14. Fourteen

Fourteen

Willow

I’m going to kill her.

This stupid, crazy-ass stalker bitch dies today.

“Germ. Still a delusional fucking psycho, I see.”

Her eyes narrow menacingly and I glare right back. Despite the sound of the boiling magma beneath me and the hushed orders behind me, our voices seem amplified in this large space. She hears the malice and intentions in my tone.

Her time is coming to an end.

“The only delusional one between the two of us, Willow, is you. How the fuck you believe you’ll get out of this is beyond me. The Summum-Master has made his demands, he’s given his orders, and that is that.”

“So you’ve known about him this whole time?”

“Admittedly, no.” She sighs with an eye roll. “Daddy didn’t feel it was necessary I knew it all. Until I came home and told him all about the whore at the academy who was trying to steal my men. Then he informed me of my role, and I took on my position proudly. Unlike you. No worries, though. Soon enough you’ll be out of the way, and me and my best friend will have the Nexuses promised to us. ”

My blood both boils and turns to ice in my veins at her words. Multiple things about how she just said that cause the hair on my neck to stand on end.

“Who the fuck are you talking about?” I ask coldly.

“Ask Caspian. He knows all about my best friend.” Her loud-ass laugh rings so loudly in my ears, it nearly makes my eyes crossed. I can’t stop the smoke that blows through my nostrils or the flames that cover my partially shifted claws.

I’ll kill her. I’ll kill them both.

“It’s all been decided. Silvia’s being a little stingy with not giving Caspian up, though, so I caved with a trade. She could take Caspian, and I’d take Ry. He’s not too bad to look at.”

The ground beneath my feet shakes and I’m not one hundred percent sure whose earth element was just set free. Mine, Tillman’s, or Ry’s. But when Ry takes off sprinting to the right, attempting to charge around this big-ass platform to reach Gima, the sides surrounding us begin to crumble into the magma below.

All of us wobble from the sudden shift and I fall forward, catching myself on the railing, holding on for dear life as my men hang on to me. The unforgiving heat that licks across my face has me peering over the side to get my first glance at the bright orange magma. It’s bubbling angrily and shooting large glubs in the air as the stone continues to crumble into it. The temperature rising around me has beads of sweat instantly forming on my forehead, and I know, if any of us fall in there, there’s no surviving that.

I whip my head around rapidly when Tillman bellows Ry’s name and with a quick command, he has a vine wrapped around his waist, snatching his ass back off the edge before he could literally fall to his death.

Peering around me, Lyker, Aria, Lennox, Kyan, Keeper, and Roye, plus the E.F. members, have had to huddle closer together. Some are even pushed back into the hallway, and we’re completely cut off from getting around any other way. My eyes scan the other side, pinpointing the earth elementals who have their palms faced out, commanding the platform around us to fall .

“On each side of us, they’re using earth elements to tear apart the platform and hold it down. We need to get them back up,” I frantically shout.

Tillman’s orders to our earth elementals come not two seconds later and multiple people break from our hoarded circle to stand closer to the edge to bridge to gaps between us.

I hold in my protest when Roye joins one side and Lyker steps up on the other. A silent whimper pleads through my mind, begging my brother to get the fuck back. It’s a useless request, though. He’s got one of the strongest earth elements here and he’s not just going to stand around watching.

My breaths come in harsh pants as I push myself to stand back up once the shaking finally ceases and I sneer at the manic smile on Gima’s face. That stunt and her words have me on the verge of blowing this entire volcano up, but I shove the desire down. It’s going to take a shit ton more than that to have us back down, and in reality, the bitch is undeniably crazy if she thinks anything she just said will come to fruition.

And Silvia can count her fucking days.

I’ll hunt her down if it’s the last thing I ever do.

“Where the hell is Oakly?” I growl.

