Just Breathe (24 page)

Please hurry, Whetu. The Wyldlings and my whales depend on you.

* * * *

Gavin was worried. About a lot of things.

He and Jack had spent hours scouring the Dreaming for the Dreamweaver, to no avail. They disrupted several pockets of clustered Fyres but uncovered no leads. The Fyres had the Dreamweaver well hidden.

Jack left Gavin near the Sentinel Castle with a promise to catch up in Realis after he finished some Librus Group business.

Having been summoned by the Council, Gavin stood alone before the ominous drawbridge and shuttered his eyes under tight brows. This called meeting didn’t bode well.

Though he’d only left Zoe a short while ago, his Water supply had dwindled to almost nothing. Keeping his inner inferno submerged had stripped his defenses, and it had become difficult to replenish his stores. He clawed at the itchy Fire tattoos, which now pulsed with a constant glow while the others dimmed. He had no clue what the councilors wanted, but they’d be able to smell the Fire from light years away if he couldn’t mask the stench with enough Water.

If Byrn tattled about the deal with Scarlet, every ally Gavin had would turn against him. But losing the Sentinels’ confidence—hell, even Jack’s—would be a piece of piss compared to losing Zoe again. Zoe would view his pact with Scarlet as the ultimate betrayal.

And in truth, it was.

Hefting a sigh, he navigated the corridors and stepped into the Sentinel Council chamber. His heart ached with dread.

Wyland looked up and stood. “Finally. If it pleases the Council, I’d like to address some rumors floating around about our illustrious new Sentinel leader.” He gestured with a beefy hand to Gavin.

Fuck. Gavin straightened. Metallic tinged saliva glutted his mouth. Taking the only available chair, he summoned Water to quench the spreading Fire but came up short.

Glances bounced between Kai, Erin, and Seth. Ellie and Camira lowered their heads.

“Rumors?” he said, knowing full well what Wyland meant.

Wyland flung a manila folder across the polished jarrah tree table. It slid to a stop in front of Gavin’s surprisingly calm hands.

He opened it and read the typed paper inside: an anonymous letter to the Council documenting Gavin and Scarlet’s Fire Oath, word for word.
Exactly
as they had spoken it.

Before his death, Yileen had warned about a traitor on the Council. Gavin had his suspicions, but he’d never gathered enough evidence to point the bone. Someone in this room was in league with Scarlet and had written the letter to get rid of him. Unfortunately, the accusations were true. Gavin couldn’t deny the claims if he wanted to. His aura would give him away to these keen Sentinels’ eyes. Probably already had.

He laid down the page and scanned the faces surrounding him.

“Have you nothing to say?” Wyland asked. “Your Council demands an explanation.”

Gavin rose and rested his knuckled fingers on the table. There was no way around this. His only chance for mercy was via confession. He let out a heavy breath. “The allegations are true. I swore a Fire Oath with Scarlet so we Sentinels could take back the Dreaming. She promised to give me the key in exchange for my…Fire.”

Murmurs of disapproval flew across the room.

“Why would you do such a thing?” Erin said. The disappointment in her straight-backed posture cut him to the quick.

Wyland smirked and tilted his head to the side. “You had a relationship with Scarlet before, did you not?”

Smug bastard. “It’s no secret. When we were together, I didn’t know she was a Fyre. The relationship ended when I found out. But that’s beside the point. I entered into the agreement with her as a back-up plan in case Whetu doesn’t wake up before the equinox.” He paused, eager to gauge reactions to his other option. “Or if we can’t find the Dreamweaver.”

Grumbles and groans echoed through the chamber. Heads shook. “The Dreamweaver?” someone said. “Seriously?”

“This is an outrage.”

Disbelief painted half the faces before him. Flat-out disgust shadowed the others.

“The Dreamweaver is a myth. Don’t waste your time.” Ellie didn’t look up from the hands folded before her on the table.

“How do you know?” Gavin asked.

Now Ellie met his eyes. “Because I’ve looked for her, too. She’s a fairy tale.”

“Not finding her isn’t proof she doesn’t exist. I think we should use every means at our disposal to—”

“That isn’t the issue at the moment, Gavin,” Wyland interrupted. “You think you can waltz onto the Council, take point as its leader, and wave your hand to make bad things go away? You made a grave mistake. And so did we by appointing you head of this group.”

