Page 176 of Her Dark Promise

When my breathing evened and the pounding in my head eased, I was about to cuddle back with Callum, but froze when he said, “You don’t belong here, Calathea.”

I whipped my head around to him, confused. “What?”

I thought this was the afterlife, forever lying in the grass of eternity. I was content with that. I didn’t want to leave the others, but I knew that my sacrifice would keep them safe.

He just smiled at me.

“I—I don’t want to leave you. Please don’t—”

“Hey, hey, Calathea, look at me.” My lips thinned to keep the sob from escaping. I shook my head; I didn’t want to listen to him.

“It isn’t your time yet.”

“But—”

“Emilia, Soren, and—” his voice hitched and cracked when he said, “Bast needs you. They all need you.”

I reached out and wrapped my hands around the nape of his neck. “Ineed you. I have always needed you.” I was desperate.

He grabbed my shoulders and pulled away slightly to stare into my eyes, “I will always be with you. There will never be a moment when I am not looking over you.”

My lip quivered. I hugged him with all of my strength and whispered, “I love you.”

He wrapped his hands once more around me. “And I love you. I always have.”

Chapter thirty-three

“Thea! Come on, fight, dammit!” I felt someone pressing hard on my chest and then someone breathing air into my lungs. “You are so fucking stubborn, andnowyou decide to just give up?”

I sucked in a huge gulp of air as my eyes looked around wildly. My body ached all over, and I tried to sit up, but pain radiated through me. Every small movement caused me to wince.

“Pick her up! We need to move!” I heard Soren command.

I didn’t have time to ask why we had to move. How long was I gone for? Where was Emilia? Was everyone alright?

The questions caught in my throat as I looked around at the crumbling castle walls, debris falling through the air, a huge block of stone not far from where I was laying. My world was literally falling apart.

“I’m so sorry! I didn’t know. I am so sorry.” Emilia was bent over the side of me, sobbing, fisting her hand and circling it around the middle of her chest over and over again. She looked to where Callum’s body was and back at me, sobbing even harder.

Bastian lifted me in his arms and ran toward a shattered window. “Emilia! Run ahead of me! Be careful!”

She continued crying, but did as she was told. I couldn’t focus on anything she was saying right now.

I looked behind Bastian and saw Soren hesitate.

“Soren?” Bastian stopped right at the window. What was he doing? “Soren!”

“Go! I’ll be right there!” Then he took off back through the room. He disappeared into the smoke and debris, it was so bad that I couldn’t see him.

“Ren!” Bastian called, cursed under his breath, and hurried out the window. “I am going to beat his ass if he gets himself killed.”

Emilia and Bastian ran as far away as they could from the castle, all the way to the treeline. Bastian set me down. I sat in shock as I watched the top of the tower fall over and come crashing to the ground. Bastian moved his body over the top of Emilia and me as a gust of wind from the impact shot toward us.

I tried to look past Bastian to see where Soren was, but there was too much smoke to move through, let alone see through.

Then there was silence. Bastian kept his arms around us for a few more moments, then stood and looked around. Emilia stayed and sat next to me, but we were both waving our hands in front of us, coughing, trying to get the dust out of our faces to see.

“Ren!” Panic laced his voice.

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