Page 179 of A Winding Wave of Magic
A name. I knew it once.
Already a buoy in this phantasmagoric storm.
He jerked as my visions poured through into him while his fear and surprise layered over my Sight. The boundary between us was thinning. I could barely sense the difference between me and them. Soon there would only be Us.
Cassandra.
A voice spoke louder than the rest. A deep, sonorous call, like the low horn of a ship blowing through the fog.
I’m here. It spoke directly into my mind. Through my thoughts. To someplace else that onlyheseemed to reach.I’ve got you, love. You’re safe.
I started to shiver violently. That name again. What was it?
Jonathan.
He was solid, unlike this sea of ghosts. He smelled of wood fires and evergreen trees and maybe something else not quite of this world. But not likethem.
“Please,” I whimpered against that solid chest, its stronger heartbeat, my eyes squeezed shut. It was the only word I could manage. Even language was starting to unravel.
A low growl rumbled under my ears, vibrating through the warmth. Something else passed through the visions—the shadow of a cat.
His anger and desperation passed through me. Frustration too. And grief, always grief.
And then, something else. A word, he might as well have roared at them all.
Mine.
Jonathan growled, gripping my shoulders tightly even as he tried to navigate the onslaught of images. Grief, fear, and absolute frustration swept through my body as I burrowed deeper into his shoulder. This was never going to end. I really was doomed to be a crazy woman, just like my namesake, wandering about with rampant visions too messy to understand, too powerful to dispel. I hadn’t even manifested yet; by all accounts, this was going to get worse.
The voices howled in response, and my spirit howled with them, all of us together bemoaning my utter and complete failure to find my shape, to find mycontrol.
So this is what hubris does, some small part of me thought even as it disintegrated into the wind.
Oh, how little I’d really learned.
The hands at my waist released.
No, I wanted to whimper, but could no longer find the words. It was all just feeling now, emotion unarticulated, too raw and animal to be distinct.
Touch the water
Breathe air
Light the fire
Hear the silence
It was a chant from far away. Not in my mind—that was gone, but a voice that was still a comfort.
Hands cupped my cheeks, warm but rough on my skin. The howling, the voices, everything babbled incessantly, painfully. My mind was about to burst. I cried with them all.
“Open your eyes, Cass.” The voice was a quiet rumble through the storm like a black cloud on the horizon. “Focus on me.”
Scent the wicked
Taste the good
Kiss thy love
