Page 105 of The Lands Defying
“Are you okay?” I ask hesitantly, not really sure what to say from his demeanor as I look over his body for any sign of injury. He has what looks like healed wounds on his arms, and I dread to think what put them there. Then I look at the scar that runs down from his elbow, through the link it cut.
It sticks out clearly, the thick, white of the scar carving a path through the black markings, through the blood link.
I want to grab it, rub it and make it go away.
Kade scoffs, and I internally wince. “Am I okay?” he scowls at me and I swallow, ignoring Darius’s progress with the others on the other side. “Do I look okay to you?”
“I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner. I’m sorry I wasn’t strong enough to protect you. Let’s just...let’s just go home, okay? And we can talk about it,” I plead. “I’ve been so worried. Whateveris wrong we can fix it, just come away from there,” I hedge carefully.
“I have no home,” he shouts, and I flinch back at his sudden outburst. A growl sounds in the wind and I know it came from Darius, a warning to him, but Kade pays no mind to it.
“Your home is with me,” I manage to get out, trying not to cry, to scream and fall to my fucking knees at the unfairness of all of this.
“You were never my home.” And just like that, my heart shatters.
It bleeds and burns, withers within me at those words.
I struggle to take in air, struggle to see past my eyes through the overflow of tears I couldn’t have held back, even if I tried.
“Rhea!” Someone calls, or shouts. I’m not sure which, but it has no effect on me. Has no power to turn my face away from the boy that I call my own.
“You can hate me all you want, just let me help you.” I stagger forward, unable to hold back. I’m so close now we nearly touch, and I look up into blue eyes I know so well, ignoring the cold look in them.
For a moment, for onesmallmoment, I swear his eyes fill with pain and longing. I swear he looks just like my Kade.
“Get back away from the fucking edge, Rhea!” Darius shouts, his voice full of worry.
Snow begins to fall, dotting everything white as flakes land on us.
Winter is coming, and I will bleed upon its snow to make it right.
I’ll make it better, I can make this better.
“Kade,” I whisper, lifting my shaky hands to his face, my thumbs stroking the apple of his cheeks. “You don’t mean that,” I tell him as he just stares at me. He’s not seeing me. “You are my home, and your home is with me,” I cry, unable to keep it inas I dig my fingers into his cheek gently. “My life was not worth living until I took you out of that kitchen and held you tight. It wasn’t worth the pain of living with what they had done to me, to us. None of it was, until I looked into your blue eyes and I vowed to myself…I fucking vowed to myself, Carzan, that I would do everything to protect you. Even live in this deep-seated, vile, crushing curse of pain within me that never leaves, if I can just make your life what it was always meant to be.”
He stares at me, eyes clearing a little as he shakes his head.
“Arbiel canna. Always,” I choke out. “You are my azari.”My son.“Come back to me, come home, vallier.”
He lets out a stuttering breath, and his head leans forward, touching his forehead to mine. A sob spills from my lips as Runa pushes up against my skin where Kade touches.
I soak it in as his scent surrounds me and for that moment, the land is right. My soul is at peace.
Gods I’ve missed him.
My hand moves from his cheek to the back of his head, running my fingers through the longer hair there.
Just like I had always done.
I can bring him home to us, he will just need time.
After a deep breath, I sluggishly move my hands up his face until I land on either side of his temples. The move was not my own, but I didn’t resist anyway. I call whatever power I have left to spring to my fingertips, and just like I knew it would, it comes effortlessly—like an instinct.
Then I push it into his mind.
Kade’s eyes widen, filling with tears as he gasps for air, but I never take my eyes off of him. I ignore my own chest caving in, and blood dripping from me. I ignore my body’s call to lay down and rest, I just push everything I have left into him and what greets me is a ball of black, like thick mud.
My power aims for it, making it the target to eradicate and get rid of it. To evaporate the wrongness.
