Page 15 of The Lands Defying
I can’t seem to help it lately and I’m tired of feeling pathetic.
“I’m ready,” I tell him and straighten my shoulders.
“I have you.”
He does.
One thing about us starting as enemies, we have been through more than most in a small amount of time, and that means I know his intentions now.
His reasoning behind his actions.
How his words hold weight.
How he cares for me in his own way, even as he feels he doesn’t know how.
We both reach out at the same time and touch the crystal, and then, we are instantly transported back into the memory.
I hold on to Darius’s hand tightly as I look at the ground, gaining the courage to face what is before me once again.
Darius pulls me close, wrapping his arms around me as I take a few breaths to face the memory. We need to see if there is anything that may help us with the rogures, with Charles.
Placing my hand on his chest, I look up at him, taking in his strength as he strokes my cheek with the backs of his fingers, letting me know he’s there.
Runa comes to just beneath my skin, and Darius’s eyes flash black before I feel his wolf there.
They are also with us.
I nod and turn in his arms, taking in the scene once again.
Hooded figures chanting, Charles on the stone platform, another person off to the side. My mom is in the center, hanging by chains.
I swallow the bile that threatens to come up.
“You’re okay,” Darius tells me as he massages the back of my neck.
I inhale a few shaky breaths, trying to control the nausea I feel, the shake to my bones.
“I’m okay,” I breathe.
“Do you know what they are saying?” Darius asks me quietly, rubbing my arms as if we can feel a chill.
I don’t feel anything but heartbreaking dread.
“No,” I say, my mouth dry. “But I think it is something to enhance power. At least, that’s what it feels like.” My brows furrow, trying to explain it but I can’t.
“You feel a difference?” he asks.
“Yeah. The air feels charged almost, like a thickening blanket full of power, waiting to be placed.”
“Hmm.”
I take a step forward, Darius following at my back as we walk through the hooded figures. I look at the glowing platform, the runes placed there and fist my hands.
“A trap stone.” I nod to the platform. “She couldn’t escape even if she managed to get down.”
He squeezes at the back of my neck again in comfort.
She was trapped, and I think she knew that, but she still fought until her last breath.
