I squeeze my eyes shut and give a light shake of my head to stop the ringing in my ears. I hit my fucking forehead on the seat again.
“Nariko?” I croak, reaching for her when the harness keeps me in place.
She doesn’t say a word.
She’s alive. Her heartbeat is steady. There’s pain stinging the tendrils of our bond, like a burn that won’t stop catching on fire.
“Ruka?” His heartbeat is slower, and that’s when I realize the majority of the blood I smell isn’t Nariko’s.
It’s his.
Metal drags across the ground. The car rocks left to right. The hinges squeal.
And his damn dash camera is still recording.
The back end of the vehicle rises once, twice, three times, and all four wheels are in the air. The roar the beast gives is so loud, I hold my hand over my ears as we are eaten, pulled into the gut of a nightmare.
“Ruka! Hey, Ruka!” The truck flips and spins as we tumble through the whipping winds of a tornado. “Talk to me, man. I can’t see what’s going on!”
“Hmm,” he groans in pain.
His and Nariko’s emotions are clouded and fuzzy. A drowsy sensation comes over me, a dizziness washing over my mind.
“Wake up!” I use my abilities to enhance my voice, forcing Nariko awake too.
His pain awakens me, and I see his face.
Banks.
Not again.
Blood is everywhere.
“Oh god,” Ruka screams, pressing his hand against the ceiling. “Oh, god. Oh my god. Ah!” he roars with agony, and the emotion stabs me in the chest like a freshly sharpened blade.
I double over, inhaling until I gasp. His agony brings tears to my eyes.
I focus on Nariko’s heartbeat. It’s hard to cancel the noise out. The chaos. The taunting of death just outside this metal can.
Bahdum. Bahdum. Bahdum.
Her heartbeat centers in my mind, the strength of her fighting away the memory of Banks.
This isn’t the same. This isn’t the same storm. These are different people. Banks is gone. Snap out of it.
Lorcan said Ruka would die tonight if he chased.
“This isn’t the same,” I whisper on a deep exhale, my brother’s face flashing in my mind.
Nariko’s heartbeat is there to ward him away.
“What’s happening? Where is Nariko? I can’t move,” he whimpers, shock setting into his body. Every inch of him shakes. His teeth clatter together as if he’s cold.
“Nariko is out cold. She’s okay.” Or I’d already be dead because I’d kill myself before Fate had the chance to. “It’s you we need to worry about.”
“Oakley, I—I—” His teeth are chattering. “I can’t move my left arm. A branch is in me.”
As we drift through the wind, I risk unbuckling myself to get a better view.