“You know, I thought you were a hell of a lot smarter. The men in the Mastery speak of you as some legend, but you didn’t even bother to look above you when you came through the entrance. The scouts up top watched everything go down and alerted us in here. You’d think for an animal that could fly, it’d be natural for you to look up,” she says, giggling as her head tilts back and she gazes through the top of Pyra.

Slowly, not trusting this bitch whatsoever, I cast my gaze above me just as she’s doing, and I choke back a sob as I stumble into my men’s bodies behind me.

From the neck down, Oakly’s covered in a stone encasing, and the entire contraption around her is being held in the air by a net knotted by vines. Her head is slumped to the side and she’s out cold. She doesn’t flinch, twitch, or move as I scream for her in my mind repeatedly.

Her name bellowing from her Nexus’s throats barely registers in my ears and whatever the guys are saying to me doesn’t penetrate the darkness closing in. I can’t hear. I can’t breathe. I can’t feel my Nexus’s hands on my body. I can’t see through the red tinting my vision.

Every nerve ending in my body prickles painfully, causing my limbs to tremble and the rage-filled tears that slide down my cheeks are nearly scalding.

“She’s their true Primary and they’re fully bonded. If she dies, the four of them do as well,” I say far more calmly than I feel when I snap my gaze back to Gima’s and step forward to grip the railing.

“Not my Nexus, not my problem.”

“But Ry—”

“Is replaceable. Corentin’s who I care about the most. The others are added bonuses but again, replaceable.” She flicks her hair off her shoulder as if she couldn’t give a single fuck about anything or anyone but herself right now. “Anyhow…this was fun. I’ll see you in a few once they capture you and bring me my men.”

The delusional bitch saunters up to the railing on her side of the magma pit and when she leans over the side, looking down laughing, I hope and pray she falls in.

Of course that prayer isn’t answered and when she rights herself, there’s a deranged smile playing across her lips.

Then, in true psycho Gima fashion, she blows me a kiss.

Except, it isn’t a kiss…it’s a fireball.

And it’s not heading toward me.

The entire realm tilts on its axis as the sound of snapping vines draws my gaze back up above me. I watch in delayed horror as the last bit of the netting holding Oakly in the air burns to ash.

Just as her stone casing begins to fall from the sky, time seems to freeze as our entire life together flashes right before my eyes.

No. Impossible. We have a lifetime to go.

One hundred years, two hundred years, three, four… fuck, a millennium.

Elementra, you said…

You vowed none of my bonds would ever break. You…you…

Realization hits me like a ton of bricks right to the heart and I nearly crumble under the weight of it .

My bonds don’t have to be physically in this realm for them to stay intact.

No.

“Gima made her decision today, Ultima unum. Make yours.”

Her soft, otherworldly voice comes and goes just as quickly.

As does my decision.

I will always choose her.

Shouting, wailing, full-fledged fucking panic collides with my chest once reality seems to catch back up. The fear of the entire army behind me, my family and all, crashes into me so hard it becomes hard to think about anything other than that, but I forcefully shove it away and take a deep breath.

“Everything’s going to be okay.”

I push it to my men, Ry, San, Jamie, Nikoli, my brother, his brothers, Aria, Keeper, Roye, despite not knowing if they will even hear me, but the least I can do is try.

The silence that surrounds me is of my own creation. I block everything out. Everything. The shouting, the orders, the guttural screams, the hisses coming from the magma with each new stone that disturbs its peace.

And I take a deep breath.

Just as Oakly plummets past the railing…

I dive off the side.

Commanding my earth element out, I tear away the stone prison surrounding my sister as she free-falls at breakneck speed and tears well in my eyes as her purple hair blows around her and her sundress dances wildly in the wind.

She looks like a falling angel.

A scream that’s laced with my anger and fear rips painfully from my throat as I shove my air behind me to propel me down faster.

The unforgiving heat that has my skin feeling like it’s melting off calls to the flames that burn in my blood, and I call the beautiful beast who blessed me with it forth.

Share control .

My power explodes out of me with my shift and a furious roar bursts free from my lungs. Pure animalistic instincts pulse through me and I allow plenty of room for it in the forefront of my mind.

