Page 65 of Secrets of Graves and Gold

Another pang of that uncomfortable emotion hits me in the chest.

I don’t think she’d look at me like that either. If I offered to go on a quest by myself, would she try to convince me to stay for my safety?

I wouldn’t, though. I don’t even like it when we’re apart within this city, even though I can see why sometimes it’s necessary to carry out our mission.

Everyone starts to get up from the table. Stavros tips his head toward Alek. “Let me go over some self-defense techniques for when you’re on horseback, just in case. So our lady can worry a little less.”

“Yes, you do that,” Ivy mutters, but the look she gives the big man is undeniably fond too.

I nudge back my chair and push to my feet, still fascinated by the sensation of moving through physical space: the air shifting against my skin, the recalibrating of my center of gravity. I went through my entire past existence totally unaware?—

A force wrenches through me like a rake hooking its prongs around my insides. As I stumble backward, bumping into my chair, a command that’s as much felt as heard reverberates through my nerves.

Come here, the call says. Come to me. Now!

I have only a vague sense of where the magical command is directing me to go, but my body lurches around before I can get a grip on it. The chair clatters over on its side.

Ivy’s voice reaches me as if from a distance. “Rheave? What’s the matter?”

Then Alek’s: “It might be the scourge sorcerers trying to regain control. They did it before. Remember what we talked about, Rheave!”

And then Hanie, panicked: “The sorcerers can still make him do things?”

I try to focus on Alek’s words. Remember what we talked about—the advice he gave me back at the Haven.

Focus on all the ways this body is mine now. All the things I can make it do.

I try to stomp my feet against the floor so the impact will reverberate through them, but I nearly trip over them instead. A flare of my own panic crackles through me.

I can’t let them manipulate me. I can’t let them make me hurt anyone.

I can’t let them kill me.

My hands flail out. One smacks into the wall; the other swings toward the table.

In my urgency, the energy I can call forth courses up my arm as if it can anchor me to the furniture. A bright streak sears across the wood, blackening the surface in an instant.

Hanie yelps. Stavros charges toward me, but Ivy darts in front of me first.

She grabs my face between her hands, turning my head so her face fills my field of vision. All I can see is her bright blue eyes, her skin turned even milkier than usual, her pale orange hair billowing around her.

“Rheave,” she says. “You’re staying with us. You don’t belong to them anymore. You can fight them off.”

I find myself swaying toward her even as the command yanks at me again. As if she’s a tether holding me in place.

No, I don’t belong to them anymore. I belong to myself—and to this woman who’s always cared even when I couldn’t do the same in return.

I set my hands against her forearms to help solidify the connection between us. From somewhere beyond her, I’m vaguely aware of Hanie saying, “I’ve really got to get going,” and scampering out the door.

Ivy doesn’t break eye contact with me. “Better?”

“Yes.” Then I shudder with another magical tug. The rake prongs are digging in with little points of pain.

That’s another sensation I never experienced as a pure daimon. Pain is fascinating but also unpleasant—especially when I know that the purpose of this specific discomfort is to break my will.

“Come here.” Ivy guides me into the sleeping room and closes the door, putting one more barrier between me and the sorcerers attempting to repossess me.

“If you need any help…” Casimir calls after us.

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