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“I’m telling you everything—” she started.
“Nothing I haven’t dragged out of you. You have diaries and spells and all kinds of things in your arsenal that you can’t teach me in a few days.”
“If he were ever to find—“
I interrupted. “I don’t disagree. But I don’t think you need to hide yourselves as well as the portal. The portal hasn’t been doing anything. You could have lived your life with the witches, finding out what’s going on, helping younger witches, anything, but you’ve just said a big fuck you to everyone and hid under a rock.”
“You don’t have to make a point with such vulgar language.” She sneered, but in the silence that followed, her face fell, and she sighed. “But you’re right. We have hidden away.”
“I get it. We are hiding right now. But that’s only until we have a plan on how to deal with this. We aren’t telling the world to fuck themselves. We’re putting our oxygen masks on before we help others. You’ve had yours on for ages now, and the rest of us are turning blue. It’s time to help.”
“How do you suggest I do that?” she asked quietly.
“Call the council. Tell them everything you know about Fafnir. Give them the names and pictures of your family on his side so they can track them. It might help them find him more easily. Offer help in any other way you can think of. It’s not hard.”
She stared at me silently. Long enough to make me feel uncomfortable and twitchy.
Finally, she said, “You have not had the life I wanted for you, but you have become a good man, Charlie.”
Her words were so surprising I stepped back like she punched me, and warmth bubbled inside me at the pride she had in her eyes. I had to look away as I muttered, “Thanks.”
She nodded briskly and put the photo album back on the shelf. “I will call a family meeting and tell them everything I have learned from you. We will see what they have to say. If they agree to help, we will help.”
Not a yes, but not a no.
Is that a win?
CHAPTER6
BAELEN
Zaide disappeared, leaving me alone in the dreamscape with the shadows who continued to haunt me.
I was no longer in control of the dreamscape, and it changed from the familiar sight of the healing tent in Akar to a desolate place. Ash fell from a gray sky, scattering on the blackened earth, which had deep scars and craters across the barren landscape. I’d never seen a realm so colorless and dark.
Where am I?
Figures formed in the dimness, two males and a female. The smokey gloom of the environment and the darkness of their skin hid any distinctive facial features. Their thin and flaky clothing, which hugged them like a second skin, allowed for no concealed weapons.
But even if they were armed to the teeth, I expected the shadows had gifts I didn’t know.
With my fangs protruding and my mouth pulled back in a snarl, I crouched, ready to attack the moment they moved. My instincts homed in on the figures, looking for ways to kill most efficiently.
Of course, I found none, since the figures were incorporeal, which only served to make my akari nature more furious.Invade my dreams. Take my soul mates. Threaten me again. Die. Die. Die.
In the back of my mind, I was glad Clawdia and Zaide were not there to see me like that.I do not want them to see the monster that lurks beneath.
But the events of the past few days were testing my restraint and I could no longer pretend civility.
A male voice barked a laugh. “Put your fangs away, youngling. You cannot puncture a shadow. Especially not with those tiny things.”
Anger turned my vision red. I growled, “Remove yourself from my dreamscape, or I will remove you myself.”
Although, without being able to see their blood threads or attack their corporeal bodies, I was not entirely sure how to follow through with that threat.
“Your dreamscape? Are you familiar with the desolate landscape of Ombra?” I felt the mocking smile in his tone.
“Ombra?” I asked but didn’t move from my stance.What is Ombra?