Tucking my wings to my sides, I continue my nosedive and as soon as I’m confident I’m close enough, I extend my powerful legs out as far as I can and wrap my claws around her waist. The sudden swoop and unfurling of my wings cause the magma to jump up out of its pool and surround us in waves, but I shove my air out at it with full force, then command it to propel us upward.

Riding on nothing but the current of my element, I tuck my legs in as close to my chest as I can and wrap Oakly’s body to mine by vines, then cocoon her protectively with my wings.

The flaming temperature of her skin sears into my scales and has a hiss whistling through my teeth. My water element instantly responds, flowing freely into her, both trying to hydrate and cool her down.

Like a missile, my large silver body crashes over the side of the stone platform and I slide until my back collides with the volcanic wall. I don’t even have time to take a breath before suddenly I’m being pummeled with brutal strikes from elements and gifts.

It dawns on me instantly that I’ve landed us on the wrong side of the platform, and my dragon shoves more of herself forward. And I embrace it.

With a harrowing roar, I release my flames on anyone who dares to stand in my line of fire.

The deadly purple pours from my throat along with an ear-piercing screech that has the huge crowd scattering like mice away from me, but I don’t allow that. Fuck no.

I command the flames to climb the walls, hunt those down who dared to try to kill my sister, kill me.

“Willow,” a gentle voice calls and I whip my head around, growling viciously.

“Willy, it’s me. Jamie. I need you to pull your flames back. Caspian moved me through his shadows to get me here, but now they’re fighting off waves of Mastery who are trying to get to you. They need you and I need you to uncoil your wings so I can get to Oakly. Please,” he says softly, holding his hands up, palms out.

“They need us. Calm down. Focus on who that is.” I coax my dragon.

His sudden appearance startled her and she’s on high alert, not wanting to give me back full control. With a low, rumbling warning, she sticks her snout directly to Jamie’s face and inhales.

As soon as she scents the bond of our sister on him, she relaxes.

Calling my inferno back to me, I see familiar E.F. uniforms now clashing with the sorry-ass Mastery members. My men are somewhere in that chaos, killing their way toward me.

After uncoiling my wings, Jamie immediately springs into action and lifts Oakly into his arms. Once they’re a few feet from me, I shift back.

“Fuck…FUCK. Willow, this isn’t good,” Jamie shouts as soon as I kneel beside him. “This is…this is something far different than what any of us were given. What anyone I’ve ever treated has been given.”

My heartbeat thunders in my ears and a lump forms in my throat. Laying my hand on Oakly’s forehead, I sense that she’s truly burning up. This is a next level fever.

“Is it the Wymfire poison?” I ask, almost hopefully, because we have a cure for that.

“No. She’d be…dead already. I don’t know what this is,” he yells.

“Tell me what you need, Jamie,” I croak.

“My brothers and a healing wing. This is going to take more than me, Willow.”

When his watery eyes collide with mine, my heart shatters into a thousand pieces and my shadows engulf me.

I move through the darkest faster than I’ve ever moved before.

The first of Oakly’s men I find is Nikoli and a breath of relief leaves me. He’s a Detector. He’ll know what this is.

I don’t even announce myself as I step out of the shadows, hit the person he’s fighting with my flames, then snatch him by the collar of his uniform and whisk him into the darkness with me.

I’ve never moved anyone through the shadows before, but my gift is running on purely heightened emotions and desperation .

When we step out, he whips around with a snarl on his lips until he realizes it’s me, then his face crumbles. Just as I try to step back into the darkness, he wraps me up in his arms.

“You saved her,” he whispers.

“Not yet, I haven’t. Help Jamie,” I say quietly, then push myself away from him.

I shove the emotions clogging my throat as far down as I possibly can. If I think too much about how she’s lying on that stone, almost too hot to touch, unresponsive, and fading fast, I’ll break into a million pieces. Even my men won’t be able to fix me completely again.

