11
“What have you done?” Treno demands, his voice pulling me from the in-between I’m floating in as my body adjusts to everything that just happened to it.
I didn’t pass out, which I’m pretty fucking proud of. I’d wing five Pigeon if, you know, I could move.
“Only what she asked me to do,” Wekun defends evenly.
“You have no right to try and take her from us!” Ryn bellows. “It’s not just her decision to make!”
I can’t open my eyes, but I can just picture him, stepping threateningly into Wekun’s personal space. Oddly, I become aware of purple threads inside of me that seem to lead from me to Ryn. I look over in my chest to see another set that connects Treno and me. I would groan at their unwelcome anchor in my soul, but I don’t think I’m completely awake.
“It is Falon’s decision whether or not she wants to be with you three. She’s the only one who can make that choice,” Wekun lobs back. “Don’t come snarling in here at me. If you had been more careful with her and who she is from the beginning, she wouldn’t have tried to cut your bonds.”
His words make my chest ache.
Tried? Does that mean it didn’t work?
I swim through the distress that fills me at that thought and try to surface from the numbness I’m treading in. The purple threads feel heavy inside of me, and I need to know what that means. Am I free, or did I somehow strengthen what I was hoping to break?
“Where’s the Syta?” Wekun asks. “He’s usually the more volatile of the group, why is he not here lumbering around and being all threatening?”
I would snort if I could. It’s almost as though Wekun likes pissing Zeph off, but his question makes me pause, because it is weird that he’s not here blanketing everything in his outrage.
The room goes quiet.
“He’s not dealing so well with these,” Ryn states, and confusion stabs at my numbness. “He told us to make sure that Falon was okay, but he’s in a bad place right now…”
Something in Ryn’s tone calls to me, and I force my battered consciousness to look down at the threads I know lead to Zeph. I reach out to the purple tether that’s not supposed to be there anymore, and in a breath, I’m pulled from where I am with Wekun, Ryn, and Treno, and yanked toward Zeph.
A roar slams against me, shocking me as my feet touch soil. I blink the darkness all around me into focus and find myself at the bathing pools. Another cry fills the night around me, and I can hear the panic and terror in it. I try to shake the disorientation I feel from my senses.
What did I just do?
Am I doing that dream thing again? I’ve never been able to control it or make it happen at will. I look down at myself and scrunch my toes in the damp soil surrounding the bathing pool. I don’t feel like I’m dreaming. This lacks the somewhat fuzzy quality I always felt when it happened before. I feel like I’m actually here, but I have no idea how.
I’m pulled away from my confounding thoughts with a jump, as Zeph crashes into the water in front of me with a horrified bellow. The warm water of the hot spring sprays up all around him as he runs deeper into the pool and falls to his knees.
My first reaction is that he’s under attack somehow, because he looks like he’s running for his life, but as I look around, there’s no one but us here. He starts to scrub furiously at his skin, and the torment laced in his every movement has me running into the water to help him with whatever is hurting him.
A whimper escapes him as I close the distance, but Zeph doesn’t even look over as I make my presence known. I round on him and see he’s scrubbing at rings of black marks that now wrap around his arms. His eyes are far away and lost looking, and his movements are frenzied. I’m taken aback and confused for a moment.
Where did these marks come from?
It’s as though he doesn’t even know I’m standing right in front of him, and I reach out for him, not able to stop the drive slamming through me to help him in some way. I’m not sure what’s going on or why he’s so spooked and terrified.
I freeze as my arm comes out in front of me and I see the same rings of marks on my body. Understanding sucker punches me in the mouth, and I immediately know what’s setting Zeph off.
He’s wearing my runes.
He’s covered in marks that represent the people who destroyed his entire life, raped his mother, killed her and then his father. People who swore by these marks, brandished them like weapons, betrayed his family, slaughtered his brother before his eyes, started the war he’s currently fighting. Zeph has worked his entire life not to ever bear a rune that could ever enslave him and bring him to his knees against his will. And now, he is covered in them, on his knees, trying to wash them all from his skin.
My heart breaks.
I may not like him or appreciate what’s gone down between us, but I wouldn’t wish the panic and pain I can see in his golden gaze—and feel in my soul—on my worst enemy.
I’m not sure what to do. How to help Zeph navigate this. He seems out of it at the moment. He’s manically scrubbing and clawing at himself, but his eyes look as though they’re reliving all kinds of horrors.
Fuck!
I thought Wekun was going to break the bond, that even if my marks came back, it wouldn’t affect anyone but me. I didn’t
