Tainted roots

My body froze, my mouth opening and closing, unable to voice a single word as I stared at this stranger in utter bewilderment. What the fuck? She was the second person to sneak up on me within the hour. This was some serious bullshit. I had no inkling of being watched or of another presence until she spoke.

Her body was relaxed as she leaned back on her hands, crossing one lightly tanned leg over the other. The white and gold floral dress with the bodice laced together in the front, didn’t exactly scream I’m here for a fight. Neither did her strappy wedged sandals.

I was unable to find any visible weapons on her. The only flash of metal was a silver band, winding up her left forearm, as well as a golden band wrapping up her right bicep. A bronze-colored metal was wrapped around her right thigh, and there was no way in hell that shit was comfortable.

A long delicate chain dipped into the front of her dress. Gold, silver, and copper metal adorned her ears with at least ten piercings. Delicate chains hung between the piercings—which was also unsuitable for a fight.

If I was the type of woman to be insecure around a beautiful woman, I would be downright uncomfortable around her. But as it stood, I saw her beauty for what it was: a distraction to lure you into a false sense of security. Men in particular. I knew a predator when I saw one. Just as I knew she was the woman on the beach. It was just too big of coincidence for it not to be her.

Golden eyebrows, a few shades darker than her loose waves, sat above upturned light blue eyes. Her eyelids were covered in gold glitter to match the shimmering highlighter on her cheeks. Nude and glossy lips showcased her defined cupid’s bow.

I had the suspicion that she could kill me at any moment, which was why I didn’t attack her. Even though I wanted to, just in case she was the one to make Koa bleed. But as she displayed earlier today, I had no clue what the true scope of her powers were. It would be stupid to start a fight I couldn’t win and risk pissing her off. If she wanted me dead, she wouldn’t have announced herself.

I crossed my arms and raised an eyebrow. “Shouldn’t you be out starting freak storms? Not spying on others, one of which you stabbed earlier,” I said, taking a shot in the dark that she was the one who stabbed Koa.

“Two.” Her silvery voice struck a cord of familiarity, but I couldn’t focus on that right now.

“What?”

She held up two of her ring-adorned fingers. “You said I stabbed one, when I’ve stabbed both you and your mate.” Her tone was light and casual, and her expression was one of amusement.

My blood froze in my veins as I realized why she sounded familiar. Words spoken to me over a month ago floated through my mind: and here I thought my shriek was piercing. Her words in the alley had a whole new meaning now. Inhaling deeply, I found the same tropical flower and coconut scent. Son of a fucking bitch. This was the asshole that stabbed me.

It made sense now that I thought about it, controlling the weather and creating walls of enchanted water were in the same range of power. Both things I had never thought possible before.

She didn’t give me time to process this, immediately changing the subject away from this revelation. “On the subject of me 'spying' on you; voyeurism isn’t my thing, I was over a mile away and yet I still heard you. That’s how loud you were. Although, if I had a man look at me the way he looks at you, I wouldn’t care how loud I screamed either.” Her laugh was as silvery as her words. Again, meant to distract and disarm, trying to make you forget how dangerous she was.

“I didn’t want to intrude. It was clear to me earlier today that you needed it. Bad.” She cocked her head to the side as she toyed with her necklace, moving the pendant back and forth on the chain. The blue of her eyes was bright as she continued observing me. “Tell me, could you even hug your male friends?”

My pulse skyrocketed. “Have you been watching me?”

“No.” She laughed and shook her head. The red metal of her rings caught the fading light from the sun as she ran her fingers through her hair. “Your erratic bond told me everything I needed to know. It’s how I know that your little moment out here has strengthened your bond, and any hopes you may have harbored of being rid of him and this bond are now pointless.”

My jaw dropped and I wasn’t sure how to feel about her being to able to see my bond—especially since it still wasn’t fully formed—much less how I felt about that last part. Now that Koa wasn’t around, doubt began seeping in, whispering to me, telling me I still didn’t know why he left last month.

“But the good news is that you’ll be able to hug your male friends again, now that your bond has been reaffirmed,” she said observing our surroundings, unaware of the internal turmoil her words had caused. “The only other way you could’ve cured your erratic bond, was by death. His death.”

I sucked in a sharp breath, pulling her attention back to me. A slow smile graced her lips, revealing dimples. Because of course, this bitch would have dimples. “Yeah, I thought that wouldn’t be an option. It’s next to impossible to think of your mate dying this far into the development of your bond, much less be the one to kill him yourself.”

“Why are you even here? I doubt it’s to chat about mate bonds,” I said once the clenching in my chest eased.

“I can talk about fated mate bonds if you’d like. About the benefits of completing your bond,” she said, her eyes alight with mischief. “Those with a completed fated mate bond can share energy—”

“With their fated mate, and if they are of the same race, they can tap into their powers. Yes, I know,” I cut her off with a sigh.

She didn’t seem annoyed by my interruption. “I couldn’t be too sure what you do and don’t know. But I am curious, why aren’t you trying to complete your bond, having access to each other's strengths is advantageous—especially when dealing with Mythic possessions.”

“I don’t care about power,” I whispered, feeling uncomfortable with this subject.

The way she sat still as she assessed me—like a predator stalking it’s prey—made me want to start squirming. “Most do. You’d be surprised how many want the power, strength, and prestige that goes along with having a fated mate.”

“Not me, I’d rather have someone who loves me and is there when I need him most.”

