Page 191 of A Flame of the Phoenix

Zaiana answered by drawing her hands together, charging a ball of energy within, and sending it hurtling for the Spirit.

She didn’t get to witness whether it struck when movement caught in the side of her vision. Zaiana spun low, her knees cut over the glass shards, but it was worth it for the twin blades that sliced through the backs of the guard’s knees. He didn’t get the chance to fall before she plunged one through his neck.

Then she came face-to-face with Maverick.

“Stop this,” he said, far too soft and calm.

The monster in her laughed gleefully.

“Never.”

She attacked, seeing nothing but a traitor. This was his fault.

Maverick only deflected, and the lack of strike back only made her push harder.

The next gathering in her palm that prepared to shoot for him never got to release.

Zaiana tensed against moving. An invasion twisted her thoughts, turning her mind against itself, and her head throbbed wildly in resistance.

Zaiana was being pulled under, into a peaceful darkness she didn’t want.

She had to know that Kyleer was alive.

In her helplessness, all she could do was search for his heart.

Maverick caught her before she had the chance to fall.

The last of her fight struggled against him. “You’re a coward!” she cried. Zaiana hit her weak first against his chest but he held her tightly. “You’re acoward!”

Gods,she was hurting more than she thought any person could withstand. Not on her flesh, or even her mind. Her chest caved in on itself, and she might have been dying from her tight bottling of emotions she’d guarded for centuries that finally shattered.

“I’m so sorry, Zaiana,” Maverick said, so quiet maybe he hadn’t spoken at all. “I’m so sorry.”

The sounds were canceled out one by one. That control remained hers. She found three heartbeats in the room but kept searching. She would know Kyleer’s in a room of a thousand.

It happened so silently and slowly it wasn’t something she could stop, this attachment she harbored at the sound of it. Zaiana found herself looking for it even when she knew he was nowhere near. She listened to other beats, finding every one of them was off-key. His was her perfect song.

And it was gone.

It was then she learned still hearts could break. They could shatter. And the pain of that erupted in her chest, so desperate for an outlet she screamed. The world blasted to pieces and reformed at that cry of anguish.

When it did, a drum was racing in her chest.

It battered against her ribs as if a beast had made a home inside her and she had to claw it out. Hands clasped to her chest, she was ready to sink her iron guards into her flesh to be rid of the taunting creature. No one was restraining her anymore.

“Make it stop,” she breathed, not familiar with this kind of panic. “Make it stop.Make it stop.”

Zaiana crawled to Kyleer.

Make it stop.

Make it stop.

The more she tried to block out the loud drum, the more it pulsed in her ears and sped in her chest, making her skin feel like paper in its efforts to break free.

Make it stop.

Make it stop.

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