Quentin had warned her that Fenris was gone. She didn’t believe it. He was waiting, holed up like a hibernating bear, dangerous to wake and biding his time for his own incomprehensible purpose.
Then she remembered what Fenris wanted more than anything in the world except permanent mastery of Quentin’s body. She had asked Quentin to try to accept Fenris as a part of himself. How could he do so if she refused to accept Fenris the same way?
Accept him, even submit to his lust. Another risk she had to take.
“Fenris,” she said. “I know you hear me. I am waiting for you. I need you. I need you, Fenris.”
Quentin jerked.
“Come to me,” she coaxed, her voice filled with promises. “Help me.”
The muscles in Quentin’s face suddenly shifted, swiftly completing the subtle but distinct change to the coarser features of his other self. His eyes snapped open and focused on her.
Her comparison of Fenris to a hibernating bear was apt indeed. He lunged up from the mattress and stalked toward her, every line of his body shouting violent intent.
“You want my help?” he snarled. “I still have some use to you, now that he’s had you?”
She could only guess what it had been like for Fenris to experience Quentin’s life as an observer, watching and unable to interfere as she lay with Quentin at the Haven, seizing control only to lose it again before he could complete his goal.
“Yes, Fenris,” she said, refusing to flinch. “You know of Boroskov—”
He grabbed her by the arms, almost lifting her from her feet. “I know everything. You gave yourself to the weakling. But I brought you here, didn’t I?” His fingers bit into her sleeves. “Now you’re in trouble because of him. But when I save your pretty little neck, you plan to get rid of me, don’t you?” He gave her a shake. “Don’t you?”
Of course. He hadn’t been so far “gone” that he’d failed to hear her discussion with Quentin. The only defense she had left was to make him understand.
“Haven’t you always defended Quentin from his enemies, and yours?” she asked, ignoring the pain. “You and Quentin share a fate, just as you share a body. You can’t escape what happens to him.”
“You’re calling me a coward?”
“Quentin said you were gone, even when he tried to find you. You ran from Boroskov, didn’t you? You buried yourself deep, because you know that what Boroskov wants is worse than anything Quentin could do. Worse than anything you could be.”
He let her drop. “Boroskov is like me,” he said. “Why shouldn’t I ally myself with him?”
“Because you won’t be anyone’s slave. Because you know he’ll eventually destroy you. Because he embraces the evils that you endured for Quentin’s sake.”
“Words. Boroskov wants power. I want the same thing.”
“No. You want the pain to stop.”
“And when it stops, I’ll be gone. There won’t be anything left.” He bared his teeth, but the gesture was ruined by the quivering of his mouth. “Quentin will have you. I’ll have nothing.”
Fenris the monster was gone indeed. Now she heard the voice of the boy he had been, callow and immature, desperate to find some meaning in his hellish existence.
Begging to be loved.
It wasn’t cold reason Fenris needed, but intimacy. Not animal lust, but true caring. Like Quentin. Like herself.
She had to love Fenris as she loved Quentin in order to set him free.
She closed the space between them and lifted her hand to his cheek. “When I see you, Fenris, I don’t see Boroskov. I see Quentin. I see what both of you share. I see the man I love.”
He stared at her. “You’re lying.”
In answer she did as she had done with Quentin not so long ago. She drew his face down to hers, and kissed him.
The kiss was given, not taken. And it was devastating. Fenris froze in shock. Johanna pressed against him, and he felt the heat of his rage drawn from his body through the gentle parting of her lips.
Without the rage, he didn’t know who he was. Johanna had summoned him forth against his will, against every instinct of self-preservation he had learned in childhood.