Page 95 of The Nymph Prince
Purple flashed in his eyes as an invisible force held me in place. Unlike the other instances when he’d been angry and his eyes turned that shade, there was only pain and grief in his expression right then.
“Don’t you see, Lorcan? My love brings nothin’ but pain.” His voice broke on his last word. “The moment I say I love you is when you’ll be taken from me.”
The force keeping me in place lifted, and I caught myself on the rail as I stumbled. “You’re selfish.” I glared at him. “You allow fear to stop you from loving me. In turn, you’re denying me, too.”
“I see it more as sparin’ you.”
Why was his voice so cold now?
“Sparing me?” I questioned. “From what?”
Alek scrubbed a hand over his face before slumping forward on the rail and hanging his head. Defeated. “If I can’t fight the darkness, I’ll become its prisoner. The closer that day looms, the greater the fear becomes. The fear of not only losin’ you, but being the cause of your death.”
He believed he was going to kill me.
Just as I opened my mouth to say how silly he was acting, something happened.
Smoke filled my nose. Not only smoke, but the rot of death. I could no longer see Alek before me. Instead I saw a battle…or rather, the end of one. Bodies were scattered on the grass. Their hands were stretched skyward, blood dripping from their fingertips. In the carnage, I saw familiar faces.
Reif. His head rested several feet from his body.
Malik lay on his back, staring up at the billowing smoke with unseeing eyes. Dead eyes. Crimson trickled from his mouth and his chest was torn open. His sword was still in his hand, an extension of him even in death.
And Troy. I cried out at the sight of him. His small body was beside Malik, his throat slashed and his eyes open. His cheeks were wet, as though he’d been crying before he’d drawn his final breath.
My friends. My family. Dead.
In the center of it all, I saw Alek. Blood was smeared on his face and covered his tunic, but it belonged to someone else. My dead body lay at his feet, still clutching his leg as if I’d begged him to stop until the very end. The mage smiled at the field of fallen warriors, and in the distance there were echoes.
“All hail the king!” the voices exclaimed.
“Lorcan?”
Someone shook me, and the horrors of the battlefield faded. I was back on the castle balcony, staring into the face of the man who’d be the death of us all. Such a sweet face, he had, and concerned eyes. How could this be the face of the evil monster I’d just seen?
“Come on, love, talk to me,” he whispered, holding my cheek in his hand.
Father said my mother had been an oracle and he believed I shared her gift. But up until that moment, I’d only ever witnessed terrors in my dreams. Never had I had such vivid images while awake.
Was it a vision?
I focused on him…the man I loved…and could only stare. The words were gone from my mind. Only shadows were left. Shadows and the icy chill of death. I could still smell the smoke. Could still see the black of his eyes as he’d smiled and kicked my hand from his leg.
“You’re afraid of me.” His hand fell from my face.
“I…I need to rest,” I said before turning and going inside.
He didn’t follow.
***
Not even the sun on my skin could warm the chill in my bones. Troy and I had taken a stroll through Talena that midday.
Our walks together usually began with small chitchat before falling quiet. He was someone I could enjoy silence with. His company didn’t have to be met with mindless chatter, and it gave us time to think on our thoughts without the persistence from others to voice them aloud.
Troy seemed to have a lot on his mind, too, that day. His eyes moved from the buildings we passed, to the people, and to the sky. As curious as he was, there was something else, as well.
The images I’d seen refused to give me rest. They played over and over again, showing me the faces of the dead. Repeating the agonizing cries of those still dying. It’d been two days since I’d had the vision, but it was still just as painful.
