Wildfire Phoenix by Zoe Chant

Chapter 14

Burn.

Even through her respirator mask, she could taste the smoke; thick and choking, burning her eyes. Under her protective gear, her clothes stuck to her skin, drenched in futile sweat. Blind in the choking smog, she fumbled along the walls, trying to orientate herself. Searching for a window, a door, anything.

Burn.

There was no way out. There was never a way out. She knew what was coming. Knew what was going to happen, but she couldn’t stop it. There was—

A door.

An impossible door, cool to the touch despite the oven-hot air. A door that had never been there before. Not in real life, nor in dreams.

Burn!

She wrenched the door open, nearly tearing it from its hinges in her haste. Air rushed past her, like an indrawn breath; not bringing life, but death. The bright heat of flash over bloomed like a nuclear explosion, but she was already diving, tucking herself into a ball as the shockwave picked her up and threw her—

Out into calm, cool clouds.

“Hello, Blaise,” said Zephyr. He smiled. “I’m glad you decided to join me.”

“Not as glad as I am to be here.” Blaise got to her feet, too relieved to even be disconcerted by the fact that she wasn’t standing on anything in particular. “That dream wasn’t shaping up to be rainbows and fluffy kittens. But I guess you could tell that, seeing as how you yanked me out of it.”

“No, actually.” Zephyr wore dark gray jeans and a plain, slate blue T-shirt, similar to his clothes in real life; but the colors shifted subtly whenever he moved, like oil on water, or storm clouds. “I didn’t want to intrude on your privacy. I only brushed your dream lightly, enough to shape a way out, if you chose to take it.”

“Well, your timing was impeccable.” Blaise dusted herself off, discovering in the process that her urban firefighting gear had disappeared, replaced by her usual off-duty outfit of comfy jeans and a Thunder Mountain Hotshots crew shirt. “Most days I manage to work hard enough that I switch off the second I hit the pillow, but now and then my subconscious decides to be a real bitch. So if this isn’t a rescue call, what’s up?”

He ran his fingers through his long hair, looking a little self-conscious. “I need to talk with you. This seemed like the best place.”

“Are you sure about that?” Blaise cast a nervous glance up at the cloud-filled sky—not that there really was an up, or any other direction, for that matter. “Don’t want your big flappy gatecrasher turning up again.”

“It won’t.” He tipped his head—not up, but down, as though peering into water. “I can sense it, circling in the deeper dream, but the Thunderbird will keep its distance. Until I call, at least.”

“Do not do that,” Blaise said, rather more vehemently than she’d intended. “Seriously.”

Zephyr’s mouth quirked. “I wasn’t intending to. More to the point, your animal also can’t join you in this place unless you deliberately call it. That’s why I thought you might be more comfortable meeting here.”

“Huh.” It was easier to look at him now that she couldn’t feel the frustrated flare of her animal every time their eyes met. She could see him, rather than her mate. “You’re right, this is a lot easier. So, what’s on your mind?”

Zephyr started to speak, then paused, eyebrows drawing together. He looked round, as though he’d just heard someone call his name. “One moment. There’s something rather distracting that wouldn’t take long to fix. Do you mind if we take a walk first?”

“Sure.” She fell into step with him, though with the lack of any sort of landmark, it felt unnervingly like she wasn’t moving at all. “Uh, where are we going?”

“I don’t know yet.” In the real world, Zephyr always carried himself with careful tension, as though everything around him was made of glass, but here, in this swirling nothingness, he moved with loose, easy strides. “I don’t normally actively search through dreams, like we did last time. People have a right to privacy, so I try to only go where I’m invited.”

“People do that?”

“Well, not me specifically. But when the nightmares close in, most people don’t want to face them alone. I listen out for those calls for help and do what I can to ease their dreams.” He paused mid-step. “Ah. Here we go.”

The fog drew back like a curtain, revealing an enormous corridor lined with narrow metal lockers. Strip lights buzzed overhead, harsh and unforgiving. A teenage girl—about thirteen or fourteen, Blaise would have guessed—darted from locker to locker, tugging futilely at each door in turn.

