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*****

GAHRYE

As he resisted the image of his fellow Anima treating him with respect and admiration, the vision shifted and Gahrye's breath caught.

Another image rose, bubbling to the surface of his mind in full sensory detail, as if he lived it. As if he had already lived it and could recall it in detail.

He stood in a softly-lit room that he didn't recognize—strangely square and mercilessly clean, but it stank of a strange scent he'd never encountered before. Something… false.

Behind him, a large, perfectly rectangular bed squatted on the floor. He stood with his back to it, shirtless, his hands shoved deep in the pockets of strange, stiff trousers. But a female stood there, pressed into his stomach, her arms inside his, wrapped around his waist.

He knew her.

Really knew her.

She was short, barely reaching his collarbones, but she had her face tipped back so her entire throat was exposed to him—a throat that he had tasted. He knew its texture and warmth. He knew the salt of it. Her eyes, a strange mix of green and brown that changed with the light, sparkled. Her dark brown hair was long enough to hang, but short enough that it didn't catch on her shoulders. And without a word, she grinned wickedly up at him, then dropped her open mouth to his chest.

Gahrye grunted as his body responded, not only to the image, but to a warm press on his skin.

"It's not real,

" he snarled, shaking his head and closing his eyes, though it did nothing to remove the images playing in his mind.

"She's not real.

"

"She's real. She's yours.

"

"Mate.

"

"True mate.

"

"She will see you, Hero—but only if we let her. We can bring you to her.

"

"Vowed.

"

"Mated.

"

"Step off the path. Take us with you. She will be with foal—she will take your seed and give you a family.

"

"Love.

"

"Companion.

"

"Never alone again. Never alone, Hero. Never.

"

"Show them.

"

"Take what is yours.

"

He forced another step, but the desire was growing within him, right there, to grasp it. The yearning bloomed in his gut. He gritted his teeth and urged himself to keep walking, but now the shadows moved at his sides, as if they walked along with him, tugged at his sleeves, pointed the way to a different destination.

A place he wanted to be. A place he ached to find.

Then another image… This female… His mate… the body he knew, the body that knew his, arched beneath him, her eyes heavy with desire and rising fire, her fingers gripping his shoulder tightly, her legs wrapped around his hips, and her lips open and crying his name.

And he knew… he knew to stroke her in just that way, at just that time. He knew the spot under her ear that always made her shiver.

He knew the smell of her skin and the dips and curves of her, the way her spine curled when she leaned into him. He knew the sound of the sigh that meant do that again, and the one that meant she was ready.

It was all alive in his head. As if it had already occurred. As if it was his life. Desperate, he pushed harder, harder towards the light that now glimmered faintly at the other end of the path, because these images, this intimacy, it called him in a way nothing else they suggested had. And he knew. He knew if he let himself see it, if he let himself think about it, he would give in and go and he would never fulfill his vow, he would leave Elia without a guide, and…

With a harsh, guttural cry, he pushed himself forward, his mind torn between the scene playing for him, and the light ahead where he had to go. He had to. He knew he had to—

"Mine,

" she whispered, her lips at his neck, her tongue tasting his skin.

"No one else can have you.

" And he knew.

He knew.

She spoke those words to no one else. Before or after. She would never choose another.

He was hers in truth, though others might not know it.

Gahrye stumbled, his knees barking on the dirt of the path and a jagged stone that sliced through his leathers and into his skin and he bled.

The images vanished, the voices howling and hissing, their screams echoing in his ears.

Gahrye gasped at the pain, but he blinked. He could think. He could see.

He could run.

"We will not let you go!

"

"You cannot escape us!

"

"We see you, Hero. We do not forget!

"

But he pushed to his feet and sprinted, straining, pushing himself to the limit of his strength and speed.

"She cannot be yours without us.

"

"You will never own her except through us.

"

"Come back, Hero, and find your destiny.

" But they were strained, their voices thinner, sharper. No longer a soft seduction, but a harsh warning.

Gahrye clasped his own and Elia's bags to his shoulder and ran for his life.

And when he reached the end of the path and launched himself into the light of the portal's end, the screams twisted around him,

"She will never be yours without us!

" then shattered—

He hit the dirt on the other side with a grunt, his nose immediately wrinkling against the stench, until, for a moment, he wondered if the light had been a trick of the voices.

But no… the earth beneath him was warm. The sun beat on the back of his neck.

Gahrye's heart thundered, pounding in his ears, and his hands shook as he pushed himself to stand on wavering knees until he could straighten and turn to take in his first glimpse of the human world.

His jaw dropped open.

Holy. Fucking. Shit.

****

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