Finding Ry and San together on the farthest side from where Oakly is, I nearly throw myself at my gentle giant when I see him with them, tearing down men left and right. He stands so strong, and I call on this part of him to build me back up in this moment.

Walking up behind him, I lay my hand on top of his outstretched one. He doesn’t even flinch, doesn’t even have to look down to know it’s me. I feel him open himself up, welcoming my element into him, and I command them to merge.

Wrapping vines around the waist of the E.F. members in the thick of this mosh pit, he snatches them back to us, and quicker than the Mastery members can figure out what’s happening, he opens the stone platform. As the thirty or so men fall to their deaths, he closes it back up.

“Jamie needs Ry and San. I’ll be back,” I tell him when he turns to me, but he shakes his head.

“Stay with Oakly. We’ll have this cleared in a few minutes and we’ll meet you over there. Roye, Dyce, and Keeper have teams with them searching the other halls. Palace teams are moving hostages out.”

“If you need me—”

“I will, little warrior.”

With a quick kiss to my forehead and a nod to Ry and San, I whisk us back through the shadows to join Jamie, Nikoli, and Oakly.

The sight is not what I wanted to see.

She’s still completely unconscious, skin red, and Jamie’s beginning to sway .

“I need Draken,” he commands.

“Jamie needs you. Where are you?” I ask, panicked.

“Be there in one minute, little wanderer.”

I know the one-minute time will prove to be true because the ground beneath my feet shakes with his roar and I know he’ll be soaring through this volcano to get to me.

“He’s coming. We should go ahead and move her to the healing wing when he gets here,” I say frantically as Jamie begs Oakly to take what he’s giving her.

“If we could, I already would have. Until they have these halls cleared, we can’t get out with her like this. We can’t transport out of here. This fucking volcano, this fucking weird magic, these fucking people,” he bellows.

His brothers move in closer to him, while never taking their hands off Oakly as well and the rising tide of my anger swells once again. Not at him or his yelling. I take no offense whatsoever to it because I’m not feeling much better. The biggest difference is where Jamie might yell because he’s angry, I may kill someone.

I stop my pacing as the beating of wings draws my attention and Draken, in the smallest dragon form I’ve seen him in, comes racing toward us.

“Little wanderer,” he says, swooping me up the second he shifts back feet from us.

“It’s bad, dragon,” I croak.

“Don’t say that. He’ll heal her up and she’ll be okay. I’ll power him up until he’s about to combust from all the magic,” he purrs softly, cupping both of my cheeks.

All I can do is nod, and he accepts that for now.

I resume my fretful pacing as I watch the number of Mastery members continue to dwindle down. I don’t have to hunt for Tillman when I want to find him. Other than towering over everyone, the E.F. members naturally gravitate toward him. Corentin, on the other hand, I’ve had to keep my eyes peeled for. One second there’re five of him fighting, the next, I can’t find him anywhere .

Caspian’s the only one I haven’t been able to see, and I grow more and more panicked as I watch Corentin approach Tillman and pull him into his light. I feel it in my chest that they’re heading toward me, but my ghost is nowhere in sight.

“Cas, where are you?”

“Be there in just a moment, Primary.”

“You’re okay?”

“Yep.”

I don’t like the short answer, but he’s responding and nothing in his tone or bond would suggest otherwise.

Every second—okay, constantly—I tap into Oakly’s bond. I rotate from banging to hugging the mental link in our minds, begging her to please wake up, do something. Show Jamie that you’re responding to his efforts.

“Princess,” Corentin breathes, snatching me up and out of my mind. I hadn’t realized they were right on me as I just stare at Oakly.

“Corentin, what do we do? She’s not healing. She’s not responding.”

“They blocked off the exit we came in from. The E.F. members are protecting the hostages, but we’re waiting for the others to get another hall cleared, then we’re going. I promise. He may not be healing her, but he’s keeping her alive, princess. I swear.”

