Page 66 of Where Broken Wings Fly

I knew it was a bad decision almost immediately. I hadn’t been brave enough to peel my eyes open just yet, but my skin was blistering instantly with the abrasive contact of the oil against me, burning and scorching the outer layer of my skin. But I kept kicking my feet, kept moving deeper and deeper into the depths until I finally felt brave enough to open my eyes.

I shouldn’t have. They nearly melted the moment the oily water coated them, but I blinked and blinked and blinked until I could see the muggy water all around me, the shadowed tinge to my surroundings that made seeing anything, let alone a pixie, nearly impossible.

But I kept kicking. I kept paddling. I kept swimming, even though the water was like molasses and my body was burning from the inside and the outside. Nothing mattered — nothing mattered but the fact that I knew there were others down here.

I collided with a body not a second later. It rebounded off of me, gurgling and spitting against the water as they recognized someone in their midst. Without thinking, I latched onto their body and began to kick upwards, seeing a faint light against the darkness that I directed my movements towards.

Seconds later I breached the water-surface, a half-alive pixie in my arms that I immediately passed to Niamh, who was hovering over the water on Sonus.

Behind her was Raegan on Rìoghail, who had just started to shout at me to get out before I dove back down into the water.

That pixie wasn’t the only one. It was as if my soul reached out and called to those beneath me, like my body was alive and pushing to get to them even if it meant my own demise.

I tried my hardest not to swallow any of the water, instead blowing bubbles from my nose as I kicked around, feeling aimlessly with my hands out in front of me.

The next one I found was a young pixie, half my size and limp in my arms. Only because she stirred ever so slightly when I scooped her up did I push off of the rocks and emerge once more. I passed her body to Killian this time, who leant off the side of Milis and tried to grab onto my arms. Yanking away from him, I took another deep breath and dropped below the water again.

The next body that I found was a male, his arms wrapped tightly around a female. Though I was certain she was dead, I helped haul them up to the surface. This time when Raegan roared out at me, I heard every word.

“Olivia, you’re going to get yourself killed. Get out, now!”

I dove once more.

And again.

And again.

It was on the last one that I felt something shift within me. A pain, like none other that I had felt before, erupted beneath my skin and seared my insides, setting my blood boiling within my flesh, my bones grinding as I fought to keep swimming, deeper and deeper.

There were more. I knew there were more. I wouldn’t stop.

Darker and darker the water became the farther I went.

I was dizzy. Everything blurred around me, the solid wall of darkness puddling into ripples in my vision as I fought to stay conscious. My lungs burned more than my skin did, my head ached more than my muscles did.

But that’s when I found them.

Twins. Tiny, so tiny. If they had been humans, I thought they were little more than four or five years old. They were huddled against one another, their last acts in the horror that befell them being clutching to each other in a final attempt of serenity.

Right as I grabbed on to them, I finally passed out.

24

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My eyes peeled open to the familiar overhang of compacted dirt and swinging ivy.

Groaning, my whole body feeling scrubbed raw, I tried my best to lean against the wooden headboard behind me.

“Now who’s insane and stupid?” Raegan spat from where he stood against the opposite wall, his back pressed against it and his arms folded over his chest. “What were you thinking, Olivia?”

Oh, he was pissed.

Very pissed.

I opened my mouth to speak, but realized that the inside of my throat felt as if acid had been poured down it. Instead, I slammed my mouth shut and simply looked at him.

“You’re a fool,” he growled, beginning to pace back and forth at my bedside. “A damn fool.”