My despair and my pain fill me up, choking the life out of me. Suddenly, I can’t take it. Lightning heats my veins. Maybe, if I boil away all my suffering, all my petty insecurities, all my frustration and toil, I’ll hit an indestructible core. Something that cannot be broken by greed or lust or violence. Something that isn’t quite magic but is still power. “No,” I say, facing Temper. “I’m not running from this place.” The beginnings of a smile tug at my mate’s lips when I meet his eyes. I say, with steel in my voice, “It’s time the Otherworld understands just how strong a human can be.”