“I can’t find it,” the girl was saying over and over. She sounded on the verge of tears. “I have to find it.”

“Find what, Tegan?” Zephyr said gently.

Tegan jumped, whirling round. One of her hands curled around something, holding it to her chest. She saw Zephyr, and her brown eyes widened in recognition.

“Oh, it’s you,” the girl said, her narrow shoulders dropping. She paid no attention at all to Blaise. “I haven’t seen you for a long time. I thought maybe you’d moved to a different school.”

“I couldn’t come to see you for a while. But I’m back now.” Zephyr pointed at a locker. “This one is yours, isn’t it?”

Tegan’s panicked expression shifted to relief. Hurrying over, she spun the dial to unlock the door. Before she could open it, however, Zephyr touched her shoulder.

“It’s very small and dark in there,” he said. “I don’t think she’ll like it.”

Tegan bit her lip, looking down at her closed fist. “But I have to hide her. I can’t let anyone find out. They’ll laugh at me.”

Zephyr nodded gravely, as though that made perfect sense. He took the girl’s other hand. “There’s a better place. Come with me.”

Blaise trailed behind the pair in bewildered fascination, not daring to ask questions in case it made Tegan notice her presence. Zephyr led the girl down the corridor with confident steps, to an old wooden door. It seemed out of place to Blaise’s eye, but Tegan brightened, a smile breaking across her face.

“Yes!” she exclaimed. “I didn’t know there was a way to get here from school.”

Zephyr smiled too. “There’s always a way here.”

He opened the door, revealing a cozy library with cushions scattered amidst low shelves of books. Soft spring light streamed through high, narrow windows. The air smelled of old paper and lavender.

Gently, Zephyr took Tegan’s clenched hand, turning it over. “You can let her go now.”

The girl’s fingers tightened, then slowly opened. A plastic dragon lay curled in her hand. Just a cheap, badly painted toy—but then it stirred, opening luminous eyes. It yawned, showing tiny, perfect teeth, and blew out an orange spark of flame.

Zephyr stroked the dragon’s jeweled scales. “I think she’s hungry.”

Tegan flinched, her fingers curling around the dragon. “But if I feed her, she’ll get bigger. I won’t be able to hide her.”

“That’s true.” With gentle flicks, Zephyr shooed the dragon off the girl’s hand. “But she’d also be strong enough to protect you.”

The dragon spread rainbow wings, leaping into the air. It circled Tegan’s head, tugging at her hair with minute claws. She giggled, taking a step forward—then hesitated, looking back over her shoulder at Zephyr.

“It’s hard to find the way here on my own,” she said. “You won’t go away for so long again, will you?”

“I’ll try not to.” Zephyr gave the girl a gentle push into the library. “Go on now. See where she takes you.”

Tegan flashed him a smile, then turned away. As the fog rolled in, Blaise caught a last glimpse of the dragon’s bright, gleaming wings. They already looked larger.

“Is she a dragon shifter?” Blaise asked Zephyr.

“I don’t know.” Zephyr gazed into the fog as though still watching Tegan walk away. “Possibly. But many people hide a secret soul, without being shifters.”

“Huh. She seemed to know you.”

“I’ve visited her many times, though if we passed each other on the street in the waking world, she wouldn’t recognize me. She moved to a new school a while ago, and has been struggling to fit in. I’m glad to be able to catch up with her.” He cocked his head. “Actually, I can sense a number of people I haven’t seen for a while. I’d like to check in with them, if you don’t mind a few further diversions.”

“Hey, if it’s a choice between a magical mystery tour, or tossing and turning while my brain re-runs my own personal horror movie, sign me up for the dream train. As long as I won’t get in the way?”

“Not at all. You caught me by surprise, when you joined me in my uncle’s dream that first time. Now that I’m aware, I can keep you hidden.” He held out a hand. “Shall we?”

Somehow, it was easy to take his hand here. It felt natural to walk like that, his fingers lightly clasping hers with gentle warmth.