“Can’t me or Caspian just shadow everyone out? I can move through the walls in here, so surely, I can move outside,” I plead. I need her out of here. I need her to open her eyes.

“If it takes much longer for the halls to be cleared, that’s what we’ll do, baby, okay? Roye is keeping Tillman updated by the second,” he says, gently pinching my chin.

I swing my head to Tillman, and although he has his arms crossed, standing strong behind Ry, I can tell by the distance in his eyes, he has his mind elsewhere. Probably in multiple other people’s heads.

Nodding, just as I release an unsteady breath, a cloud of shadows forms a few feet from us and my shoulders sag in relief.

But it isn’t my dark and damaged protector who steps out first.

No …

Gima is slung to the ground with her body coiled tight in shadows and a furious scowl across her face. The heavy rise and fall of her chest match mine the longer I stare at her, and the heat in this room mingles with my flames roaring back to the surface. My anger burns away my worry and my body trembles with adrenaline.

“Brought you a present, Primary.”

My glare swings to Caspian and the twisted smirk on his face is all the permission my darker side seems to need.

In milliseconds, I’m out of the safety of Corentin’s arms, commanding Caspian’s shadows as if they were my own to put Gima on her feet and release her. The moment she steadies herself, I rear back and punch her as hard as I can with a stone-covered fist.

Her howl of pain is music to my ears. The sight of her bright red blood cascading from her nose and into her mouth feeds my fire, and with a battle cry pouring from my lips, I fucking pounce.

My legs straddle her waist and she attempts to hit me with a fire-coated palm, but a quick snatch of her wrist with my flamed fingers has her screaming in agony and I blow her element out as if it’s nothing more than a candle.

Repeatedly, I rotate pounding into her face with one stone hand, and the other I leave bare so I can feel her skin split beneath my fist. I need her to feel the pain she’s put me through. The torture I endured because of her assistance. Whatever is coursing through Oakly’s blood. It’s her fault. And she will pay me back with more than a pound of flesh.

Her eyes roll back into her head and her arms lose the feeble strength she was using to try to push me off.

I let my arms drop to my thighs as I catch my breath for a moment, then shove my magic out to open my pocket dimension in front of me.

Reaching in, I quickly snatch out two healing vials. I despise the fact I’m about to feed this bitch something my Guardria made with such care and love, but nonetheless, I need her alive for now.

Gripping her jaw in my hand, I pry the clenched muscles open and shove them both in her mouth. It takes a minute for her throat to start working, but after a second, she’s choking and sputtering. I slam her mouth shut, making sure she drinks every drop, and patiently—not so much—wait until her blackened eyes begin to flutter back open.

“Get the fu—”

My palm flies across her cheek, cutting off her sentence, and when she slowly cranes her face back toward me, fear finally flickers in her eyes for a brief second before they narrow on me.

Delusional, yes.

But not completely stupid.

“What the fuck did you give Oakly?” I growl.

“I didn’t give her shit.”

“Maybe not directly, but you had a hand in it. You can tell me with your mouth, or I carve it from your mind. Make your choice.”

“You can’t—”

“I can and I will,” I sneer.

The extremely low-cut shirt she’s wearing is only tied together by a string above her belly button, so her chest is on clear display. She has no rune and the only individual who would mark her is here with us. There’s no chance of her heart falling out, so if she thinks I won’t melt her mind to find my answers, she’s crazy.

“Have it your way, Germ.”

The resistance from the block that is placed on her mind is nothing for me and I tear it down mercilessly. Her screams just barely echo in my ears, but I’m already plundering through any and everything I want to see.

This is where she’s been hiding since the academy was attacked and her father has been at the helm of all the decisions being made for her. His voice isn’t the one of the man we heard in Layton’s mind from the meeting with the Summum-Master. Which leads me to believe that stupidly, the Everglow family was recruited by the other family who betrayed us.

