AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“No.”
Deciding to get comfortable, I sit down across from him, my back braced against the wall. I’m going to shut my mouth until he tells me what the hell is going on. I raise a brow and Ezra sighs, his head tipping back with a thump against the cabinet.
“I went to go see Ruby for… whatever, that doesn’t matter. We got into an argument and, hell, I know everyone’s magic has been getting stronger, but I really haven’t noticed much of a difference.
“Except for the sniffing,” I interject but make a zipping my lips gesture when Ezra stares daggers at me.
“Today, I was so damn worked up after I left Ruby’s place that I couldn’t get settled. It was like a fire was burning in the pit of my stomach, and it kept getting stronger and hotter. The pain started just before I got home and…” Ezra looks up at me and I almost rear back, his eyes look larger than normal, their warm brown almost blown out and the pupils are too big.
“Did you ever figure out what kind of magic you’re supposed to have?”
“No, man. All of this bullshit feels like a fantasy. I mean, don’t get me wrong, we all know it’s real, but I guess I’ve been living in denial. I’m not sure I want to find out any more about my magic. You know how it is. All the shit that went down with my parents. I know everyone gets it, but I think I’ve been pretending it’s bullshit for so long that I don’t know how to accept it’s real.”
“So you think this is your magic doing something to you?” I scrub a hand over my face, rubbing my eyes. I haven’t been sleeping well since everything went down with Lena. My eyes feel full of grit, like they’ve been held open in a science-experiment-torture-session.
“Archer, I think I’m…” Ezra trails off, shaking his head. As if saying the words out loud might make something happen.
“Dude, it’s happening whether we talk about it or not.”
Ezra looks down at his hands, his face pulled into a grimace. “I feel like there’s a beast inside me that’s trying to break out.”
I blink in surprise, because that’s not what I was expecting him to say. “You think the magic is changing you, making you into something like it changed our parents?” Although as soon as the words are out of my mouth, I know that’s not exactly true. It’s been an ongoing question we’ve all struggled with over the years. Did forming the Axis turn our parents’ evil, or were they always like that?
Ezra opens his mouth and then closes it, obviously reconsidering whatever he was going to say. Instead, a low groan pours into the room, and he clutches his stomach and curls in on himself.
“Jesus.” I scramble to his side, my hand landing on his shoulder. “Holy fuck, you’re burning up. Do you need to go to the hospital?”
Hospital is a bit of a misnomer since there isn’t an actual hospital on the island, more of a general practitioner's office. She does the standard check-ups but for anything more complicated than that, people have to go off island. It’s always a shitty situation in an emergency, but that’s the price you pay for living on a tiny island.
“Fuck, no. I just… God, can you just help my weak ass into the bedroom?”
I loop Ezra’s arm around my shoulder and wrap mine around his waist. I heft him up, eliciting a groan from the both of us.
“Damn, you’re a heavy fucker,” I joke, but Ezra doesn’t respond. Sweat drips down his face and real fear for my friend grips at my guts and twists, hard.
I manage to get Ezra into his bed without toppling either one of us. Once he’s there, I honestly have no clue what to do. No one ever took care of me when I was sick. Actually, no one ever needed to. If I ever got sick, I don’t remember it. I can’t recall a time when Ezra’s been sick either. That makes all this all the more concerning.
I pull the covers over Ezra before going to the kitchen to get him some water. By the time I get back in the bedroom, he’s already asleep. All I can do is shake my head in confusion over this whole thing. I settle into a leather club chair in the corner of the room. Putting my feet up on the matching footstool, I resign myself to staying put all night and watching over my friend.