She grew used to the slide from one place to another, though not the dreams themselves. There was always that moment of jarring strangeness; like stepping off a plane into a foreign country, suddenly unable to read any of the signs and notices around you. Other people’s heads, Blaise soon decided, were just weird.

Zephyr took it all in his stride. No matter how bizarre the situation, he approached each dreamer with quiet calm. At least half the time, nothing they said made a lick of sense to Blaise, yet Zephyr listened with grave attention. He didn’t say much. Just a few words here, a gentle question there. Yet it was like he knew every frightened mind as well as Blaise knew the crew engines; what to tweak, what to oil, to get rattling gears running smoothly once more.

Some of the dreams, Blaise could understand. She’d had the sweat-soaked anxiety of sprinting for a bus, knowing that you were going to miss the big exam and flunk the whole year. She could have done with Zephyr jogging at her side, asking if she’d checked her pockets for her car keys. (“And if you can drive, you must not be in junior high, so you don’t need to get to school. You could go anywhere…”) And the tooth-falling-out dream was way too familiar, though she wasn’t sure she’d have been soothed by someone suggesting that she collect the endless molars and store them somewhere safe. (“This happens to everyone. See, here’s my box. Let’s make one for you.”)

Some were just bizarre. Zephyr spent a long time crouched next to an agitated teen boy, solemnly helping him plant shattered bits of circuit board in the ground. One girl had apparently lost her parsnip, and was desperately searching for it in the middle of a dead-on recreation of last year’s Olympics (even Zephyr seemed to struggle a little with that one). But after a while, Blaise realized that all the dreams had one thing in common.

“They’re all kids,” she said, back in the gray place between dreams. “What’s up with that?”

“Honestly, I’m not sure. Most of the dreamers who reach for me are adolescents. I think their minds are more open.” The corner of Zephyr’s mouth lifted. “Or perhaps I just have a certain affinity for lost teens.”

Blaise snorted. “You kind of had bigger problems than math tests and girlfriends at that age, though.”

“All problems are big to the person who has them.” Zephyr started to stroll through the clouds again, at an unhurried pace. “Whatever the reason, I’m glad that these young people reach out to me. I like being able to help them with normal, everyday issues.”

“Like lost parsnips?”

Zephyr let out a soft breath of laughter. “I admit, that one was rather enigmatic. But most of the time, it’s fairly easy to see the way their waking worries shape their dreams.”

“Easy for you, maybe. I couldn’t make sense of any of those weird-ass hallucinations even if I had Google and the complete works of Jung. How did you get so good at this?”

He shrugged. “I was here for a long time. And I had the Thunderbird to guide me. It is much more than a force of destruction, no matter how it may seem in the waking world. Sometimes it carried me to the deeper levels, below the dreams of sleeping minds, where things get… stranger. I won’t take you there. I don’t think I could, even if I tried.”

“Yeah, hard pass. This is strange enough for me, thanks. Were you always able to come here? Before the Thunderbird, I mean.”

“No. That’s why it surprised me, when I discovered I was still able to dream walk even without the Thunderbird. The possibility hadn’t even occurred to me. Perhaps something of the Thunderbird’s power still lingers in my soul. Or maybe it’s just that I was here for so long.”

“Must have been hard, being stuck here. Especially since you were just a kid yourself.”

“There… was a learning curve, I admit.” He stared into the clouds. “Things got better, when I learned how to reach into other people’s dreams. I treasured even that small amount of contact with normal life. Especially teenagers. I missed out on most of those years, all that turbulent drama and little rites of passage. Helping them with their problems is the closest I’ll ever get to experiencing those things for myself. Does that sound creepy?”

“Not creepy at all.” She squeezed his hand. “You sacrificed a lot, to be the Thunderbird.”

He tilted his head, neither agreeing nor dissenting. “It was necessary. But still… sometimes, when I talk to these teens, I can’t help wondering what might have been, if things had been different. If I had just been awkward, geeky Zephyr, a normal Lakota boy whose biggest problem was plucking up the courage to ask the hot girl from Calculus class out on a date.”

