Page 135 of Of Vows and War: Special Edition
“No, Asta, I must do nothing other than rule over our world. Your mother is a shell of what she once was. All Shamay has left isus.Your complaints and your grief matter little in comparison!” His cheeks were flushed, the color beneath his almost translucent skin an odd shade of blue. His aubergine hair cascaded down his back, swaying in a phantom wind.
I wanted to stand up for the female—Asta—in that moment. He berated her in a way that made even my teeth grind, but the image shifted, and I was thrown to another place—anothertime.
When two new figures appeared, I gasped in shock. There was no doubt who this female was. I had grown up with her. Loved her.
Asher stood with her arms crossed, her head tilted to the side and her body clad in the same silver as the female’s hair from before.
Silver. Asherneverwore silver.
Across from her was a different male, his hair midnight black and his eyes sparkling blue. His ivory cheeks boasted a smattering of freckles that did not quite fit his menacing presence. He looked like a weapon—a beast.
My feet took two more steps forward, and then I was moving towards the pair. Just as I was nearly there my hands reached out, instincts telling me to save Asher from whoever this male was. But as my fingertips moved to graze Asher’s arm, they were met with nothing but air.
Asher’s form shimmered and waved, going somewhat transparent momentarily.
Suddenly, my heart was racing. Panic enveloped me like a too tight embrace, and I felt suffocated by the heat of it.
“Tomorrow is the blood moon, Ash. You heard the prophecy. Doom lingers. Lurks,” the male rasped, his eyes never leaving hers. He looked at her like…well, like Kafele looked at me. As if she strung the stars and hung the moon. As if she were the universe itself.
“And we are more than ready. I can do this, Bell.” Asher’s voice was far stronger than I had ever heard it before. She stood with her back straight and her chin tilted up. A force.
The male sighed, his eyes closing and scrunching at the sides. What Asher said seemed to pain him. His hand reached up, not needing sight to find her cheek. As if it were second nature.
Just as quickly as it had come, the vision disappeared, once more shifting to something else.
Toeverythingelse.
I watched as the past, present, and future unraveled before me. Strings of time wrapping and twirling and snapping before my eyes. I began to choke on them, their weight and strength weaving around my neck.
Every scream that left my lips merely echoed off the darkness, my throat going raw and my chest desperately heaving from the swarm.
And then, a cold sort of nothingness seeped into my bones. It felt like being under fifty feet of snow, a freezing darknessmy only companion. In fact, what I saw then was like a wave of shadows, the mass of black overtaking me.
All at once, the darkness evaporated, and the same male who had spoken to Asher countless times in the visions appeared. Bellamy Ayad.
But this image of him was not normal. Gone were his joyful dimples and flirtatious smirks. The blue that had once marked Asher as the universe itself now stared on without any depth or emotion. Empty. That was what the stare was. His black hair was disheveled, onyx armor dented as if a battle had been fought and lost.
Worst of all, Bellamy was completely alone.
Until he was not.
Asher’s screams sounded eerie in the otherwise silent moment. They ripped apart my soul in the same way they seemed to shred the world around her as she dove for the ground—for her soul bond.
She grabbed his face, tears streaming down her cheeks and sobs making her chest heave in desperate bursts. She wore twin armor, her hair braided back instead of loose. Her face was a contortion of pain and fury as she stared down at her now dead love.
My heart felt like it might cease beating altogether as I watched her scream for him to wake up. And when she began tugging him onto her lap, I truly did cry.
I was empty in more ways than one. Perhaps nearly as empty as Bellamy’s dead body that Asher continued to sob over.
When she finally looked up and turned around, her gray eyes were ablaze. She gave one last kiss to Bellamy’s already dry lips before pushing herself to stand. As she walked away, I noticed that she had closed his eyes.
***
I jolted awake, my body shaking and drenched in sweat.
Finally, I was free.
Well, as free as someone could be with so much information.