The wires in Gavin’s defensive mechanism tripped and shot off his mouth prematurely. “Then kick me off the Council. I never wanted to be here in the first place.”

Camira’s dark eyes flickered. “We may.”

Fuck, this wasn’t how he expected the meeting to go, but maybe it was for the best. If they booted him, he could help the Wyldlings on his own terms. Jack had no allegiance to this group other than to train Gavin. The two of them, along with Jack’s Elemental army of four, could do some damage—providing they got on long enough to make it to battle. And assuming Whetu could get them into the Dreaming.

Shit.

If nothing else, leaving the Council would provide plenty of opportunity to track down the traitor.

He studied each of the six faces around him. Who had the most to gain by ousting him? And what did they want? His position? They could fucking have it.

“We need to think this through before we do anything rash.” Kai’s fingers tapped the wooden table, but he didn’t look at anyone. He had been close to Yileen, too, and Gavin sort of trusted him.

Camira scowled. “Gavin the rash one. He strike deals with enemies.”

Gavin gritted his teeth and faced her. “Camira’s right. I made a bad decision, and now I’m paying for it. Scarlet’s Fire burns inside me. I can’t be trusted with the Council’s plans and secrets as long as she’s here.”

Ellie’s green eyes studied him from behind a curtain of long, gray hair. She rested her hands in her lap. “This is very bad timing, Gavin.”

He sighed. “I know. I’m sorry. I think it’s best that you elect a new head of the Council and find another to take the vacated position.”

“There’s no hope of getting out of the contract?” Seth asked. “Can we help?”

Gavin shook his head and mentally tightened his tenuous, Watery hold over the prickly Fire searing his throat. “No. It’s pretty solid. But before you discharge me from my duties, I respectfully request that you keep the reason for my termination quiet. No one else knows about the oath—not even Jack Weaver. If the other Sentinels found out, it could lower morale. That’s the last thing we want with the possibility of war looming.” His reason might be a stretch, but he needed everyone in the room to agree to keep quiet. For Zoe’s sake.

Wyland nodded. “Agreed. If anyone asks, we’ll tell them the decision was mutual and leave it at that.” He glanced around the table. “We must all support a change in leadership. Is anyone opposed?”

Erin, Kai, and Seth held their tongues. Wyland banged his fist on the table. “Gavin Cassidy, you are discharged from your responsibilities to this High Sentinel Council. Do not enter these premises again without express permission of one of the Councilors herein.”

The Fire rose in triumph and licked at his insides, kicking both the physical and emotional pain to brand new levels. Suppressing a groan, Gavin gave a curt bow. “It was a pleasure to have served the Council.”

One by one, each councilor symbolically looked away from Gavin in turn, but Kai held his gaze the longest before joining the others. The fiery agony eased for a split second. Gavin nodded and strode out of the chamber.

Kai knew something was up on the Council, too.

Chapter Twenty-six

September 18

The rain eased up enough for Zoe to go back to work, which was just as well. Gavin worried she might be physically harmed the longer he stayed near her.

The Elemental pull had upgraded from an annoying, intermittent blip to a constant tug—a sort of flaming gravity luring him closer to Scarlet. If that mighty rubber band snapped with Zoe in the way, she wouldn’t get hurt. She’d get dead.

The bitch of it all? Zoe’s Water was the only thing that calmed the blaze, but every minute he spent with her was a minute Scarlet had potential access to Zoe’s words and actions. When he was with Zoe, Gavin walked an unraveling, thread-thin tightrope strung over a blazing pit of eternal damnation. When she was gone, he
became
that pit of eternal damnation.

Thinking he’d be more productive in the Dreaming while Jack covered Realis, Gavin spent the entire day searching for a Dreamweaver who might not exist, watching for congregations of Fyres that might indicate where the door was, and assisting the few Wyldlings wandering about during daylight hours. His sweat glands worked overtime. He didn’t need a mirror to know his burning eyes were thoroughly bloodshot. Muscles trembled like a fucking junkie’s. But worst of all, he couldn’t stop thinking about Scarlet. Every time he got distracted, she was there to reel him in.

He thought about how he’d fuck her. What position would be best for maximum penetration. How many times he’d come with her Fire egging him on. Red colored his sight and tainted his mind with sadistic lust. Fire burned away reason. He’d soon be pared down to a quivering sack of instinct whose only goal was to perpetuate the Fire.