She nudged him with her shoulder, a friendly push. “Well, apparently in this alternate universe, regular human Blaise faces stiff competition. Exactly who is this hot girl?”

Zephyr laughed again, all traces of introspection vanishing. “Since we’re reordering the universe to suit ourselves, I’m declaring that ordinary Zephyr managed to land an exchange trip to England. That’s where you went to school, right?”

“Yep. Well, in that case, ordinary Zephyr already knows that ordinary Blaise is crushing on him. Rory and the other guys would have worked it out in about five nanoseconds, and you already know what they’re like when it comes to staying out of other people’s business.”

Zephyr’s smile widened. “Ah, but you said you’re not a shifter in this fanfic. No animal to push you in my direction. You wouldn’t have glanced twice at me.”

“Zeph, have you ever looked in a mirror?”

He glanced down at his ridiculously well-muscled body, and his grin turned pained. “However you’re picturing me as a teen, you need to remove about half my mass and nine-tenths of the self-confidence. I was, shall we say, a late developer.”

“Hah. Same here. I think I spent most of my mid-teens buried in a black hoody, wishing I could disappear.”

Zephyr cocked an eyebrow. “Now that I find difficult to believe.”

“You’ll have to take my word for it, because I am never showing you any photos of myself taken before the age of nineteen. Maybe it’s just as well we didn’t meet back then.” Something occurred to her, and she gestured at his long hair. “Hey, how come you don’t look exactly the same here as in real life?”

“This?” He tucked a stray lock back behind his ear. “The hospital staff cut my hair while I was in my coma. I suppose my subconscious hasn’t quite accepted that yet. To an extent, your dream body reflects your self-image. In my case, the other way round, too. When the serum separated me from the Thunderbird, I took on the human form that my mind expected me to have.”

She eyed his biceps. “Then, if you’ll forgive my bluntness, you have a really inflated ego.”

God, he had a wonderful laugh. She could never tire of hearing it. “I’ll take that as a compliment. No, this is my real appearance, for better or worse. It worked a little differently for me when I was the Thunderbird. I was here physically, so my dream self matured just as I would have done in the waking world. Thankfully. I would not have cared to wake up as a thirty-year-old mind in a fifteen-year-old body.”

“Yeah, that would have caused a whole different set of issues,” she agreed fervently. “As it is, I’m not complaining. Though I’m surprised you ended up so buff. I wouldn’t have imagined many teenagers dream about intensive gym workouts.”

“Not really.” His smile flickered, and just for a moment she glimpsed the long, dark years that lay under his gentle good humor. “But everyone dreams about monsters.”

“I warn you, if we run into someone dreaming about giant spiders, you’re on your own,” she said, more to restore the spark to his eyes than as a genuine warning. “I hate spiders.”

To her relief, his mouth crooked up again. “That can’t be true. You picked up that spider in the storeroom yesterday. You even carried it outside in your hat and released it into the grass.”

“Only because the guys were watching. You’re the first person I’ve ever told, but I really, really don’t like bugs.” She fixed him with a mock-glare. “And you’d better keep that to yourself. I’ve got a reputation to maintain, you know.”

“Your terrible secret is safe with me.” His dark gaze deepened, resting on her thoughtfully. “You never show any weakness, do you?”

For the first time that night, her skin prickled with awareness of his proximity. She let go of his hand, opening up more space between them. “Have to. Black woman in a male-dominated industry, and all that. But I don’t think you brought me here to talk about my personal issues with spiders.”

He hesitated, his hand hovering as though to reach after her. Then he tucked it behind his back, straightening. “Actually, I did. Well, not spiders, but a somewhat related topic. Blaise, this isn’t working.”

She didn’t need to ask what this was. “Yes it is. I know the training’s hard, but you’ll get there. And you can’t say you aren’t fitting in with the squad. You’re getting on great with everyone—”

“Everyone,” he interrupted, “except you. We can’t keep on like this. Let’s imagine that your plan does work. The Thunderbird returns, but this time I’m able to shift back to human, freely, whenever it doesn’t need me. I’m still around, most of the time. What happens with you and me then?”

