder them all. Right before his eyes. Just to prove a point. But the seconds ticked by, and the moment didn’t shatter. It made everything worse. Jarrett ran a hand through Tenn’s hair.

“You’ve been out for a while,” Jarrett whispered. “But we’ll let you rest. I’ll be right outside. Always.”

Tenn nodded. He wanted so badly to be happy right then. He wanted to feel like he had done something good. But Tomás’s words were a curse: How could he celebrate when the incubus was still out there, pulling the threads of Tenn’s life? Playing them all in a game he didn’t understand? He wanted to tell Jarrett, but he knew Tomás would deliver on his threat. The Kin had just killed his own sister. He would have no problem killing Jarrett and the twins.

Tenn closed his eyes. Jarrett kissed him again, and although Tenn’s heart fluttered, it wasn’t enough to cut through the fear he prayed the others couldn’t see.

They left.

The door closed behind them.

Tenn waited for the shadows to shift into Tomás.

They never did.

He thought of the tracking rune on Tomás’s heart, felt the incubus’s presence in the corners of his mind, but Tomás was far away. Very far away. So why did he feel like Tomás was a part of him? Inside of him? The Howl had somehow enchanted Tenn into killing Leanna. Tenn remembered so vividly how it felt to be manipulated like that. How easy it had been to give in.