Page 49 of My Hexed Honeymoon

Then the trembling starts.

Talia goes completely rigid, her back arching against me.

I tighten the arm I have banded around her middle, desperate to keep her from falling, and feel her begin to convulse.

Her teeth rattle together, and her entire body shakes violently. I’m not sure if it’s a seizure, but I imagine this is what they’re like. All the color drains from her skin, and fear grips me in its fist and squeezes extra tight.

“Talia! Talia, can you hear me?”

“Pull her out,” Riven yells, promptly switching teams on me, but I’ve already gathered my bride in my arms, cupping her cheek and jostling her slightly, inwardly begging her to come back to me.

“Fucking working on it!” Yelling at the vampire helps untangle the bramble of my emotions so I can focus on what’s most useful.

Then, like a hero in a damn fairytale, I take Talia’s chin in my hands, twist her face to mine, and crush my mouth to hers in a heated kiss.

Our chemistry and that feral, carnal pull between us is the strongest thing I’ve ever felt, and I’m desperately hoping it’ll break through to her now.

“Come back to me,” I whisper, fingers tangling in her hair. “Natalia, we’re in this together, remember? I’ll find a way in and destroy the entire realm if that’s what it takes to pull you out.”

Pressure fills the space, popping my ears and leaving my head too heavy for my body. The forest comes to life around us, wind whipping through the trees, birds crying out and leaving branches in a chaotic flutter of wings.

Until all of a sudden I’m thrown backward onto my ass, Talia still in my arms as her spirit crashes into her body.

She comes to with a gasp that immediately turns coughing fit.

I wrap my arms around her, drawing her tight to my chest as she works on catching her breath. “It’s okay. I’ve got you.”

She’s ice cold and drenched in sweat, trembling and tormented and rocking back and forth, back and forth.

She cranes her neck, her eyes thrown so wide with terror it strikes fear in me as well. “Diego. Is the compound okay? Did you get it put out before it burned?”

At the mention of the compound burning, everything within me shifts, a dark and ugly sensation rising up with a cloud of hate.

“Okay, phew, we’re in a different forest,” she says, rapidly blinking to get her bearings.

At the sharp inhale to our right, so filled with a covetous awe, my instincts have me curling Natalia protectively closer.

That’s when I notice she’s holding something in her hands, gripping it so tightly her knuckles have gone as white as her blanched face.

With pale white bones attached with what looks like dried out strings of intestines, stained with blood and glowing faintly with runes I don’t recognize but instantly distrust.

My heart stutters, an internal tug o’ war taking place within me.

She brought it back, the weapon she risked going into the Hollow to take.

The vampires have their Blood Loom.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Whatever was in there,watching and whispering—promising to teach me to use my powers correctly—came chasing.

The instant I took the weapon from the version of me that followed my mother’s warpath, my instincts screamed at me to run.

I’d sprinted across the ever-changing and morphing landscape as fast as I could, headed back in the direction I’d come, the loom gripped so tightly in my hand I’d probably have the imprint on my palm for days.

Enshrouded, other-worldly creatures swooped down at me, like banshees determined to rip the magical tool from me.

Lungs burning, I’d reached the spot where I could see a puckered scar from my original entrance, but no amount of yanking at the threads worked. They weren’t golden or infused with life anymore, and a cold sweat broke out across my skin as a shadowy figure darted around me, too fast to see with my naked eye.

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