She’d been trying not to think about that. “Well… then we figure something out. Believe me, that’s a problem I’d be just thrilled to have.”

“Me too. But we need to talk about it now. I don’t want you to have to keep racing out of the room whenever our eyes meet. I want us to be able to be…” He gestured between the two of them. “Like this. In the waking world, not just here.”

“We can’t. You know I can’t, Zeph.”

“I don’t mean mating.” His voice roughened, just a little, something raw breaking through his careful composure. “Though I admit, I want that too. There’s a great deal that I want, and can’t have, and I know that can’t be changed. But this is killing me, Blaise. To not even be able to joke with you, or share a meal as friends, or just be.”

She let out a shaky breath. “Yeah. Me too. But there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“There is.” He raked a hand through his hair, his resolute expression faltering a bit. “Well. Maybe. It might not work. This goes rather a long way beyond anything I’ve ever attempted before. Perhaps it’s a bad idea.”

“You’re really selling this, Zeph.”

He made a pained sound. “See, that’s part of the reason I’m having second thoughts. Normally my dreamers aren’t aware that I’m there, or even that they’re dreaming. You are. I’m not sure how that will affect things.”

“Are you going to spit it out, or am I going to have to come over there and give you a wedgie? If that even works in dreams.”

He laughed at that, though it was barely a hitch of breath. “I’d rather not find out, thank you. All right. Blaise, when I meet people with reoccurring nightmares, there’s usually some trigger, some imagery, that sets off all that negative emotion. Like, for the sake of argument, a giant spider. It doesn’t do any good to just make the spider go away, because it’ll just come back again. So instead, I take the spider and put it in a different context. One that isn’t threatening.”

“Like in a cage at a zoo?”

“Exactly. I don’t force the person to look at it, or insist that it isn’t scary. Because the spider is frightening, to them. But I can make it small, and put it in a glass jar in the corner of their favorite cafe, or some other place where the dreamer feels safe. Somewhere with powerful positive emotions. I can let them sit with that spider, get to know it, little by little. So that eventually, when they see it again, it won’t trigger the same panic and fear.”

Blaise squinted at him. “Okay, but I don’t see where you’re going with this. Yeah, I have nightmares, but that’s hardly my biggest problem.”

“I know, but the same principle applies. Changing a dream, in order to treat the underlying cause.” He spread his hands. “Blaise, I’m yourspider.”

“That,” Blaise said, after a moment of consideration, “is quite possibly the least romantic thing anyone has ever said.”

He grimaced. “I could have phrased that better. But it’s true. In the waking world, seeing me triggers your phoenix, and that triggers you into a cascade of powerful negative memories. It becomes a vicious feedback cycle. It’s no wonder you can’t stand to be near me. I’m honestly impressed that you’ve managed so well for this long.”

“So you’re saying you want to try to… desensitize me?”

Zephyr nodded, his black eyes lighting up. “Exactly. Look at how easily we’ve been able to talk here. This is a safe place, away from your phoenix. I want to try to use that. If we can create positive associations here, it might help in the waking world. Give us both more control over our emotions.”

Blaise was a long way from convinced, but she shrugged. “Well, I literally don’t have anything better to do right now, except drool into my pillow. Might as well give it a shot. What kind of thing did you have in mind?”

“I thought we could start by recreating a normal daily scenario. A dress rehearsal for the real thing, as it were. If we practice until we’re comfortable here, then it should make it easier to do later.”

“Okay. How about weight training?”

“Ah.” He cleared his throat, a slight flush staining his cheeks. “Perhaps something a little easier, for a first attempt. One moment. I’m not entirely sure how… ah, there we go.”

Sunlight fell across her face. Blaise shaded her eyes and discovered that they were now standing in the familiar meadow that the crew used for training drills. She could feel the breeze against the back of her neck, the warmth of the sun; yet the blades of grass blurred together, and the edge of the forest was just an impressionistic green haze. Everything was a little too bright, the colors too saturated.

“This is like being inside an Instagram filter,” she said. “Whose dream is this?”

