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His footsteps thundered away. A door slammed.
More puking, my body not in my control for long, torturous minutes.
Until finally the muscles in my diaphragm stopped clenching, but now I was stuck on my side. I couldn’t even roll onto my back and I was still gasping for air, my body shaking.
The door opened and I tried to sit up, tried to look toward the door to tell Charlotte I didn’t need her help. But I couldn’t move my arms. Couldn’t move my legs. Like that room with the upside-down tree had set a poison deep into my veins that paralyzed me.
Feet appeared in front of me, just beyond the contents of my stomach splattered onto the floor.
Tiny feet in silver shoes.
Charlotte didn’t have tiny feet. Nor would she ever wear silver shoes like she was a fucking princess.
I managed the slightest twist of my head upward.
An older woman.
Helen.
An old associate with ties to the panthenites pointed her out once to me long ago. One of the trio of elders that had once led the panthenites. A trio that had been reduced to one, just Helen, after the incident nine years ago when I got Venetia back.
Triaten had been filling the gap that was left by his father and the other elder dying. But Helen—she was the one with the most power.
And she was staring down at me, practically salivating.
Her bird nose tilted down, her voice pinched. “What do we have here? A Folotto, deep in our very home. How in the hell did you get in here?”
She stepped around my vomit to nudge my thigh with the tip of her silver shoe. No defense against her, the nudge toppled me over onto my back.
Her lips jutted out, pursing in thought. “Well…this is an interesting turn by the Fates. Welcome to my mountain, Mr. Folotto.”
Well, shit.
Trapped.
Too weak to fight. Too weak to even move. To speak.
Fucked.
Chapter18
{ Ada }
Skye closed the door behind Aiden carrying Damen out of the tree room, and I heard the outer door open and close.
In a second, Skye was back in the main room with me.
“Aiden will keep him safe.” She pointed to the upside-down tree. “Let’s do this fast before anything else goes wrong. I don’t know how long I can have you in here without you passing out on me.”
“What was that? How are you even in here?”
“Tolerance—I spent years increasing my tolerance. There’s something about the tree that sucks all the lifeblood, the energy, out of people. It’s worse with some than others. Apparently, the worst with Damen—I’ve never seen anyone react quite like that before.”
Skye grabbed my arm and pulled me closer to the tree, and I could feel exactly what she was talking about—waves of energy rolled off the tree, then pulled back, taking something from deep within me with every pulse. Like the ocean crashing into the shore and pulling out in a riptide.
She motioned to the tree. “Like I was saying, every panthenite and malefic exists on here. She released my arm and stepped to her left, pointing to a thread glowing a swirl between purple and yellow. This is me. You know I’m a straight half-breed, right?”
“Yes.” Most in our worlds knew about Skye. The half-breed that could control time. A power that no one alive had ever seen before. One of the reasons Damen was so intent on creating more half-breeds. “Triaten told me.”
