Reclaimed (Shadow Beast Shifters, #2)(28)

He nodded. “It does, and there’s a possibility that at some point in the next million years, if humans last that long, evolution will bring many more powerful supernaturals to the forefront. For now, you’re so young.”

I thought back to the other worlds off the Solaris System and had to agree. We weren’t even remotely in the same league as those big players.

“Shadow Realm was Earth, just a few million years ago,” Angel said softly, her head held high as the light breezes shifted her hair around her face. “And the royals were once near human. Until they figured out how to absorb the mists. How to use them. And then, as evolution does, they grew stronger, and now with the Supreme Being”—she shot a look at Shadow—“they’re almost unbeatable in this system.” She shrugged. “Well, they were before they kicked him out and shut their doors down.”

Shadow smiled at this. “They’ve weakened themselves, and once I figure out how to claim my power, I’ll be able to take advantage of that.”

This caught my interest. “How will you find your power?” I asked. “Is it just floating around somewhere, waiting for you to claim it?”

Shadow’s smile grew larger. “Sort of. Any who are able to control the power are born with a mist tattoo.” He lifted his arm, showing me the dark swirls around the large skull on his biceps. “I’ve added to this one, but the first mark was there at birth.”

I spent far too long staring at the muscled arm, and by the end, I could have redrawn the damn tattoo, I knew it so well. But seriously, it was… nice. Yeah, that was what it was.

Nice.

“Some have tried to fake the mark, right?” Angel asked, thankfully allowing me to tear my gaze away.

Shadow shot me a smug look, always seeing too clearly how he affected me. “Tried and failed,” he answered Angel. “They don’t usually survive the tattoo, let alone the bonding to the mists that allows the power to transfer.”

“So how did your sister do it?” I asked.

“The bloodstone,” Angel and Shadow replied at the same time.

I looked between them. “Ohhh, right. The old bloodstone. That was my second guess.”

Shadow’s eyes were deadset laughing at me. The bastard. “And what was the first?” he asked.

Uhhh. I shrugged. “Fucked her way to the top?”

Yeah, I’d just sent women’s rights back a few thousand years, but she was a bitch, and I was too braindead for a better idea.

Angel chuckled. “Knowing her in the short time I did, your guess isn’t that farfetched.”

Shadow didn’t bother to comment on it, and I had no doubt his sister’s sex life was the last thing he wanted to think about.

“The bloodstone is passed between the Supreme Beings,” he told us. “Its power is nothing much until the bond to its master happens, but my sister must have figured out how to utilize it to some degree. Giving her a little more control of the mists. And that’s all she’d need to control the other royals.”

I grimaced. “Who thought it was a good idea to give one person ultimate power? I mean, isn’t that just asking for corruption from this Supreme Being? A being no one in this land can fight against. What stops them from aiming for complete and total subjugation?”

Still one of my greatest fears. Even if I only lived with the facade of freedom, I needed it to keep my sanity intact.

Shadow shot me a side-eye. “What are you saying, Sunshine? You think I have the capability to destroy worlds once I receive my legacy?”

He expected me to say yes, that was clear in his expression, but… once I truly thought about it…

“No.”

He paused, stopping our trek across the river plane. “No?”

“You’ve already had supreme power,” I said, thinking it through out loud. “Take Earth, for example—there’re very few who would even be able to last ten seconds against you. And as far as I know, you’ve never abused that power over shifters or humans. You’ve left shifters to go about their days, let humans continue as they were. So… unless this new energy has the aim to corrupt you, I don’t see why you’d change now. But you could be the exception to the rule of total power corrupting.”

His lips parted, lips that had kissed me not that long ago, and just like that, I could taste him again. A craving to close the distance between us and lick this delicious beast almost knocked me over. Like, damn. That boy was a magnet dragging me into its field.

And I wasn’t even mad about it.

“The power is not evil,” he said, and it took me far longer than I’d like to admit to focus on those words. “It will not change me. If anything, it’s designed to open my mind. Force me to comprehend every facet of my action before I make it. To my knowledge, throughout our history, there has never been a Supreme Being who was corrupted by the power. Generally, the land is at its most prosperous when the chosen one is at full power.”

“My knowledge too,” Angel said. “And not that I’m not enjoying this conversation, because I am, but is there any chance we could get to where we are camping for the night? I need to recharge my energy. I anticipate attacks in our future, and I want to be at full strength.”

Shadow nodded. “Yes. It’s just beyond this meadow.”