“Mine. Sorry, I don’t usually have to construct the entire setting from my own memory.” As Zephyr spoke, the scene steadied, detail filling in like a JPEG downloading over a terrible connection. “I thought we could run through line cutting drill.”

“In that case, we’re going to need tools,” Blaise said, and discovered a Pulaski in her hand. “And also beer.”

“Nice try.” Zephyr now had a Pulaski too, and his clothes had morphed to the dull dun of turn outs. He pursed his lips. “Hmm. For accuracy, I suppose I should include the rest of the squad too. I can’t actually bring them into my dream, but a basic simulation of their appearance and behavior should suffice.”

A set of figures appeared, frozen in place like clothing mannequins. Blaise took one look at them, and burst into uncontrollable laughter.

“Oh my God,” she wheezed, clutching her stomach. “Is that how you see the guys?”

Zephyr looked from her to his fictional creations, and back again. “You… don’t?”

“Are you kidding me? Fenrir’s accurate, but Wystan’s way too short, and Rory only wishes he was that ripped.” Fighting down giggles, Blaise circled the group. “Shit, is that meant to be Joe? You’ve made him look noble. And Callum! What did you do, mash him up with Chris Evans?”

Zephyr held out his hand. “Perhaps you’d like to try?”

“Sure.” She rested her palm on his, and concentrated. The images of the crew blurred, rippling into much more accurate representations. “There. Much better.”

Zephyr blinked at her new, improved versions. His lips twitched, and he covered his mouth with one hand.

“It is suddenly very apparent that you grew up with them,” he murmured. “On second thought, perhaps this would be better without a simulated audience. Let’s try something simpler.”

Like a bad slideshow transition, the meadow dissolved, turning into the mess hall. The tables were set for breakfast, with pitchers of juice and bulk boxes of cereal lined up at the side. No one else was present, yet Blaise had an impression of the usual early morning sounds; a clatter of spoons, and a low, indistinct grumble of sleepy complaints and conversations.

Zephyr backed up a bit, then strode confidently toward her, as though he’d just entered the room. “Good morning, Blaise. Did you sleep well?”

She managed to suppress another laugh, though not her grin. “Oh, yeah. Really weird dreams though. You?”

“I had an interesting night,” he replied, black eyes sparkling. “Can I get you a cup of coffee?”

“Thanks,” she said, playing along. “Black, two sugars.”

“I know.” He returned from the coffee pot, handing her a mug. Out of the corner of his mouth, he muttered, “Don’t actually try to drink it. Taste and smell are the hardest senses to fool.”

There was something subtly off about the liquid in the mug. When she looked at it, her brain said coffee, but it was like reading the word rather than actually smelling the aroma of the beans.

She pretended to take a sip, then put the mug down, still fighting not to laugh. “Well, here we are. Look at us, having a perfectly normal conversation.”

“Indeed.” He leaned against the edge of the table, a smile tugging at his lips. “Here we are, all alone, with no one bursting into flame.”

The dawn light caught the playful curve of his mouth. She was abruptly very aware of the hard lines of his braced arms; the way his pose pulled his T-shirt taut across his chest.

The urge to laugh vanished, replaced by a very different need. She swallowed.

“Yeah,” she said. “Here we are. Without my animal.”

Something shifted in Zephyr’s eyes. He was still smiling, still relaxed; but there was nothing casual about the way he looked at her. The low hum of background noise faded, and the details of the room blurred. She couldn’t have said where they were now, if anywhere. It didn’t matter.

“Here we are.” His voice was a deep, soft echo of her own. “Together. Alone.”

She wasn’t sure which one of them moved first. Maybe they both did, in unison, drawn by the same unstoppable force.

Her hands tangled in his hair. His slid around her waist. And this was a dream, it wasn’t truly happening, but God, he felt real. He was there, solid and hard, body pressing against her own.

Their lips met, and a heat that had nothing to do with her animal shot through her. She was a sunbaked forest, parched and yearning, and he was the sweet kiss of lightning. Finally, finally she was alight, every part of her burning with a pure fire that consumed nothing but her own awareness.

