This was about taking a step toward what she was meant to be. To do. This was about undoing what she had done so long ago.
And instantly, her mind dredged up the image of the vision she’d had hours ago. Of standing beneath bolts of lightning with her sisters, calling to the darkness. A chill rushed across her skin, pebbling her flesh with goose bumps. She remembered the taste of the fear she’d felt that long-ago night. Remembered the instant of shame, of regret that had pressed down on her. She remembered what Torin had said about atonement and how long they had all waited for this time to come. And she remembered, at last, that this man, this Eternal, was her only shot at long-sought redemption.
She took a breath and looked into his eyes. There was so much there, she thought. So much more than she’d seen in the first terrifying moments when he’d appeared out of nowhere to whisk her away from a dangerous mob. His hand on hers tightened, pressing their palms flat together.
“For a true mating to begin,” he said, “you must accept both me and your destiny. In the past, you held yourself apart from me. Though we shared sex, you refused the mating.”
“Why?”
He shrugged, though she suspected his feelings went deeper than he allowed himself to show. “At first, you wouldn’t risk sharing power. You and your sister witches clung to each other and shut out those who would have been the other halves of your souls. Then, later, it wasn’t time. The Awakening had to arrive before the mating was possible again.”
“And now?”
“It’s time. At last. Do you accept me?” he asked quietly, every word a benediction, a hope.
It cost this strong, brave man to ask her to accept him and she knew it. Sensed it. But she also knew that this was the tradition he’d waited lifetimes for. Was she ready? Did she have a choice?
If she refused him now, she risked returning to the dark place that still lived inside her. The vision she’d had earlier was still vivid in her mind. With danger. Fear. And terror. She couldn’t face this alone—and her Eternal was waiting for her. As he had been for so long.
“Yes,” she whispered, her tone as reverent as his. “I accept you.”
“And our past?”
“Yes.”
“And our future?”
“Yes,” she said and his fingers locked more desperately with hers.
“Do you take me as your mate? To stand beside you? To fight with you and to make right what once went so wrong?”
She swallowed hard and felt the hugeness of the moment crashing down on her. Each of her answers to his questions had spurred heat to quicken inside her. Now those flames flashed and burned so brightly it was a wonder she wasn’t glowing. This last question, she knew, was the key to it all. To taking him as her mate. To vowing to stand and fight beside him. To trust him.
And even as she opened her mouth to give him her answer, a part of her held back from that blind trust she knew would be so necessary. How could she completely trust him when she didn’t entirely trust herself?
“Shea.” His voice was a demand. An insistence that they had come this far and she couldn’t back away now.
She lifted her chin, looked him in the eye and whispered, “Yes, Torin. I accept you. I accept the responsibility. I accept the danger.”
Flames erupted over their joined hands.
Bright orange and yellow light danced and jumped across their skin, searing the two of them together. There was no heat. No burning, no charring of flesh. But the flames churned and flashed brighter, hotter, until at last they winked out just as Shea felt a jolt of that heat shoot through her palm. It snaked along her arm and settled in her chest in a tight knot of heat that flared with every beat of her heart.
She sucked in a gulp of air and looked at him, startled. “What?”
“We begin,” he said and dipped his head to claim her mouth with his.
Hands still joined, their bodies came together and Shea arched into him. In the hearth, flames snapped and hissed as they consumed the wood stacked there. The only other sound was the wind, rattling the glass panes as if it were an entity demanding entrance.