Page 19 of Gift from the Nexus

He doesn’t look at me as he slams the door in my face, and I stand there, staring. I won’t lie and say I have empathy or sympathy for anyone who’s in the Mastery, but that’s becausethe overwhelming majority made the decision on their own to join. Those who didn’t are far and few between. I’ve only come across one: Layton.

Shaking myself out of my stupor, I finally give my bladder the relieve it’s screaming for, then mindlessly stand in the middle of the bathroom. There’re no sinks to wash my hands, no mirrors to look at myself, no seat to sit on other than the toilet, nothing. So I lean my back to the wall and slowly slide down. I maybe have three minutes left to get my shit together and I’m drawing blanks.

Come on, Willow, think, think, think.

What do you have to do?

Break the concealment. The cuffs are already gone.

Okay, so step one, break the concealment when we get outside. Then what?

I run through multiple different scenarios of what could happen when and if I’m able to do that. I could break it, then transport myself to the mansion, but if I’m drained, if the spell takes too much out of me, and I can’t transport out, I’ve just shown them my hand, they take me, and bind me anyway, then I’m screwed.

Come on. Please.

“Talk to Tillman.”

“What?”

“Talk to him, Willow.”

A sob falls from my chest because the urgency in CC’s voice scares me, and it means I’m running out of time, but also because I know what they’re telling me to do. The switch flips in my head like a light in a room cutting on and it becomes clear why they made me think so intently about him.

Releasing a deep breath, I clear my mind once again and only think of Tillman, everything from earlier, plus I dig deeper. Idig to the depths of my bond where his is so tethered to me, we couldn’t survive without one another.

Pulling on it, I focus on the wall around his mind.

Tears flow freely down my face when I feel it. I feel its resistance. I feel him trying to push me out because he doesn’t know it’s me. He won’t be able to tell until I force my way through. So I push hard, begging, pleading, praying he gives in.

“Tillman, it’s me. I’m here. Please let me in.”

He continues to resist, and I continue to cry silently.

“One minute, Willow,” Trex yells through the door, and I cover my mouth to muffle the sounds of my sobs.

I can’t break through. He’s fortified his mind so tightly with what’s going on, it’ll take an army to get through to him right now. So for the first time I can recall in my entire life, I give up.

I quit my pounding and pushing against his fortress, and instead, I give in to my grief. I picture myself lying on his chest, running my hand over his heart, just like the first night he ever held me.

I love you so much, Tillman. I love you all, and I always will.

Four

Tillman

Stomping back to the training fields, I can’t quiet my mind.

The bleeding rage filtering through my brothers, our friends, our family seeps into me, and my regretful, erratic, murderous thoughts soak it all up like a sponge. I don’t know how much more I can take.

I want more than anything to go back in time, just an hour, and change everything. I’d tell Willow she had to go with Corentin, or Draken and Caspian. I wouldn’t have let her andOakly stay in the command room, even though at the time I believed she’d be just as safe there with Ry watching as she would be with any of us.

How fucking stupid could we have been to just assume the enchantment around the gym was one of ours?

Shaking my head out does nothing to soothe the thoughts. No matter the amount of stretching out my bond does, or how hard my gift tries to pound against the barriers of her mind, I can’t reach her. I can’t sense her. I can’t feel her.

And it’s driving me crazy.

I’ve never loathed my position as E.F. Leader like I do at this moment. I’ve never loathed the role I’ve taken upon myself in our Nexus as the calm, centered, patient one, until now.

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