GAHRYE

Gahrye landed in the dusty dirt inside the portal with a moan of pain. It took a second to assess himself, his body and to realize exactly how deeply in the ** he was.

He wasn't bleeding. He didn't have a knife. There was a bear on the other side of the portal in a fever dream, who believed if he came out of here, he came with the voices. Gahrye had no doubt Gawhr would tear out his throat if he attempted to go back—and he wasn't even sure the Portal would let him.

As soon as he moved from this spot the voices would descend, and he was unprotected—his wounds all clean and dry. And even if he could find a way… he wasn't sure his leg would work. He was going to have to drag himself through the traverse naked.

His heart raced. Could he do it again? Cross the traverse without the protection of the blood?

He had to. He had to get through here. He had to get to Kalle.

He began to shake.

There was only one answer.

He lifted his arm and opened his mouth, tearing into the skin inside his forearm with his teeth, groaning and spitting, until it bled, praying that it was enough.

Then he looked into the darkness of the traverse and saw the light at its end, so far away. His mind echoed with all the things they'd done and said to him in this place. All the hate, all the fear, all the temptation… And then he thought of his mate—her beautiful eyes, her shining hair, the tinkle of her laugh, and that light in her eyes when her scent threaded through with desire…

He set his jaw and shook his head slowly. There was no choice.

"Come on then, you **ers,

" he muttered.

"Do your worst.

" And he reached out a hand to drag himself forward as the voices swept in.

*****

KALLE

She'd been restless all night, unable to sleep despite bone-aching tiredness, and uncertain why. It was as if her body wanted to move, but she had nowhere to go.

By midnight she'd been tossing and turning for almost two hours. By one am she lay in the bed she'd shared with Gahrye, staring at the ceiling, her leg jiggling just to ease the push within her to move.

She yearned for her mate.

She'd yearned for him every day since he'd left. But this razor-edge of need was new. As if he was just out of reach. As if she could hear his voice, but couldn't find him.

Adrenalin slammed through her as the old house made a tiny noise, and for a moment she was convinced it was Gahrye, calling for her.

"This is stupid,

" she whispered. She threw the covers back and found the clothes she'd thrown over the chair before she got in bed, put them on, along with pair of gloves and a scarf because it was almost freezing outside.

She would go for a walk. She'd take herself out to all the spaces they'd been and she'd remember him, and probably cry, and maybe talk to him like he was there and no one would know that she was nuts, because the staff never left the house after dark since Shaw died, and her grandmother slept like the dead.

Her eyes pinched with the unfairness of it all—the way she'd only found him for a few months before he'd been taken from him. And yet, she admired him so much. He was right to have taken Elia back to Anima, she knew that. And the fact that he hadn't returned right away… there has to be a reason. A good one. She knew that too.

She also knew that, whatever was happening on the other side of the traverse, it was good that Gahrye hadn't been here for these weeks. The Police were suspicious, and looking for him. They'd questioned her twice more, though she could be completely honest with them about not knowing where he was, and she'd even offered to do a polygraph. They'd arranged it, and seemed very frustrated when she passed.

So, it was all good and right. She was sure of it. She just hated it. She hated not knowing if he was okay. She hated being apart from him.

She hated that his pillow didn't smell like him anymore.

Dashing away the tears that wanted to drag her down into grief, Kalle trotted down the huge staircase and through the wide, yawning entry and corridor to the back door. The last time she'd walked this route, she and Gahrye had been leading Elia in her beast form.

Kalle blew out a breath remembering the fear and grief of that night. All the ways she'd almost lost him.

When she pushed through the door it whined and closed loudly behind her, and she winced, hoping she hadn't woken anyone up.

Without thought, her feet followed the route they'd taken that night, through the garden, past the turn in the trail, beyond the thickets of trees and lines of manicured bushes, towards that pile of rocks at the bottom of the massive garden.

And when she took the final turn and it came into view, at first she thought the Police must have been digging when they'd last searched out here, and her heart raced. What if they found a way into the Portal by accident?

Worse… what if this was all a ruse. What if someone knew about the Portal and was using the Police to try to get close to it?

There was a thick pile of dirt or something at the base of the boulders that she thought the Police must have dug up, but as she got closer and her eyes adjusted to the dark, the pile moved.

Kalle stopped dead and almost screamed.

She was still fifty feet away, the shape on the ground little more than a smudge of lighter color than the rocks behind it.

Then she heard a groan.

"Kaaaalleee?

"

Without another thought, Kalle raced forward, crying tears of joy.

Her mate was back.

Her mate was here.

He was back.