Page 45 of The Sacred and the Tormented

“I—Arianna.” He turned to face his mate. She watched him with her lips parted, body hunched over from pain.

“She’s all right.” Sive repeated.

“I didn’t mean—” God’s what the hell had just happened?

Sive drew another symbol and he clung to the magic that washed through him, centering him.

“The mind can only tolerate so much hardship.”

Rion clutched his head. The mind…was he finally losing it? Is that what she meant?

“I told you to broach the subject gently.” It took him too long to register that Sive was addressing Conall. Scolding him. Rion glanced over his shoulder to find the male rising to his feet, pulling his female companion up as well.

“I didn’t think—”

“No, you didn’t,” she chastised, her voice harsher than Rion had ever heard it. Conall closed his mouth and took in the aftermath. Rion dared to look at Arianna again. She just stared, her heart slowing to nearly normal levels.

How many times was he going to hurt her or nearly hurt her? Rion stared at the chair she’d been seated it. He’d obliterated it.

“I need space.” What he truly wanted was to run, but even if he were a danger, he couldn’t leave Arianna alone. But they’d said the others would arrive soon, maybe then—

“No, you need to rest. You’ve been awake for two days, have refused to eat, and nearly saw your mate die before your eyes. Group that in with months of torture, finding your mother, and struggling with the new truth of your heritage, I’d say it’s a miracle you’re still sane.”

Rion collapsed to the ground and pressed his palm to his temple. “Maybe I’m not.”

“You certainly wouldn’t be the first.” He peered up at her. “We rescue those trapped in the prisons. We see what it does to a person.”

“And?”

“We can help. If you’ll let us.”

He loosed a weak laugh that bordered on the edge of hysteria.

Sive stepped closer and reached out. “Let me see your hand.”

He stared at her open palm and imagined that she might have knelt beside him if she were able. The shadows in his mind whispered against trusting her but Rion was tired of fighting. He simply gave in and placed his hand in her own.

Her fingers were warm and gentle. They prodded the skin around his wrist for a second before she was drawing lines across it.

Relief washed through him ten times stronger than what she’d been doing from a distance.

He wanted to fold in on himself. To bury his face in Arianna’s shoulder and come apart at the seams. Maybe then his pain would ease. Maybe it never would.

Her hand traveled down his arm. “This will only last a short while. I need something to write the runes out in order to make them permanent.”

“What do they do?”

“Remind your heart that this is your reality. It’ll block out the most gruesome of the nightmares. You’ll still remember, but they won’t be able to torment you the way they have been.”

“Do it,” he said. “Do whatever needs to be done.”

Chapter Thirteen

Arianna

Rion settled with his back against a tree and Cara carried a chair over for Sive to settle in. The female with Conall had fetched some ink and Sive was now working on drawing lines across Rion’s arms. Arianna wasn’t sure she liked the woman putting anything on her mate that might alter his mind, but after seeing what he’d done …

Arianna eyed the wreckage surrounding them. Rion had shattered four of the chairs and the table was left as nothing more than tiny fragments scattered across the broken ground. Loose particles of dirt littered the area like a coating of fresh snow.

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