Void(74)

“The first recorded Void was all the way back in the thirteen hundreds,” I said, more to myself than anything.

Gritt grunted but made no other noise as he picked at his claws.

“Capable of draining immense power, all Voids have explained their ability in similar ways, describing it as an endless hunger. There have been testimonies of a Void consuming hundreds of powers at once, and it still being capable of draining more. There is no known limit to the amount of power that they can pilfer.”

My words died in my throat as I stared. I knew that my power was extreme, but I had no idea that it was limitless. Just how many people could I steal powers from until I had to stop? Would the Void ever be satiated? According to this, I had a lifetime of starvation to look forward to. That thought didn’t sit so well.

“Who was he?” I heard myself asking, my eyes still trained on the page.

In my peripheral, I saw Gritt look up from his claws. “Theodore Rhodes,” he replied in a bored tone. “Last known Void to exist. There used to be more thousands of years ago, but they were gradually killed off, as well as information surrounding them. He died about a hundred years before you were born. Leveled an entire shifter compound. A horde of vamps took him down.”

I swallowed thickly. No wonder Gritt had so much animosity toward me. Voids had a deadly history of killing his people. “He grew up in a human orphanage, but when he came into his powers, they moved him to a super city. He had a fancy amulet, just like yours. But it failed. The temptation was too much for him. And the more power he ate, the more he craved. He didn’t just take their powers, he took their lives, too.”

My heart thudded in my chest. This right here, this was my biggest fear.

“I don’t want to ever get to that point,” I whispered, drawing Gritt’s attention to my fearful expression. I stared him in the eye, wordlessly telling him everything I was feeling.

“You wouldn’t,” he said with certainty.

“But if I did...just, promise me you won’t let me ever do that. You and the other paragons—you’re strong enough. If I ever lose control like that, promise me you’ll stop me. Whatever the cost. I don’t want to be a mass murderer.” Tears filled my eyes, dread filling me, given what I was capable of. I’d always known it, but now that I’d actually seen evidence of it, it sobered me with stark cold terror.

He studied me intently, and I ignored the buzzing need in my amulet just to stare back at him. “I won’t let you get to that point,” he said quietly, and there was an unexpected tenderness in his tone that made my breath catch.

I breathed out a shaky sigh of relief. My biggest fear had always been to lose total control. To become a mindless Void and forget all about Devicka. “Good,” I said with a nod.

I resumed flicking through the pages. Aside from the warnings, there wasn’t much information in here. Just a lot of awful accounts of what Voids had done to supers in the past. It wasn’t a pretty picture. Gritt coughed and started tapping his pencil on the desk, observing me as I thumbed through the pages.

“None of this talks about any Void transferring powers or even being able to do partial feedings,” I observed. “In fact, most of these pages just talk about...putting Voids down as soon as their powers came out, or locking them up.”

My Void churned inside of me, feeling hungry and uneasy. Hundreds of children killed, all because black smoke came out of them one day. It was fucking awful. If I’d been born a few hundred years earlier, that would’ve been me. Murdered at ten years old for no fault of my own.

My amulet started buzzing harder, and I looked down at it with a wince. The skin where it sat had turned red like the amulet was burning me. “Fuck. Can you take me back to the cabin? The Void is hungry again, and since Banner is gone today...I don’t want to risk losing control,” I admitted. I made a move to stand, and Gritt jerked his hand out to stop me.

“You’re hungry,” he said, his green eyes locked on my face.

“Yes,” I replied, feeling suddenly nervous under his intense expression.

“I can feel it.”

I frowned. “You can feel my hunger?”

He nodded slowly, and I noticed that his pupils had dilated. Was he...aroused? The bond wasn’t breaking. If anything, it seemed to be growing stronger.

He stood up and grabbed both my wrists, pulling me up to stand. “We’ve already done this twice. We’ve proven we can handle it.”

His hot breath feathered down my skin, trailing lines of heat along my face as my lips parted. Up close, I could see the stubble on his chin, the slight dimple on his right cheek. My tongue darted out to lick my lips, and his eyes followed the movement in rapt attention. “I-I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I stumbled before taking a step back.

“Are you sure?” he asked with a pout. I wasn’t sure what to make of his sickly sweet, tempting voice.

“Positive,” I choked out, even though my necklace was buzzing, my heart thudding, and every damn cell in my body was demanding that I take off the necklace and mold my body to his, eat him up like the decadent treat he was.

His flirty expression faltered and a smirk replaced his pout. “What if I said I wanted you to feed from me?” he asked while stalking even closer.

My forehead was just a kiss away from his chin. I tilted my head up, hating him for tempting me if he was just going to change his mind again, but also curious about what he meant. He was acting like happy Gritt again. Like the Gritt I’d woken up beside.