AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I grab my phone from my pocket and dial for Ridge. He picks up on the third ring. “What?”
“Well hello to you too,” I respond playfully. I’m not actually feeling playful, but I’m in the mood to annoy someone just as much as the fucking universe and Ethan are pissing me off. I also know that it needles the hell out of Ridge when I’m in a chirpy mood, so cue that.
“Nessa,” he mutters, already sounding disgruntled and I smile, this one real.
“Don’t worry, this is a work call. I’m not going to pester you to hang out with me.” I sigh and roll my eyes at the immediate rustling sound on the other end of the call. Ooh, someones eager tonight. “What’s happened?” he asks.
I groan. “Jeez, there is no reason to sound so excited, frankly it gives me the heebie jeebies and I’m a pretty desensitised person.”
Ridge laughs. Like, actually laughs.Him. It has me frozen, eyes wide in utter fucking disbelief as I stare down at the severed head. “Nessa, I hate to be the one to break it to you, but you’re a fucking psycho and that’s coming from me. Don’t sell yourself short like that, and don’t let anyone try to convince you otherwise,” he says, voice still filled with amusement.
I clutch a hand to my chest like the bastard can see me and put on my mosttouchedvoice. “Oh my Goddess, Ridge, I think that’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.”
Ridge snorts and I can practically hear him rolling his eyes. Wow, a laugh and a snort tonight, I must’ve turned into a comedian somewhere along the line… or he got laid. I cock my head to the side and raise my eyebrows. Yeah the latter seems more likely. “Have you finally found a person to date?” I ask the sociopath, my surprise clear, but I would be happy if he had. He fucking deserves it, the shit head. We’re not really close per say, but we’ve worked together enough for me to know that he’s capable of forming close personal connections, he just seems to see everyone else as pawns.
The man growls and lets out a scoff which tells me everything I need to know. “Oh my gosh you actually have! I’m so happy for you,” I say honestly, some of my faith in supernatural beings restored.
He grunts. “Where are you and what do you need?”
I let out a disgruntled breath at him not wanting to talk about his new lady or man friend before I reveal why and where I need him. “Outside my dorm and it’s a severed head.”
He lets out another laugh and I send Aurora acan you believe this guylook before I hang up the call. It’s going to be a long night.
Humming under my breath—quite out of tune, might I add—I move through the forest. I’ve had some time to cool off and it’s done my chaotic brain and emotions wonders. I left Ridge with the head not long after he arrived at the base of the tree outside of my dorm. Other than noting the dark hair that was a similar shade to mine. When I saw that, I immediately connected it to the lock of braided hair that was part of my first ‘gift’. The severed head’s hair doesn’t appear to be cut though, and the braided lock of hair I received was also lighter in colour, where the head is pretty much identical to my shade of black. So I’m assuming it must be from two different people. Other than that, I couldn’t help get any information on it so there was no reason for me to stay.
It’s a still night, the bugs quiet and sky alight with stars and the moon. The moon Goddess watching over us. I may not worship a specific God or Goddess of the realm, but I do respect them all.
Unicorn is out hunting so I’ve decided to do something I’ve been wanting to do for a while. Return to Aurora’s death site and explore. Explore the magical place Aurora and her magic created.
I locate the illusion barrier with ease and give myself a moment to study how realistic it appears before I step through it. As my eyes adjust to the lighting, I can’t help but let out a breath of relief that it seems like nothing has changed. The place is so unbelievably beautiful that it’s almost hard to accept the fact that it’s actually real.
“Wow.”
I flinch at the unexpected sound and whip around—magic flaring—to face the person who spoke, lips parted in shock only to find Foster standing just inside the illusion barrier that surrounds Aurora’s resting place. Immediately my magic settles down, but my body remains tense. “What the hell are you doing here?” I hiss, jaw gritted.
Foster’s eyebrows furrow and he cocks his head, watching me curiously. “Following you, I thought that would’ve been obvious at this point.”
I widen my eyes at him and give him mybest,are you seriousfacebefore throwing my head back with a groan. “Corin is going to kill me,” I mutter under my breath, scrubbing a hand over my face. I mean we didn’t explicitly agree to keep this place a secret, but for some reason I feel like I shouldn’t have shared it with someone else without him knowing. That’s something I’m going to have to puzzle over later.
“What was that?” Foster asks leaning closer to me, expression innocent.
I roll my eyes and turn away from him, ignoring how cute his stupefied expression is as he takes everything in. “Stupid supes and their good hearing.”
Foster snorts behind me, and I flip him off over my shoulder, which has his snort morphing into a full laugh as I let my eyes roam over the area. It’s just as amazing this time around as it was the first time seeing it. The bioluminescent plants of varying colours and the huge tree. The odd glowing blue butterfly floating lazily over the grass field. It’s all fucking beautiful, in a way that seems almost too perfect for it to be real.
I shake my head, and weigh my options. It seems like I have two main ones, grab Foster, chain him up then let Unicorn eat him, or I could stick with my original plan and explore this place, just with him as a tag-along. Or, I could put a rune on him that prohibits him from being able to say anything about what he sees here? Yeah, that’s an easy one, clearly feed him to Unicor—ha, just kidding. I roll my eyes upwards and mumble to myself, “I guess I’m going to be testing out a new rune today.”
I turn to face Foster and flash him a grin, which immediately has his face paling a little and he takes a step back. Damn, I really do love it when I have that effect on people. I open my mouth, ready to tell him what I’m about to do, then think better of it and just throw my magic at him, the rune branding his sternum.
Foster yelps as it takes effect before his lips draw down into a pout rather than anger like I was expecting. “Really, a censuring rune? Fine, here.” Foster walks over to me, arms out in a gesture of good faith I’m assuming. His knowledge of the rune is intriguing and it has me curious about how he learnt it. It’s an uncommon rune that I wouldn’t even be aware of if I hadn’t come across it in one of my many nights reading in my fathers library. They have a ton of factual books rather than my massive collection of smutty fiction books.
Since he’s offering I hesitantly reach out and brush my fingertips against his shirt covered sternum. I’ve never used this rune before and my magic is still not cooperating a hundred percent, so I reason that it’s safer to be closer to the rune for me to activate it. I imbue it with a tiny trickle of my magic and my intent—which is that Foster can’t tell anyone about this place or anything he learns here. I bite the inside of my cheek when I’m done and draw my hand back, Foster’s chest rising and falling quicker than it was before. I tip my head back, focus locking in on his face, and a low sound slips from my throat at the intensity in his glowing eyes as he looks down at me. I’m snared in his gaze for a moment before I snap out of it with a shaky breath as I slowly let my hand drop and take a few steps back.
Clearing my throat, I turn around and drag my focus to the massive tree to give myself a few seconds to get myself together. Light footsteps move in my direction until Foster’s body is a blur in my peripheral vision, alerting me that he’s stopped at my side. That and his vanilla scent swirls around me, slightly richer than it usually is. “So what’s the plan?” he asks, voice slightly gravelly.
“The plan is… that there is no plan,” I say, wanting to face palm as soon as I say it.Goddess, that’s it Nessa, just let the world know how frazzled the man beside you has managed to make you. I puff out a slow breath and tug my shoulders back, owning the stupidness. Rolling my eyes at myself, I take off, walking at a fast clip into the field that’s filled with long grass. I’m not planning to actually go into the treehouse thingy today, but I do want to look around everywhere else.
As I move through the field, blue butterflies erupt from the grass, their glowing bodies beautiful. A tiny smile tugs at my lips and I peer over my shoulder to find Foster paused at the edge of the field watching both the cloud of butterflies and me, face curiously blank.