Gima may act like hot shit, but the majority of the men here ignore her existence. The Summum-Master hasn’t bothered to even meet her and I sift my way through, looking for Silvia, but even she hasn’t been allowed to see her. All communications between the two of them are being passed through Gima’s father .

They had a long discussion, I swear like a fucking business meeting on the terms and conditions of how my Nexus and Oakly’s will be split between the two of them. It’s sickening to hear, and the more I listen, the angrier and more aggressive I grow with my exploration of her mind.

Finally, we approach this morning and my blood boils.

Oakly was brought into a room and judging by the quick movements of her eyes, at this point, she was only drugged with the immobilizer. She’s still fully aware of what’s happening as a group of men get her strapped onto a table. Gima’s stupid fucking ass is bouncing around laughing, waiting for them to finish. Once they do, one of them turns to her.

“They’d like a word with her, then you can come back in to watch her.”

“Ugh, fine. I’ll tell them to make it quick,” Gima groans, rolling her eyes as she stomps to the door. When she opens it, my heart drops to my stomach.

No.

“Don’t take too long, Folders. Deinde-Master Darstein will be here soon.”

Tears of rage fill my eyes as Oakly’s parents stroll into the room she’s being held in, and I could fucking scream when Gima shuts the door behind them.

How could they?

They’re perfectly fine.

Nikoli had thought they’d been taken as well, but he was wrong.

They did this.

Gima only allows a few impatient seconds to pass before she’s opening the door once more and dismissing Oakly’s parents from the room. None of them argue. They don’t fight. Nothing.

Her mother just turns to her and says, “This is for the best, dear. This is our family’s way up the hierarchy, and I knew you’d never be on board with it. Everything’s going to be okay, sweetie.”

Tears stream down Oakly’s cheeks and no one even bothers wiping them away for her. That shit ignites even more rage in me, and I pull on Gima’s mind painfully. I feel her body twitch beneath mine, but I don’t give a fuck.

I listen, Oakly listens, as Gima’s voice echoes around the room as she tells her everything she plans to do to my men. Every nasty fucking sexual fantasy she can concoct in her mind, she just says it out loud, then she moves on to Ry .

Her malicious intentions are clear as she strokes her fingers across Oakly’s forehead softly and quietly tells her exactly what she has in store for Ry as though she’s reading her a bedtime story. The disgust, hatred, and heartbreak are clear in Oakly’s eyes, and I have no doubt, my sister would’ve killed Gima then and there if she hadn’t been drugged.

A short while passes as Gima continues to taunt her before the door opens wide, and a man with a stern face and sure steps walks in with a medical tray in hand. I’m shocked to find I recognize that face but not from my own memories. Caspian’s second kidnapping.

“Enough, Miss Everglow, I need to begin her preparation,” he says, exasperated, dismissing Gima completely.

“I’ll stay and watch,” she announces, hopping off the side of Oakly’s table excitedly.

“Very well.” He rolls his eyes.

There’s not much preparation at all other than him cleaning the area around the vein inside Oakly’s wrist. He shoves a large syringe in and pushes in whatever it is that’s currently keeping her from healing. Once he’s done, he simply cleans the small drop of blood away and turns back to the door.

“I’ll be in my lab and will be back to retrieve her when it is time. You are not to touch her whatsoever. Watch only,” he commands harshly but doesn’t bother to spare Gima a glance.

“Don’t speak to me that way,” Gima says, seething.

Doctor who the fuck ever stops in the doorway, slowly turning around to face her. “Listen here and listen well, you insolent girl. You are granted what you have because of your father’s ability to brownnose his way to the top. You do not get to tell me what to do. Mind your mouth or you’ll be on the table next.” With that glaring threat, he leaves without another word.

Gima stands in her spot, shaking with anger before spinning around to Oakly, and begins pacing.

“How dare he speak to me that way? Wait till my father hears about this. I’ll fucking show…” She stops her pacing, and a sinister smile crosses her lips. “He may believe that, but I have plans for you.”

