Stolen by Shadow Beasts: The Complete Collection by Lacey Carter Andersen

Author:Lacey Carter Andersen [Andersen, Lacey Carter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Phoenix Press LLC
Published: 2022-12-29T16:00:00+00:00

SEVEN

Ann

* * *

When I left Dusk at the river, I walked. I cried. I cursed and stomped my feet like a child. It was all pretty pointless, I knew that. I knew that if I wasn't me, I'd slap myself for being such a mess. But since I am me, I had to just work through my feelings until I got to a strangely numb point, then head back home.

Now, I’m standing at the mouth of the cave looking in. Only Rayne is inside, sitting facing a fire that crackles and sends embers rising into the air. He doesn't notice me at first, just stares into the fire like it'll give him the answer to the things in life he doesn't understand, probably me. But it's strange to me; as I look at him, it's not at all like looking at someone else. It's like this is Rayne and has always been Rayne, which is an unexpected sentiment.

Not that anything has been normal since he died.

I want to walk in and let him hold me, let him absorb the pain of my chat with Dusk. Let his heart speak to mine. But I can’t. Instead, I go to the fire and sit on Phantom’s bedroll, gazing into the fire and letting the heat lull me into a fake kind of peace, one that calms my visceral reactions but does nothing for the aches in my emotional heart.

There won’t be true peace until I figure out how I’m supposed to feel and what I’m supposed to do. There’s nothing in the handbook about what to do when a soulmate inhabits a new body and comes back after the situation has changed, after acceptance has been achieved, after the moving on has progressed.

And what progress it is. But I can’t think about them now, either. It’ll drive me mad.

I look at Rayne from little slits that are my eyes. I know him like I know myself. But my feelings are all over the place. One part of me wishes my shadow beasts would come back right now, but another part needs a minute to get my head together. And the one thing I don’t do when Onyx, Phantom, and Dusk are around is think clearly.

“Rayne?” I hold out my hand because as confused as I am, Rayne’s presence is a balm to my soul. He comes to lie beside me, and as much as I want to fall into him, I fall asleep instead. It isn’t until a voice wakes me that I realize how tired I was, how hung over all these emotions make me.

Flame, one of the other shadow beasts who was involved in the battle and is still healing—slowly—from his injuries, is standing over me. “Ann, the men will be taking turns guarding you throughout the night. The shadow king won’t be strong enough to attack again right away, but it’s a valuable thing to have you here and now he knows it.” He gazes at me for a long moment, something unreadable in his eyes, then steps back out of the cave.

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