Page 62 of Chaos Unleashed

“He’s right,” Reaper agrees, “Farren, we’re going to stay exactly where we are. We aren’t going to move, and you do what you need to do to prove that this is real.”

I look around at all of them. They’re all watching me earnestly, all with sadness and anger in their eyes, and usually, by this point, they would have started hurling insults or attacking me. My heart wants to believe so badly that they’re real, that all of this is real, and that I got out, but they’re right. I’m not going to believe them until I expose the tell.

“Farren?” Grey asks gently. He repeats Zev's words, “We’ll stay still, okay?”

I nod sharply once; I really don’t have anything to lose. They’re either going to turn on me, or it's not going to be an illusion after all.

I hope they meant that they’re going to stay still because they’re not going to like this. Hiromu has everything perfect, except for one thing, and that’s if I cut them, they bleed black, not the colour that they’re supposed to. I found that out entirely by accident; I don’t think he's aware of what his tell is since he can't see the illusions that he gives me. One tiny nick and I realised that it was real, it cemented it in my brain, and helped me stay grounded. It took me far too long to realise that though, and for some reason it only worked if I made them bleed, if they bled through any other means than by my blade they bled the right colours.

So, all the illusions of them dying were still incredibly real.

I grip my axes tightly in my hand. I know that they’re overkill for this situation and that one of my knives from the Void will be more than sufficient for checking whether they bleed the right colour, but I’m terrified of what will happen when they turn on me and at least with my axes I have a chance to last for a bit longer. If the illusion doesn’t last as long as Hiromu thinks it should, then he throws me into a worse one, and when I’m already feeling raw from the trauma of the first, it destroys me.

Cutting only one of them should be sufficient enough to tell me whether or not they’re real, but I know that my mind won't settle until I’ve tested them all.

This is one of the most intricate illusions that Hiromu has weaved.

I unglue my feet from the floor as I slowly make my way back to the circle, all of the guys watching me openly, with looks of horror and sadness on their faces.

I go to the one who I think may protest the least and stop in front of Zev. His eyes flash white, and when they land on me again, he simply rolls up his sleeve and holds out his arm. I’m glad that he did because, honestly, I hadn’t thought that far ahead.

“Go ahead, Farren, I promise you that this is real,” he says, his eyes soft as he looks up at me.

I nod and then, taking my axe, slice his arm as gently as I can, considering I'm cutting him.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Farren

I don’t allow myself to feel any relief when his blood bleeds the right colour, I won't allow it until I’m certain that they all bleed the right colour. Just in case Hiromu has managed to train his gift even more and make them bleed the right colour, if he had, he wouldn’t be able to do it with all of them.

Zev smiles, “Go ahead and test the rest. No one will do anything. I promise.”

Call it stupid on my part, but now that I’ve seen him bleed the right colour, I trust him, just a little bit.

The thought of how Hiromu couldn’t make them all bleed the right colour at the same time crosses my mind, and I glance away from Zev while I think about how to make sure that I can see them all bleed at the same time. What I see when I face the others has me once again questioning whether it really is an illusion; all of them have their arms held out, ready for me to slice them.

An illusion wouldn’t do that.

“I need to see you all bleed at the same time, and I need to be the one to slice you,” I tell them.

“We can use our magic to keep the wounds open longer so that you can see us all bleed at the same time,” Mayhem suggests.

I nod.

Wasting no time at all, I quickly slice their arms, noticing that with each cut, my axes buzz with magic. When they all have a slice on their arms, I spin in a circle, looking at all of their blood.

“It's normal,” I mutter.

“Yes,” Kill says gently.

“It’s real?” I ask, my voice small and vulnerable.

“Yes, Love. We’re real.” Loki replies.

The relief is overwhelming, crushing in a way that I didn’t expect it to be, and my whole body is suddenly overtaken by heart-wrenching sobs. My knees buckle, but before I can hit the floor, I’m caught in a set of strong arms. I’m incapable of anything but trying to breathe through my sobs, but I am aware of each of my guys as they put their hands on me in comfort.

I gradually become more aware, even though my sobs haven’t stopped, that I’m not the only one shedding tears, and a wave of guilt crashes over me that I’ve made them cry. I know that they’d chastise me for that, but I’m suddenly feeling all of the feels that I’ve repressed while I was captured and knowing that this is real and they are actually here, well, it’s opened the floodgates, and I’m just going to have to ride it out.

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