Weaving Fate - Nora Ash Page 0,30

than a sound, but it had Modi’s trademark impatience layered within. “You’ve got to connect closer with your magic.”

I tried my best to do as he instructed, but I didn’t understand what he meant by closer. As a result, the golden light within me rose in a sharp wave, the careful threads Modi had pulled from it washed away in an instant.

“Odin’s beard!” Impatience turned to frustration. “Like this!”

The heat around me intensified, and suddenly red light wrapped around the gold and I felt him.

I’d felt him before too—his presence; his impatience; his strength as he'd guided me; but not like this. This was… intimate. This was his essence inside of me, his innermost core opened for me.

Curious, I followed the flow of red magic back to its source, and there he was. Warmth glowed against me as bright as the sun and as gentle as the softest caress. It radiated all around me, swept me up, and hugged me close in the most tender of embraces. And finally, I understood.

It was him. Modi’s very spirit.

“What in Hel’s name are you doing?” The not-a-voice echoed with anger, and something shoved at me, pushing me away from the light and back into myself.

It was such a shock my eyes snapped open, taking me back to the alley in Oslo between the alphas, one of whom was breathing rapidly, his chest heaving as if he’d just come off a battlefield.

“W-What was that?” I croaked, staring wide-eyed at Modi’s furious face. “Was that… Did I see… you?”

“Don’t ever do that again!” he snarled, teeth bared and eyes wild. “Ever!”

“What happened?” Bjarni’s voice was calm, but he placed a warning hand on Modi’s shoulder, bracing him.

If Modi registered his enemy’s touch, he didn’t show it. He only stared down at me, and in the depths of his blue eyes I saw the pure shock he was hiding behind his anger. He hadn’t known that could happen. If he had, I was absolutely certain he’d have never bared his innermost self, least of all to me.

“Nothing,” I said without taking my eyes off Modi, the overbearing alpha with a core as soft and gentle as a summer breeze. “I had a little... hiccup. Let’s try again. For Magni.”

He didn’t move for a long breath. But then he wrapped his hand back around my neck, and I closed my eyes just as his magic barreled through my veins.

I gritted my teeth as he forced my power to obey his command, no longer showing me what to do. It was still unbearably intimate, his presence inside of me, his aggression forcing my innermost to submit, but I didn’t fight him. I’d glimpsed something that, should the world know what I’d seen, he’d be done for. There was no room for softness in Asgard, least of all for the thunder god’s son. And right now, he had to assert his dominance over me to ensure I knew my place.

Had he been any other alpha, he’d have pushed me to my knees and fucked me until I begged for mercy, so a little magical ravaging? I’d take it, and be grateful too.

It was as if he sensed my submission, because at my lack of fight his presence in me became less painful. The red light bending my golden magic exerted less pressure, its roughness easing with every passing breath.

By the end he eased out of me almost gently, the sensation as his presence withdrew almost one of loss.

He released the back of my neck and I opened my eyes once more.

Three blue passports and a credit card lay in my hands where the junk food wrappers had been before.

“You okay, sweetie?” Bjarni rumbled behind me, the press of his strong body comforting as he supported my weight. Only then did I feel my lightheadedness and weakened knees. “You’re shaking.”

“Her magic is low,” Modi answered for me, drawing my attention back to his face. “I won’t deny she is powerful, but she burns out fast. Too fast.”

“Luckily we know how to fix that,” Bjarni said, unconcerned with the tension in the air between me and Modi. He brushed his lips against the top of my head, and once again I thought how easy my life could have been if he’d been the only alpha woven with my own life thread.

Staring up at Modi, I wondered what it would be like if he truly was my fifth like Magni seemed to take for granted.

There was gentleness in both Saga and Magni,