"Stand up. If we hold hands while we walk, hopefully you'll heal along the way. Otherwise, you won't be much help."

Gavin grabbed the front of her coat and used it to haul himself to his feet. "I'll be d.a.m.ned if I let you battle them alone."

William moaned.

"Get up," Gavin said, and he kicked the Fate. "We have to get out of here. Hurry up."

"Gavin!" Sydney admonished.

"What? He can't die."

"No, but I can certainly feel pain," William complained as he struggled into a seated position. He looked down at his lap and then at his surroundings. "What happened to everyone? Is this Gavin's coat? Weren't we surrounded by Rakshasa? And-Sydney! They didn't get you!" With a burst of energy, he leaped to his feet and pulled her into a breathtaking hug.

Gavin shook his head. "I think we're both concussed. Anybody know the way back?"

"That way," Sydney said with absolute conviction. Both men gaped at her. "Trust me," she insisted. "Ever since mating with him, my sense of direction has improved. Now let's go."

William glanced up from securing Gavin's jacket around his waist. Gavin shrugged, but with no other alternative, they followed the path Sydney indicated.

The fighting was in full tilt by the time they arrived. Gavin had healed enough to be able to fight halfway decently, but Sydney refused to leave his side, despite his commands that she get herself to safety. Nate and Quentin seemed to comprehend his dilemma and made their way to his side, and between the three of them, they were able to keep Sydney from battling too many Rakshasa face to face.

By the time it was all over, the yard was littered with dead and dying Rakshasa, Gavin was near to pa.s.sing out again, and Hilde had already retreated into the house to put together sustenance for the pack. Hugo set up a triage station in the living room. Sydney took Gavin back to their bedroom to get him cleaned up and tuck him into bed.

"Do you want a shower or bath or sponge bath?" Sydney asked as she helped him limp into the bathroom attached to the bedroom they shared.

"Are you involved in any of the options?"

Sydney chuckled. "All of them," she a.s.sured him.

He chose a shower, figuring it was the fastest way to get clean. He was desperate to crawl into bed and sleep for the next twelve hours.

"I'm not pregnant, you know," she commented as she washed away the dirt and blood. Gavin claimed he was too weak to shower by himself, and his mate was kind enough not to deny him in his time of need.

"My day just keeps getting better and better," he muttered darkly.

"Don't tell me you were truly hoping I was."

"Okay, I won't tell you."

"Why?"

"Because you just told me not to."

Sydney made an exasperated noise. "Why were you hoping I was pregnant?"

Gavin wrapped his arms around her waist and rested his chin on the top of her head. "Because I thought I was going to die out there. And I liked the idea that you were carrying my child in your womb. That my memory might carry on, somehow."

"Oh, Gavin," Sydney said, as she choked on a sob. She tilted her head, so she could look up at him. "Your memory would carry on, whether I was pregnant or not. But it doesn't matter now, because you aren't dead."

"No. I'm not." They both looked down. He was definitely not dead. "But I'm not sure I can do it standing up right now. That might just kill me."

Sydney smiled. "Let's go to bed."

They made love slowly, languidly, with Sydney taking the lead. Gavin fell asleep almost instantly afterward, and she lay there for a long time, until she was certain he was sound asleep, and then she gently slipped out of the bed and dressed quickly and quietly in a pair of fleece pants and a matching fleece shirt, and then she slipped out of the bedroom.

"Is he secure?" she asked William, when he met her on the stairs.

William's glare told her he was not remotely happy with this mission, but he nodded curtly anyway.

"Let's go."

His skirt made a faint swishing sound as he followed her.

They crept through the quiet house. Most of the shifters slept out in the converted pole barn. Only Gavin, Sydney, William, Hilde and, so it seemed, Quentin, slept inside the house. This made it infinitely easier to slip around undetected.

The stairs leading down to the bas.e.m.e.nt were next to the back door, through the kitchen. They tiptoed through the kitchen, ducking when the shifter on guard duty paced past the outside door.