No way he’d make it to the equinox. Scarlet would break him before then. And more people would die the longer he resisted.

An ear-splitting boom rocked his radioactively decaying brain back to the present. He traced the sound to the Dreaming’s newest desert and took off in that direction, watching for Shadows and Fyres along the way. Reddish-orange vapor haloed the great sandy wasteland. The colors were so vivid and bright, the dead, black sky almost appeared day-lit.

The Fiery leash choking the life from his heart tightened amid a chorus of Wyldling screams. Red lights danced. Heat sparked and strangled the Air. Evil laughter shrilled.

Scarlet was there.

Waiting for him.

Lust sizzled a path through his neurons, frying connections, jamming frequencies, causing misfires. His chest rose and fell in quick bursts. He could have her tonight. He’d fill every hole in her body, and when dawn broke, he’d wake up and do it again in Realis. The anticipation of joining with her, of grinding on that irresistible Fire like he had at his house in Sydney the day they killed Zoe—

He paused his steps.

What the fuck?

Scarlet had done it again. Somehow her Fire had woven its tendrils of hatred and mad desire through his mind and body.

Wyldlings cried out for help, but Gavin dropped to the sandy ground. He was losing his mind. The Fire had mesmerized, redirected his thoughts, feasted on the fraying ends of his sanity. His head spun. Where was he? What should he do?

Scarlet? I’m here. Come and take me away with you.

Had he spoken those words? Did she hear him?

The Fire smiled.

He hugged his knees, buried his head under the mountain of his glowing arms, burrowed his toes into the hot sand.

No. That wasn’t right.

He didn’t want Scarlet. He wanted Zoe.

Zoe, where are you?

“Gavin?”

Lifting his head, he stared at the feet planted beside him. They were bare and blokey. His gaze traveled up. Board shorts. The scent of fresh fruit. “Jack?”

“What the fuck are you doing, man?” His trainer squatted, elbows resting on bent knees. A shocked expression loomed behind the fringe of gray hair. He dropped his gold apple.

Gavin’s eyes lost focus. “Wasn’t there a story about a golden apple? ‘For the fairest’ or some shit?” He reached for it. Zoe should have that apple.

The Fire proclaimed its disagreement with a solar flare to the gut. Gavin pitched forward, clutching his burning stomach. Had to get it out. Had to—

Jack grasped his arms and shook. “Your aura is almost totally red, dude. Did the Fyres get a hold of you? Come on, talk to me.”

Coolness flowed into Gavin’s extremities like a brook trickling down a mountainside. Scarlet’s Fire retaliated with a shrill battle cry and another flare, this one sharper than the last.
No!

He gritted his teeth and shoved Jack away. “No. No Water. Get your fucking hands off me.”

The bloke lost his balance and tipped over, spraying sand everywhere. Blue and green swirls shrouded his normally gray irises, and he stood, shoulders squared. He grabbed Gavin by the shirt and yanked him up like a blind, malnourished puppy. “Oh, hell no, motherfucker.”

Gavin’s feet flew out from under him, and his body flipped a full 360 degrees.

When his senses returned a few seconds later, he lay flat on his back, choking on sand. He coughed and sat up, wiping the stinging grit from his eyes.

“Have you lost your goddamn mind? Man, you’re
sweating
Fire.” Jack’s chest heaved as he gestured toward the screams ripping through the desert. “Do you not hear the Wyldlings? They need our help. Get your ass up, pull your shit together, and do your fucking job, you asshole.”

Overwhelmed by his actions, by the Fire insisting he fry Jack and leave him for the Shadows to snack on, by the guilt, Gavin squeezed his eyes shut and submitted—to everything.

A phrase of music rode the shredded tails of the scorched air. Soft, delicate, full. Zoe’s whale song. The hum that had resurrected his heart more times than he could remember had returned once more to drag him out of the depths of hell.

The Fire receded, slinking back into its dark hole within his chest, and cool Water filled the spot. Cries of desperate Wyldlings tugged at his conscience. The anger, lust, and hatred dissipated into the currents of Zoe’s song.

He reached a hand to Jack, who stared at it.

“I’m cool,” Gavin assured him. He glanced at himself. He really wasn’t, but his aura backed him up.

“Far from it.” Jack helped Gavin to his feet. “I gotta know what I’m dealing with here.”