AllFreeNovel
Share Us
They reached a casual sitting area at the end of the path. Beyond the table and chairs flowed a small stream. The trees were less dense here and mountains were visible beyond the treetops. It was lovely, peaceful.
“How did Udora find you?” Raina moved toward the table and sat down. There were six chairs, three on each side of the oblong table. All of the furniture had been secured with long spikes driven into the ground. “You could have been anywhere in the galaxy.”
Cylex slipped onto the chair at her side, so Kern chose one of the seats facing them. “Grandmother sensed her daughter’s death so she presumed that I had died too. Eleven years passed as Grandmother processed her grief and focused on building her power structure. Then one of the seers informed her that he had seen me in a vision.”
Raina shook her head, looking slightly dazed. “You could put these events in a movie and everyone would complain that it’s completely unbelievable.”
Kern allowed himself a faint smile. “I often feel that way even now.”
“Were you excited to meet your grandmother?” She answered her own question a millisecond later. “How could you be? Torret was the only home you had ever known.”
“I resented her at first, but you’ve met my grandmother. She is surprisingly likeable for someone with her power.”
She nodded, but still looked upset.
Kern envied the mind link Cylex shared with her. It would have been nice to understand what she was feeling.
She is upset at all the people who hurt you. She cares about you more than she is ready to admit.Cylex skillfully slipped the thoughts into Kern’s mind without allowing their mate to hear him. Kern’s mind and Cylex’s had been linked since their academy days, though neither had accessed the connection for years. Until now.
An unfamiliar ache erupted in Kern’s chest at Cylex’s reassurance. Kern desperately wanted to believe that Raina could care for him, but he had been so horrible to her in the beginning. No one shrugged off that sort of first impression. He was willing to work toward earning her trust—that was why he was here—but she had to be willing to let him.
More than ready to move beyond the past, Kern continued, “I lived at the temple or actually in a small house on the grounds until I was fifteen. That’s when I went to the Seyzon Academy.”
“And met Cylex.”
He nodded. “Cylex joined the military after we graduated and I returned to Pyron.” She was too damn perceptive not to realize the story was far from over but he couldn’t find the words to move beyond his teens. He hadn’t been responsible for anything he’d told her so far, but that was about to change, drastically change.
“When and why did things fall apart?” She reached across the table and squeezed his hand. “Your entire body just got tense. You’re clearly thinking about something unpleasant.”
That was a galactic understatement. Did she need to know everything? He glanced at Cylex. Even he was unaware of most of the coming events. Should Kern leave it that way? Hiding was no longer an option if they were going to form a power triad. There were no secrets from soul-bonded mates.
“Why did you break contact with me?” Cylex nudged him toward full disclosure. “I honestly expected us to be friends our entire lives.”
Cylex was living his life in blissful ignorance. It was because Kern cared about Cylex that he had kept this information from him. So Kern took a deep breath and stared past his companions as he forced the words from his throat. “Several months before graduation I started having visions, horrific, bloody visions. The images struck without warning. Sometimes I would dead drop to the floor. Other times I’d remain aware long enough to sit down. They were not dreams. I was always awake when it happened.”
“Why the fuck would you keep this from me?” Cylex asked, sounding both hurt and angry. “Everyone thought you were having seizures, that it was a medical problem. You told me you were heading back to Pyron because they have the best healers.”
“They do, especially for the sort of ailment that was tormenting me.”
“But why didn’t you—”
“Was your grandmother able to get rid of the visions?” Raina smoothly cut in, deescalating the budding argument.
Kern shook his head. “Because of the violent nature of what I was seeing, she referred me to the Wraiths. They believed that my ancestors were trying to communicate with me, so they put me in a trance that opened my mind to the spirit world.”
Raina shook her head, looking aghast at the choice. “I don’t care if they were your ancestors or not. If the spirits were sending you violent images, they weren’t the sorts of spirits that needed to communicate with anyone. You should have been protected from their influence, not made vulnerable to it.”
“Where were you back then?” He tried to smile but failed. He’d been desperate and terrified and he’d trusted the Wraiths to know what was best for him. “What resulted was the single most traumatic experience of my life. I learned nothing worth knowing but was subjected to torturous pain and scenes of brutality and slaughter unlike anything I have ever imagined before. When it was over, I was unable to speak for nearly a year. I have vivid nightmares to this day.”
“I’m so sorry.” She clearly didn’t know what else to say.
“There was one Wraith, his name was Movu. He strongly disagreed with the others but hadn’t been able to change their minds. He tried to minimize the damage and wouldn’t let any of the Wraiths near me when they wanted to try additional rituals.”
“Thank God for Movu,” she muttered.
Kern cleared his throat before he could speak again. “The visions ended as suddenly as they had begun and even the Wraiths admitted that it had nothing to do with the trance they had inflicted.” He hadn’t gotten to the worst of it yet, the part that had redefined his self-image and crushed his hopes and dreams. “Movu escorted me back to the Temple of Air and I gradually recovered enough to confide in my grandmother. I told her that the images had not seemed random, that one person appeared in every scene. She asked to see the person, so I shared his image with her. Mistress Air, the ever-composed leader of the temple, sank to her knees and wept.”
“Who was he?” Raina asked. “Why did she react that way?”
