Page 56 of The First Trial
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When I came to, it was to a scene that didn’t make sense. Oz was by my side, his hand on the floor beside me, far enough away to not set off the curse, but close enough that I could tell he wished he could hold my hand.
Enid was on his other side, looking beautiful in her disarray, but that was par for the course for a Belladonna. She had alwaysbeen stunning, even at her worst, and it was rare that any of us got to see her anything less than perfect. Now, she sat there with her knees pulled up to her chest, her chin resting on her knees. Mud and blood cakes her hair, clothes, and skin, and tear tracks had left clean lines down her cheeks. She stared straight ahead, seemingly at nothing, lost in her thoughts.
Qarinah sat opposite us next to a Deamon that looked remarkably like an older, thicker version of Phenex, while Elvina perched daintily on a boulder beside him, her concerned eyes burning holes in mine as I met her gaze.
And then there was the black snake slithering his way in circles around us, a veritable army of Shifters just beyond him doing the same in both humanoid and shifted form. They intermingled with Daemons and Humans, all three groups working together to block us from the Fae, whom I caught sight of through brief gaps in the crowd. Their expressions were enigmatic as they watched us, which I would have found troubling if I didn’t already know they lived with perpetual sticks up their asses. Some of them with thorns.
I caught George’s eye, and his relief was palpable enough to see. He sent me a small smile, but was pulled away by someone else. Probably whatever guy he’d been dating before we’d been sucked into these trials. They were quickly swallowed by the crowd, and for the first time in a long time, I didn’t lament the loss. Although George and I could never rekindle the friendship we’d once had, I was glad to see him safe. We may not have been close anymore, but I didn’t want anything bad to happen to him.
But what caught me off guard the most was that Phenex wasn’t the warm body I was snuggling into, because he was sitting by my other side, holding my hand and stroking soothing circles with his thumb on my palm. His gaze was on Oz, and the two of them seemed to be sharing some sort of silent conversation the rest of us weren’t privy to.
‘Wha…?’ I began, my dry throat cutting me off with a cough.
‘Hey, there she is,’ Qarinah said, smiling fondly at me while Phenex shoved a water-filled leaf to my lips. He tilted the cool liquid into my mouth, and I greedily guzzled it all up.
‘Whoa, slow down,’ he admonished, but the smile pulling at his lips undercut any real chastisement. ‘You’ll make yourself sick if you take too much too fast.’
‘Worth it,’ I croaked, but at least this time I got the words out.
I took that moment to brace myself, then turned to see who I had been nuzzling into. Nothing could have prepared me to see Hawthorne’s beautiful face smiling down at me, his eyes crinkling at the corners with what looked to be genuine joy and relief.
‘Hi,’ I said, stunned.
‘Hi,’ he said back.
‘Um… You’re holding me.’
His face immediately flushed a bright red, and he averted his eyes, suddenly unable to look at me. His reaction set off a similar one of my own, and I scrambled off his lap, except I went the wrong way. Instead of moving towards Phenex, I ended up practically falling into Ozzie. My eyes met his, mirroring my own wide-eyed astonishment.
‘Oh, shit,’ we said, and then the curse hit. Our heads whipped backwards like we’d been punched in the face, and I felt blood trickle out of more than just my nose. It fell from my ears, my eyes, my mouth.
But none of it compared to theagonyof the migraine that took hold. My vision swam, tinted red with my blood, and it was so excruciating that it didn’t take long for my body to go numb.
And then, only moments after waking up, I passed out again.
Chapter 22
Phenex
My mate was going to give me permanent heart palpitations. I knew she hadn’t meant to activate the curse, and I was somewhat glad she had for the sole reason that it had given me an integral piece of the puzzle, but I hated seeing her suffer so damn much.
Thankfully, I caught her before her head could slam against a rock and give her a concussion. Thorne had moved to reach for her, but had pulled back at the last second when he saw I was prepared. She had scrambled off him so fast, I could tell he was just trying to be respectful.
‘What the fuck was that?’ the Human female asked, her voice strained under Oz’s weight. He had fallen back on her and was practically crushing the poor woman.
I opened my mouth to explain what I had learned from my observations, but my jaw clamped shut without my permission, my teeth clacking painfully with the force. A sudden, sharp pain stabbed at my head from inside my skull, and I felt a trickle run down my nose. I swiped it away, and it came back red with blood. Just like the bloody noses that both Juniper and Oz were now sporting, thanks to the curse.
Oh.
Oh.
How infuriating. Now that I had figured it out, at least somewhat, the curse had latched on to me, too. This was an extremely frustrating turn of events because all I wanted to do was tell them so they knew what was happening, but I couldn’t. The harder I pushed against the curse, the harder it pushedback, and I winced as the pain heightened, the blood flowing from my nose now gushing.
‘Phenex?’ Don asked, alarmed. ‘Are you okay? What happened?’
‘I’m fine,’ I said, finally prying my jaws open enough to talk. It was mostly true, though more because I felt like my brain was no longer being scrambled.