And then they were in the bas.e.m.e.nt, tugging open a plank wood door built into a far wall of the cement-lined room. They stepped through the doorway, into another room that was simply carved from the dirt. Sydney flipped on the flashlight she'd tucked into her pocket and aimed the beam straight ahead.

The man sitting there lifted his manacled arms to block the sudden glare. After a few moments, he lowered his arms and blinked, trying to focus on the people behind the beam.

"Who's there?" he croaked.

"Sydney."

The man on the floor actually cowered. "Did you bring your boyfriend with you?"

"No. And he isn't my boyfriend, Brandon. He's my mate."

"Does he know I'm here?"

Sydney gave William a swift glance before turning her attention back to Brandon. "No."

"Keeping secrets? That's not very mate-like." Brandon made a tsking sound.

"If he knew you were here, he'd kill you."

"And why aren't you telling him?"

"Because I happen to believe you're redeemable."

She watched him drop his head against the dirt wall behind him. He closed his eyes and grimaced. "f.u.c.k," he muttered. "I think I have a vague idea of what he must feel like, all the d.a.m.n time."

"What do you mean?"

Brandon waved one shackled arm. "The guilt. You sure know how to lay it on thick, don't you?"

"I'm not trying to make you feel guilty."

Brandon opened his eyes and stared steadily at her. After a few moments of silence, he said, "He's a Rakshasa. You're a Chala. You can't be mates. Nature doesn't work that way."

Sydney ignored that. He'd been spouting this same song since she ambushed him from behind and dragged him into this handy little makeshift cell.

"Why were you going to kill Gavin?"

So far, he had refused to tell her. Earlier, in the woods, she had arrived in time to hear Gavin tell Brandon to go save the pack and come back to kill him later, but now she had to know. Why? For some reason, she couldn't move on to determine his punishment until she knew why.

"What makes you think I intended to kill him?" Brandon countered.

"I heard you," Sydney said with exasperation.

"I think you misunderstood whatever it was you heard. Did you hear anything, Fate?"

William pursed his lips. "I was unconscious."

"Brandon, you could go free, if you just tell us the truth," Sydney said.

"Don't lie to me, Chala. You don't do it very well." Brandon turned his head to the side. "Why do you want to know the truth, anyway? What do you expect to prove?"

Sydney hesitated. She glanced swiftly at William and then looked back at Brandon. "I know Gavin has a . . . checkered past. And I'm sure he's made a lot of enemies. But he isn't the same man any longer. Whether by choice or not, he's changed, and for the better. He's a great leader, Brandon. He's going to make sure we survive this thing. My species, your species, all of us."

She hesitated again. "I might be the last Chala, Brandon." She paused to let him absorb that fact. "I'm probably the last chance to repopulate the world with Light Ones, and more Chala. And if I lose Gavin, that won't happen. I am in love with that man, and there is no one else in this world that I want to sleep with. Ever. So if he dies, so does the chance to repopulate the world. Do you understand me, Brandon? Do you?"

Brandon's gaze shifted from Sydney to William and back again. Finally, he gave her a grave look and said, "Chala, I think it's you who doesn't understand."

Chapter 12.

They made plans to move, the next day. They didn't particularly want to, considering they had all made Hilde's house their home, and Hilde seemed to rather enjoy the company. But too many Rakshasa had gotten away the day before, and they couldn't run the risk of the pack reorganizing and coming after them again. They had a Chala in their midst, and her safety was more important than their level of comfort.

Sydney was out in the barracks, discussing the move with several members of the pack, when William sought out Gavin for a private word.

"You look well rested," William commented, as they deliberately veered off the path leading from the house to the pole barn, and waded through snow deep enough to cover their ankles as they walked, in order to avoid running into any other inhabitants of the household.

Gavin shrugged. "Sleeping with a Chala has that effect on me."

"Which is exactly what I need to talk to you about."

"You want to talk about my s.e.x life?"

"In a manner of speaking, yes."

"I don't think it'll quite do it for you. It's pretty hetero. Although she does like to do it doggy style."

