Elemental Hunger

Chapter Thirty

Jarvis's face, all dark beauty and sharp angles, swam through a midnight sky. We walked in the forest. We ran. We talked. Laughed. Held hands.

He looked at me with something akin to love in his gaze. Then he kissed me. I kissed him back. When I pulled away, it wasn't Jarvis anymore.

Adam's sandy curls rested against his eyebrows, and a sparkle decorated his eyes. We shared a secret, one that bonded us.

I blinked, and Adam became Hanai. Dark, brooding, beautiful Hanai.

I wanted to place them each on a separate shelf inside my heart. But Jarvis had chosen someone else even while he was kissing me. That flame had been snuffed out months ago.

Adam was a sentry one second, my Airmaster the next. I couldn't trust him. I wanted to, but doing so would be suicide.

Hanai and I probably could've had a future together in some other place, at some other time.

So even as I watched, helpless inside my own nightmare, Hanai's face dissolved away.

#

Something dry cracked in my throat. Blood. I swallowed, desperate to coat the dryness. A voice spoke. Unfriendly. The steady rhythm of movement beneath me lulled me back into the soft folds of sleep despite the chill seething in my joints.

When I came to again, the sky bled a mixture of pink and orange. Crisp and clear, the air burned in my lungs. I tried to sit up, but found my hands tied above my head, preventing me from rising more than a few inches.

Something—no, someone—warm lay next to me. I turned and found Felix. I started, trying to widen the gap between us. His heavy hand was draped across my stomach. He groaned when I moved but didn't wake up.

I cocked my head. My hands were secured to a pole in the ground. My wrists wept blood, the flesh raw and broken. Strangely, that pain didn't register. But my shoulders ached from their rotated position. My back hurt. My jaw throbbed.

None of my injuries compared to the fury that accompanied Adam's betrayal. The thought of him in those black clothes, wielding his sentry knife, brought the contents of my stomach churning to the surface.

I turned away before I retched, partly wishing I'd spewed on Felix. But I felt certain the next time I defied him, I'd get more than a broken jaw.

Felix stirred. "I'm freezing." He reached for me again, but I slithered out of his grasp.

"Don't touch me." I struggled against the bindings. "Untie me." The cancellers were gone. If only I could find a spark. As soon as I thought it, heat surged through my veins.

He stretched and wiped a hand over his day-old beard. "You're in no position to make demands, girl."

Smoke poured from my palms. Felix cursed and scrambled toward his pack. I pressed the fire, willing it to burst into flames. It ignored me. The cancellers had serious lasting effects.

And then Felix held the metal rings against my skin. The smoke cleared. The piercing cold snatched my very breath.

Felix snarled as he slid the cancellers around my wrists.

"Stop it. Please," I added.

He smiled, revealing stained teeth. "That's more like it."

I turned away from his hungry expression. His hands lingered along my waist. My ribs. My chest. I swallowed a sob, determined not to let him know how much he was hurting me.

I squeezed my eyes shut as he cupped my face in his palm. "You do possess a natural beauty, Gabriella." His voice sounded soft, almost like Adam's.