Page 35 of Detonation
Make it stop. I need to help my family.
“You are worthless.”
Fuck you.
The sparks in the dome fly relentlessly, obscuring Serenity and Lilli from sight before the dome shatters. Smoke drifts around the two figures and Serenity steps out of it, seemingly healed.
Her mouth moves in a chant and the shadow man holding me down dissipates but not before he grips my head and slams it into the ground. The voices leave but my head is left ringing and blackness begins to cloud the edges of my vision. My eyelids feel unbearably heavy.
Two arms hook around me, dragging me away, and I distantly hear someone yelling my name as my eyes close.
A large boom jolts me back and I crack my eyes open, finding myself back in the holding area hallway. Swiveling my head, I look out to the arena, shocked to find Serenity floating above the ground, rainbow orbs shooting from her palms at the dark witch who’s staggering backwards, blood running down the side of her face.
I wasn't out for that long. What the hell happened?
None of the shadow men are in sight and Serenity's mates are standing behind her, watching her whoop ass in battle.
Lilli’s face pops into the hallway, startling me for a moment.
"Hey!” she says, cheery now that her sister is back to normal. “How're you feeling? Do you need any more healing? I just patched up the wound on your face and tried to soothe the swelling in your brain from the concussion he gave you."
"I'm okay, Lilli. Thank you."
She scans me quickly, clearly not believing my answer, and upon finding no glaring wounds, she nods, her silver hair swishing with the movement. My brothers walk into the hallway, breathing heavily but smiling and clapping each other on the back.
"Ah, nice to have you back to the land of the living," Leo jokes, his concern close to the surface as he gives me a quick onceover before nodding to himself, satisfied with his assessment.
Shaking my head, confused as to what the hell is going on, I look back to the arena floor and find Serenity holding the dark witch by the hair, a dagger to her throat.
My eyebrows skyrocket to my hairline, as my mouth gapes open. "I was not out for that long! How the hell did so much happen?"
Lilli cheerfully supplies, "That concussion knocked you out and kept you down until I could get your brain back in a happy state.
I don’t think my brain is ever in a happy state lately.
Zedd grins at me. "Our first real battle and you got to take a nap during it. What're the odds?"
I laugh nervously. "Yup, just catching up on my beauty sleep for when we get to see Lana. Can’t have the prettiest one from the group down and out."
* * *
Leo
We were lucky that Lilli happens to be shockingly protective over her sister. Apparently, she secretly placed a health and location tracker on Serenity that went off when Serenity was out for the count. Lilli saved our asses getting here when she did and healing Serenity or we’d all be dead. Shocking us all, Serenity hugged her sister fiercely at the revelation, not at all offended by the invasion of privacy.
Although I’m glad with how things turned out, they’ve kept how Lilli can heal dark magic wounds to themselves. Which I’m okay with. If they don’t feel comfortable sharing, I’m not going to pry.
As soon as Serenity was healed, she attacked the dark witch full force, catching her off-guard. The second she started spilling blood, the witch lost her connection to the shadow men and they slowly disappeared one by one. With that threat gone, we focused all of our efforts and power on taking the dark witch down. Serenity secured her kingdom’s newest prisoner.
We need answers from her to see if she holds ties to Anshar. We’re flying blind when it comes to his powers and we need every advantage we can get.
Apparently, dungeons are a thing in the witch realm and I wish I could say it creeped me out. It seems that Luke, Hale and Zedd don’t share my sentiments because they were more than happy to sit this one out.
Serenity, Derrick, and I are the only ones heading down there with our new prisoner as her other mates headed off to secure the rest of the city, in the case of any more dark entities.
At first, the thought of possibly torturing this woman made me slightly uneasy but now, as we descend the steps with the shadows of the cells casting onto us, a small flame of interest flares, disturbing me a bit.
I turn to Derrick. “Are you enticed by this? Because I think I am and that’s so wrong. Isn’t it?”
