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Kellan took a deep breath and looked back at Ernest and Fern.
He closed his eyes and opened a portal. The whooshing sound drowned out his voice as he gestured Ernest and Fern inside.
I went to step in, but he stopped me.
His dirty blonde hair twirled around his head as the wind grew, and his sharp features shadowed in the sun. “Thank you. Even when you’re pushy and crazy, you make me better."
I smiled at his honesty and the vulnerability he laid out for me. “Yeah, I’ve been told how awesome I am.”
Kellan rolled his eyes, wrapped his arm around my waist and nose-dived us into the portal.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Kellan
We landed within seconds. Josie fell on top of me as my back hit a grassy hill. The field surrounding us was full of wildflowers and tall weeds and didn’t look like it was used often for travel.
I sat up on my elbows. Cupping the back of Josie’s neck, I made sure she was okay. Those too-blue eyes lifted to mine and covered me in warmth.
Besides leaves in her hair from the portal, she was fine.
Ernest sat several yards away. I watched as he wrapped something around his ankle. Fern landed on top of the hill. She stood and dusted herself off.
She looked down over the hill as I stood and helped Josie to her feet. “What is it?” I asked.
Fern shrugged. “Looks like an abandoned village. I don’t know where we are.”
It wasn’t until I made it to Ernest to see he’d made himself a makeshift brace with some of the thick leaves settled in the weeds that I realized where we were.
It hit me when I smelled the strong scent of pine. There were only a few places in this realm that had such an amount of pine.
I walked up the hill and stopped at the top. The village below us was mine. The one Deidamia destroyed. The one where my family once rested their heads at night. A sick feeling twisted into my stomach. I hadn’t been back since she gave me the elixir.
I took to the streets, looking for work and finally realizing I didn’t do well with people anymore.
Any sense of kindness that was left in my heart disappeared. It’d been buried with my family in this very village.
Tears blurred my eyes, and even when I tried to blink them away, they came back.
“Where are we?” Josie asked beside me, dusting off her clothes and looking down at the village. “Definitely abandoned. Maybe it’s a good place to rest—”
“No,” I said, louder than I intended to. I didn't want anyone to see it or be near it.
She looked up at me with concern on her face. “Well, you could have said it nicely,” she mumbled.
Her words drifted out of my hearing as I took a step toward the valley. I felt my feet sliding down the hill until I was in a full run toward the village.
My memories surfaced, blinding all rationality in my head. My heart hammered into my lungs, making it hard to breathe. The cabins were mostly demolished; only worn clothes and knickknacks were scattered around what used to be my home.
I stopped in the middle of the village, where we had our get-togethers. The old fire pit sat under a mound of leaves and debris. The vision of our village lying dead slammed into my brain.
Because I loved to torture myself, I walked over toward where our cabin used to sit. I could still envision the flowers my wife had out in pots. The toys our baby girl played with on our porch. The one I built, so they could sit outside in the summer without burning to death.
I glared at the shutters of the cabin.
Images of Deidamia flashed in my mind. The blood on her mouth. The smile of joy she got from destroying everyone.
Caw. Caw. Caw.
