Page 129 of Reflections of Peonies
“Bianca…” She lightly shook her. “Wake up.” Her statement came out as both a desperate question and a command.
At first, Bianca didn’t stir. Then, even though I expected it, I sighed in relief as she finally began to cough.
Alyssa dropped all pretenses as she threw herself over her daughter, pulling her tiny form into her lap. “You’re okay, baby,” she kept repeating. “You’re okay.”
Bianca slowly opened her eyes and looked up. “Aly?”
“I love you so much.” Alyssa peppered Bianca’s face with kisses. “I love you.”
Bianca’s brows furrowed in confusion. She seemed too disoriented even to notice that Alyssa was holding her. “I was bad.”
“No, you weren’t, baby,” Alyssa insisted. “It’s not your fault.”
“But—”
“I love you.” Alyssa held Bianca back from her. “Now, go back and wake up Kieran. He’s still bespelled. Tell him that—”
Her sentence cut off with a gasp. She didn’t need to breathe, of course, but having a hand thrust through your back would shock anyone.
Bianca blinked, still dazed, as she stared up at her mother.
“I only need one more,” the kappa growled, pulling his hand back. With the movement, Alyssa was thrown from Bianca as hesnatched her limp form. The kappa smiled, baring its teeth. “And I don’t care who it is anymore.”
Then, it dove under the water, taking the spirit of Alyssa Dubois with it.
The scene faded,and I returned to that space between memories. The stream ran past me, highlighting other windows begging for my attention. My fingertips hummed with the growing pressure of unused magic as the voices echoed through the chamber.
The sounds of laughter—and another, with a screaming that I wouldn’t be able to forget.
Darkness cloaked my vision as my shoulders tensed. There were so many lights of that type. Why was there so much pain?
They reached for me, calling for my attention, and a fundamental part of me longed to follow. My body quaked with a desire to learn, to protect. Why was it important that I not do so?
It would be too easy to embrace the destruction. I would never forgive anyone who’d ever made her cry.
“Now is not the time.” Pops was suddenly there, his hand a heavy weight over my shoulder. “You’ve found the key memory to solve this incident. With your presence, it is no longer stuck. Now we should—”
He suddenly vanished mid-word, and everything fell into sudden darkness. Everything disappeared as the familiar space vanished, and I was thrust somewhere entirely unfamiliar.
“Pops?” I asked, taking a step forward. My limbs felt strange, and even my voice sounded different. A faint light returned, revealing a heavily forested glen bathed in the soft glow of early morning.
I glanced at my hands.
My skin was lighter, and a thick layer of heavy scarring covered my knuckles. Even though I knew this form, I took another moment to reorient myself and fall back into Shui’s presence.
Well, this hadn’t happened in a while. But why now?
“I sent him back first.”
The familiar, ancient language washed over me, his words accusing. “Did you find what you were searching for?”
Mu.
My heart jumped, and guilt filled me at the sight of the other man.
I shouldn’t have been surprised that he was here. This was his consciousness, too. But I hadn’t been ready. And even thousands of years later, his voice still caused a shiver to run down my spine.
A gentle breeze blew through the air, causing his long black hair to sway behind him. His emerald robes contrasted brightly against his pale skin. And his jade eyes held mine knowingly—and judgmentally.
