Page 49 of Detonation
My feet hit the ground and black dots immediately assault my vision, my ears ringing as a wave of dizziness comes over me. Pushing through it, I rise from the bed and stumble towards the door.
Come on, Lana.
Tears fall down my face freely and I fight a wave of nausea from the pain.
Your people need you. Your family needs you.
A jolt of electricity hits me, my body seizing, and I'm helpless as I crumble to the ground.
As I convulse on the floor and my grip on consciousness begins to fade, his shoes approach. He crouches down to my level, his voice barely a whisper. "It's time for you to hear of a boy who set his heart in the palms of the girl he loved and watched her burn it to ash before his very eyes."
He rolls me to my back, staring down at me with dead eyes. "He only wanted to feel the type of love that you can't live without."
Tears leak down my cheeks as the electrical jolts continue through my body. I beg with my eyes, plead with him, implore that he doesn't have to do this, but he remains unrelenting. My mind loses its fight with consciousness and my vision goes black.
"Don't look for a heart in me, Oslana, because you'll find there's nothing there. You made sure of that."
* * *
I drift in and out of consciousness, feeling like I'm floating in the ocean, coming and going with the tide.
The pale pink ocean that I loved to visit near my kingdom fills my mind’s eyes and I fall into a beautiful dream. The sand beneath me, close enough to the ocean to feel the tide tickle my toes before receding back. The warmth of the sun on my skin, the breeze flowing through my hair, while I inhale the energy in the air.
I shiver as fingers trail along my back. I whip around, half expecting to see Gaia, but there’s no one there.
Shrugging it off as imagination, I put my hands into the damp sand, sinking my fingers into it, enjoying the warmth and connection to the realm’s energy.
A man’s soft voice carries to my ears. "You must hold on. There are plans in motion."
I don't bother to look around. There’s no malice from the stranger and it’s too much effort to face him. Instead, I stare at the crashing waves and ask, half-mindlessly, not really caring for the answer. "Who are you? What plans?"
"Your mates are figuring out the puzzle pieces while we work in the background, setting up the chessboard for the next move."
"Who is ‘we?’"
"Your mother sent me. You aren't in this alone."
Confusion crosses my face, breaking the tranquility that I feel. Why won’t anyone let me rest?
Zaria, my fae mother, or Beth, my human, foster mother?
"Pay attention to your dreams. They are the only way we are able to communicate with you while you are in their castle. There are dark spells woven so tightly that we can't break through, but for a brief moment, without alerting Erebus to our presence."
"I don't know who that is. I don’t know whoyouare. How do you expect me to trust the words of someone I don't know?"
The water swells again, blanketing my feet and legs, the sound of the waves cresting and breaking filling the silence.
"I know you are able to feel that my intentions are pure. We are connected, Oslana."
Growing frustrated with the riddles, I snap, "Speak plainly. I don’t know how much longer I have here before I'm pulled back to that monster."
The wind curls around my shoulders in a whisper of a hug. "Remember what I said. You are not in this alone. We are with you in the only way we can be for now. We're working as quickly as we can. I'm sorry I cannot do more from here. I can't heal the wounds he's inflicted on your body but, here, your mind will always be safe. Hold onto that, Lana. That's the closest thing to comfort I can offer you right now but I swear we are coming."
I frown. “Why are you being so kind to me?”
"I suppose we're family."
A cough sounds loudly in my ears and my vision begins to fade back into reality.