“Then it appears the fates have chosen correctly for you.”

I opened my mouth to tell her she had no clue about Koa and me, but the words wouldn’t come out. As I tried to find the words, something she previously said caught my attention. “Wait, what do you mean by possessions?”

“They were possessed.” Her simple words matched her expression, telling me this should’ve been obvious. “So that’s why their faces looked the way they did,” I murmured, dropping my focus to the grass.

“When certain…beings possess someone else, they can’t completely hide their true nature. It always finds a way to bleed through. Sometimes it’s subtle, other times not so much.”She uncrossed her legs, keeping her movements slow and measured.

“What the fuck could possess a Mythic?” I asked shifting around on my feet.

A secretive smile pulled at her lips. “Oh, you’d be surprised at what’s desperate enough to take possession of an already occupied body. You have no clue what storm is brewing at your preverbal doors.”

I threw my hands up as I huffed out an impatient breath. “I have no fucking clue what that even means!”

“Not yet, but you will. The question you should be asking yourself, is whether or not you’ve made enemies of the wrong people when that time comes and it will come, there’s no avoiding it. You and your friends seem incapable of staying out of it.”

Her body's relaxed posture was at odds with her ominous warning. The unspoken threat hung in the air between us, and I knew making an enemy out of her was a bad idea. But I couldn’t trust the woman who stole from one of us, attacked us, and had a hidden agenda.

“Do you honestly believe I could ever trust you after what you’ve done?” My hands ended up planted on my hips.

“And what have I done?” She sat up from her relaxed position and tapped her chin. “Did I not let you all live, not once but twice? Have I not shown you mercy, when anyone else would have killed you on the spot?”

“You call stabbing my mate mercy?” My incredulous words were spoken without thought.

Rather than look annoyed by my outburst, or pleased by her actions, she looked at me like I was the dumb one. “Maybe it was hard for you to see through the rain, but he was the one attacking me, not the other way around.”

“You stabbed him.”

“It was a flesh wound, and it clearly didn’t slow him down.” Her focus flicked to the grass.

“You stabbed him,” I repeated, a growl lacing my tone. I couldn’t get past this detail.

“You’re quite protective for someone who tried fucking others who weren’t your mate,” she noted casually, laughing when I growled again. Her expression sobered as she stared at me for a few moments.

“I knew that if he was injured, no matter how big or small, you’d come running. And with you in harm's way, his focus would shift from attacking me to protecting you.”

“You couldn’t have known that,” I whispered. Hell, I hadn’t expected myself to react like that.

“I know to never underestimate how possessive and protective summoners are of their mates.”

The sun was sinking behind the trees, and I knew I should find a way to leave without pissing her off. That it was a bad idea to be out here in the dark, especially with her. No matter how beautiful and peaceful this scenery was, every place held its own dangers. But how could I pass up an opportunity to gain information? Any information she gave me could be of value to us.

As I watched her, I tried to see if I could feel her magic, but she had it locked up. I was unable to feel any elemental magic seeping from her, connecting to the elements as it did with Reed and Harmony. “Parker thinks you’re an elemental, is that true?”

She raised an eyebrow, cocking her head to the side as amusement flashed across her face. “Yes.”“

But you’re not a Mythic.” It wasn’t a question, because I knew with certainty she was something different.

Her dimples made another appearance. “No, I’m not. My kind is far older.”

“Even older than the deities?” If they even existed, I mentally added. As before, I made the assumption she wasn’t a deity despite Koa’s comment about her powers.

Her reaction wasn’t what I expected, not as she rolled her eyes and scoffed. “Deities.” She spat out another word that I didn’t understand, the syllables flowing together in a rhythmic cadence. Her bright eyes flashed as she rubbed her hand across her jaw. “Yes, even older than them.” The light tone she’d been using was gone, revealing the dangerous predator underneath.

I didn’t know how to process this. Did this mean they existed? And if so, what happened to make her hate them?

“Is that all you want to know?” She asked, drumming her fingers on her knees.

Looking up at the sky full of twinkling stars, I considered my list of questions, gauging which ones she might answer. “What was so important about the necklace you stole from Starling?”

When she didn’t answer right away, I glanced back at her—realizing how stupid I was to look away in the first place. She was tossing a silver ball back and forth between her hands. The silver band snaking up her forearm was now mysteriously gone.

“It has magic in it.”

“No shit,” I said, my annoyance at her evasive answers growing. “Ander said he sensed ancient magic.”

Somehow, she didn’t miss a beat while tossing the ball between her hands as she briefly closed her eyes. “He’s the blood mage that was with you the first time, but he wasn’t with you today.”

The way she seemed to pay close attention to our group wasn't reassuring.

“He would notice the magic from the key,” she said nodding to herself.

“Key?” I asked, trying to figure out how that ugly rock was a key.

The silence dragged on for several minutes, with her tossing that damn metal ball between her hands, and me struggling to rein in my overwhelming urge to strangle her.

She tossed the ball up in the air and as it fell back down, the ball began losing shape and as soon as it touched her left hand, the metal began snaking its way back up her forearm.

My jaw dropped and I eyed all of the metal she was wearing. If she could turn that metal into a ball, there was little doubt in my mind she could change it into something more deadly. Anyone who didn’t know of her ability would look at her and think she was weaponless and underestimate her, it was the perfect cover

Who the hell was she, and how could I ensure that I never crossed paths with her again?