She claimed his mouth with fierce need. And if there was a slight vagueness to the sensations of teeth and tongue and lips, it was still him, her mate, kissing her back with the same desperate hunger.

Zephyr made a rough, primal sound at the back of his throat, his mouth never leaving hers. His palm slid up her back, under her shirt, and suddenly there was no shirt. Her nipples brushed against his bare chest, sending bolts of white-hot pleasure through her blood.

With a thrill, she felt his bare cock press against her stomach, hard and hot and slick with eager desire. She was wet too, need pounding between her legs. All she could hear was that desperate pulse, filling her mind, as loud as—

* * *

—Someone knocking on her bedroom door.

“Blaise?” Rory’s voice called. “Are you in there?”

Frustrated desire beat through her blood. Her whole body was still aflame with phantom sensation. Blaise had never in her life so badly wanted to murder someone.

While she was still trying to remember how legs worked and where she’d left her utility knife, the door creaked open. Rory stuck his head round the frame.

“Are you okay? Why are you still—hey!” He jerked back as her pillow hurtled past his face. “What was that for?”

“Be grateful it was the sharpest thing to hand.” Blaise sat up, rubbing at her pounding forehead. Everything seemed thin, unreal, like it might dissolve into the swirling clouds between dreams. “Something had better be on fire, Rory.”

“It’ll be your ass, if you aren’t geared up and ready to hike in five minutes. It’s nearly eight.”

Groggy as she was, it took a moment for the words to sink in. When they did, a jolt of adrenaline cleared out her lingering almost-coital fog.

“Shit!” Blaise fell out of bed, scrambling for her jeans. “Why the fuck didn’t you come and get me earlier?”

Rory had turned his back. He cleared his throat, looking up at the ceiling. “We, uh, noticed that Zephyr wasn’t at morning exercises either. We thought you two might have been… together.”

They had been, in a way, and she’d go ice-skating in hell before she relayed the details of that to her oldest friend. Face burning, she yanked a crew T-shirt down over her sports bra.

“Well, he’s not hiding in my closet.” She shoved her feet into her boots. “I, um, think he probably overslept too. We’d better go grab him.”

Zephyr had picked a cabin clear on the other side of the base from hers. They’d jogged half the distance when he met them coming the other way, out of breath and with his bootlaces flapping.

“Sorry!” he panted. His hair was plastered to his head, and droplets of water gleamed in the hollow of his throat. Blaise suspected that he’d just run through a very cold shower. “I’m so sorry, Rory. I, er, overslept.”

“Seems to be a lot of that going around,” Rory replied, one eyebrow quirking. “The rest of the crew’s waiting. Put your boots on properly. I’ll go tell Buck you two are on your way.”

Blaise kneeled to retie her own boots more securely as Rory hurried off. “You okay?”

Zephyr flashed her a pained smile, fingers busy with his laces. “I have had better awakenings. That was somewhat of an abrupt transition.”

“Hey, at least we didn’t both wake up in your body.”

“That would have been exceptionally awkward, for multiple reasons.” Zephyr finished tying his laces. He straightened, letting out a sigh. “I’m sorry, Blaise. That did not go as I planned.”

Her lips tingled with the memory of his. Deep in her soul, black feathers rustled. Blaise tensed—yet her animal didn’t attempt to rise. It was just a warmth at the bottom of her mind, like a banked fire.

Mate, it murmured, low and content. Our mate.

She moistened her lips. “Hey, look at us. Having a perfectly normal conversation.”

His dark eyes met hers, widening. She saw his throat work.

“Here we are,” he whispered. “Together. Alone.”

He was barely a foot away. It would be easy to step closer. To run her fingers through his short, damp hair, and draw his mouth down to hers—

MATE!

She jerked back. Zephyr retreated too, instantly, as though he’d also felt that flare of heat in her palms.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Too fast?”

“Yeah.” Blaise forced a shaky laugh. “I guess we need more practice.”

His eyes were still dark with want, but the corner of his mouth hooked up. “Then I’ll see you again tonight.”