"I want to talk about Sydney," William said impatiently. "And her role in your life."

Gavin stopped short and turned to face the Fate. "Forget it. The plan has changed."

"What plan?"

"She's mine. I'm not giving her up." His tone was flat, determined.

"She is a Chala."

"Yeah, I get that."

"No, I don't think you do. She needs to mate with a Light One, Gavin. You said it yourself. She is the last hope for the shifters."

Gavin turned away and stared out at the rows of naked trees, stretching bare limbs to the sky. Sort of reminded him of his soul. Without Sydney, that was exactly what his soul would be like: naked, reaching for something it could never touch. Or maybe that was his soul, even with Sydney. Either way, he lost.

"Forget it," he repeated. "We tried that, remember? Didn't work out so well. The shifter I thought was perfect turned out to be a traitor who wanted to kill me for a two-hundred-year-old grudge. I'm not going there again."

"You killed his mother," William said, the truth dawning as suddenly as the sun appearing from behind a dark cloud.

Gavin made a face. "I killed a lot of mothers, in my time. But that was two hundred years ago, and there's nothing I can do to change the past. I'm not the same man anymore. I'm different. Better. And Sydney's mine. We'll figure out a way to make it work." He strode away, leaving William standing in the snow. Whether he agreed or not didn't matter to Gavin.

Sydney was his. And he wasn't letting her go.

Unbeknownst to Gavin, Sydney made arrangements to take Brandon with them. She wasn't sure what else to do with him. She couldn't leave him there for Hilde to deal with, and she certainly couldn't cut him loose. Rumors were running wild within the pack as far as his involvement with the Rakshasa, so she had to pick her allies carefully.

Jack was young and eager enough to follow blindly any order she gave him, and Nate was strong enough and equally as blindly eager. Plus, the two of them had become bosom buddies during training sessions, and had ridden together from Detroit to Hilde's house. She left it to them to extract Brandon from the bas.e.m.e.nt and bring him along with them, making sure they were the last to leave so no one else would know. Hopefully, by the time they arrived at their destination, she would have a plan for what to do with him.

Once again, they called upon a friend of William's, yet another Fate with s.p.a.ce and time on his lands. This one lived in West Central Arkansas, tucked into a valley in the Ozark Mountains. According to William, a wide, clear stream ran through the Fate's property, and after a short hike, one could experience a breathtaking waterfall.

A far cry from Northern Michigan. Winter was half as long and half as cold, and spring had already erupted. Daffodils lined the two-lane roads they travelled to get there. Forsythia bushes exploded with color and the buds on the dogwood trees swelled. In another few days, they would be covered with frothy white flowers.

"It's beautiful." Since she had been a young girl, Sydney had rarely travelled anywhere outside of the state of Michigan, and this was like nothing she had ever experienced before.

"Stick with me, kid. I'll take you around the globe one day." Gavin slung his arm around her shoulder as he spoke.

"Really?"

He shrugged. "Sure. We live forever. Plenty of time on our hands."

Sydney liked his confidence that they would make it through this alive. She wanted to spend eternity with him.

The house was tucked into a valley between two mountains and was surrounded by trees. The only sounds, once the vehicle engines were cut, were those of nature: birds, insects, the wind, and the rushing waters of the stream running through the backyard.

The Fate's house was a great wooden structure, essentially a lodge, and far larger than what one person needs, although it would be a tight fit for the number of shifters who had joined their ranks. But they would make do. They really had no other option. Somewhere along the line, this group of shifters had become a pack, and packs stuck together, regardless of the threat. Especially in the face of a threat.

Sydney glanced behind her as she and Gavin climbed the wooden stairs leading up to a wraparound porch, to meet the Fate named Killian O'Connelly. There was no sign of Jack or Nate. But she, Gavin, and William had led the entourage, so she wasn't worried. Yet.

Killian O'Connelly was a redheaded Fate with a propensity for scowling and for snapping insults at anyone who attempted to speak directly to him. He bristled immediately when he spotted Gavin, and William had to step between them, before Killian decided to pick a fight.