life upside down. It was a worry, at first, but now…” He tilted his head. “Now I’m curious to see where this all goes.”
Shadow’s color…? Well, that explained a lot.
Reece nudged me gently. “No one is called to greatness until the time is right, Mera. This is your time.”
“Greatness?” I breathed.
He nodded. “Greatness comes in many forms. Some obvious, others not so much, but there is one constant everyone called to greatness has in common: you will be pushed beyond your comfort zone, broken down and reduced to ash, but from this, you will rise and be more than you ever thought you could be.”
From the ashes, the phoenix will rise.
The fact that he’d chosen that exact analogy to use had to mean something.
“I’m not sure I’m ready for whatever this world has in store for me,” I said, my fears spilling out. “But since I’m still breathing, and I’m still fighting, I’m going to figure out this door. I will discover my connection to the Shadow Realm—”
I was cut off when Shadow appeared in a cloud of smoky darkness. “We must return to Earth,” he said, burning energy surrounding him. “Multiple shadow creatures have amassed. Move your ass, Sunshine. We’ve got some hunting to do.”
If the fate of the Earth wasn’t hanging in the balance, I’d have told him where he could shove his order. But, unfortunately, since I was the dumb bitch who’d released these creatures in the first place, I really needed to take some responsibility for returning them. And despite my knowledge that Shadow was really the one doing all the work to take them out, if he wanted me there, I would go… just in case. Maybe it helped that the creatures had shown an unexpected level of interest in me.
“The abervoq and sprecker both paid a lot of attention to me,” I said, my mind putting the pieces together. “It can’t be a coincidence that both times they targeted me.”
Shadow crossed his arms, still looking somewhat harried. “You were the natural target, being weaker and non-threatening.”
“Yes, true,” I said, “and that’s what I initially thought as well. But the abervoq wasn’t interested in attacking me. Truth be told, I don’t think the sprecker was, either. And while I’m no shadow creature expert, didn’t they almost seem curious versus murderous?”
Two sets of eyes were locked on mine, and I had to say, it did wonders for a girl’s self-esteem to keep and hold the attention of a couple of gods. Sure, it might have been because I was some sort of shadow magnet, but whatever it was, I could pretend for a little longer that it was my shining personality.
“She has a point,” Reece finally said, nodding as if my words were making more sense than he’d expected. “Is there a possibility that someone from your world slipped across the veil in the last twenty-two years?” he asked Shadow.
Shadow tilted his head, arrogance creasing his brow as he looked me over. “She’s so human, though. Frail and powerless. There’s no way she’s from my realm.”
I forced a bright smile. “You should take this frail, powerless human and get to Earth, hey? Since we apparently have a world to save and you can’t do it without my frail, powerless help.”
Shadow’s lips twitched, and I received a smile from Reece.
“Come on, wolf,” the beast said, turning to leave.
“You forgot ‘frail and powerless,’” I called after him.
Reece continued to stare at me, a tiny half-smirk still etched on his lips. “What?” I asked, wrinkling my nose. “He said it.”
The deity shrugged. “You’re right. It is interesting, though…”
Don’t ask. Don’t ask.
“What’s interesting?”
“That he lets you push him that far. The last few shifters learned fairly quickly that Shadow doesn’t suffer insubordination for long.”
I swallowed hard, thinking of Victor. “Does he regularly murder shifters who don’t obey his every command?”
What kind of fucking psycho did that?
“He doesn’t randomly kill for fun,” Reece said, like he was personally vouching for Shadow’s character. “Only if they fight against his control.”
I… just. That was basically the same thing.
“You two need help,” I choked out. “Your brains don’t work normally.”
Reece just laughed, seemingly not offended, and at least this little moment had apparently warmed the desert deity up to me.
I was all about small victories these days.
39
Shadow didn’t know it, but this time, I had another plan to enact while we were on Earth. Of course, step one was to save humans from the creature, but step two was to figure out if I