The cunt does a complete one-eighty personality switch and resumes her taunting for a few more minutes until Oakly’s eyes flutter shut, and with a suck of her teeth, Gima literally fucking pouts like her favorite toy’s been taken from her. She proceeds to pace around the room, huffing and sighing, I guess watching her as she was told to do, until a Mastery member bursts through the room.

“We’re on lockdown. E.F.s have arrived and the heirs are amongst them. Stay in here.”

Before he gets a chance to leave the room, Gima latches onto his hand. “Actually, we’re bringing her to the center. Allow them through that entryway, please. Deinde-Master Darstein has had a change of plans.” Her gift purrs through her lips and the unsuspecting fool falls right into it. She laces her fingers through his after he slings Oakly over his shoulder and proceeds to pump her gift into him as they travel the halls.

The entire time, she persuades him to give orders and plans to the other Mastery members, and I guess with his standing, they do nothing but obey. She orchestrates this whole thing, solely on her own, and with no permission from anyone in the Mastery who actually has a standing.

Smart, psycho bitch.

I speed through our entire encounter, but it takes me by surprise that killing Oakly was a last-minute decision. It isn’t until she actually says out loud that Ry is replaceable that she considers that option and decides she doesn’t give a fuck about him or Silvia getting the rest of them as her Nexus. She completely intended to hurt me for stealing what was never hers.

Snatching myself out of her mind, I practically jump off her as though she’s burned me. My fists clench painfully at my sides as she moans and groans, pushing herself to her feet on wobbly legs, and slowly wipes the blood that’s drippling out of her nose.

When she looks at me with a crooked smile, then dares to look over at Oakly, I snap.

My arm shoots out and I grip her hair tightly in my hand, pulling her so close to me our chests collide, but given that she’s a few inches taller than me, I bring her down to her knees.

“Wait till I tell my father about this.” She hisses and attempts to pry my hand from her head.

“After all of this, you’re still so fucking delusional.” I growl and drag her to the edge of the platform.

Finally, a sense of self-preservation kicks in and she begins begging and screaming as she thrashes around.

“No, no, you can’t do this. I’ll give myself over. I’ll tell you everything,” she bellows as she sits on the ground to try to force me to stop pulling her along.

Her resistance is nothing compared to my dragon’s strength plus the unyielding anger pumping through me currently. It takes me nothing to get her just a foot shy of the drop and I crouch down in front of her.

“There’s nothing you could tell me, Gima, that I don’t already know. But I will tell you something, so listen close,” I say low, deadly. “Elementra presents choices to all of us because it’s our right to choose the path we take. Every choice has a consequence. You chose poorly. You chose to fuck with the strongest family in Elementra rather than help us destroy the plague infecting our realm. So now, I have to make my choice to rid the realm of the infection that is you.”

I didn’t think her eyes could narrow even more, but she proves me wrong. With a glare that could kill, she spits out, “My father will never stand for you harming me. This will mean war.”

“We’re already in a war and your father chose the wrong side. Any last words?” I ask coldly.

Panic, true panic, finally sets in across her face and as the tears well in her eyes, she casts them over to the side.

To my fucking men.

“Cor—”

“Never mind, I don’t give a fuck.”

With that, by the tangle of hair I have wrapped around my hand, I sling her headfirst over the side. I watch from the edge, holding her gaze for as long as she can hold mine, and her screams echo up to me. I don’t budge until I see her body catch fire within the magma.

Hands suddenly grip me everywhere and pull me back until I’m cushioned in the middle of my Nexus. There isn’t an ounce of disappointment, disgust, or anything other than pride pouring off them. Except the undercurrent of fear and worry that is still raging through all of us.

Their sweet words and praises will have to wait.

“The man who came to see you when you and Tillman were kidnapped is here. He’s somewhere in the volcano and he’s the one who gave Oakly whatever is coursing through her right now,” I tell Caspian and immediately his eyes darken.

“I’ll find him, Primary.”

With that, he moves through the darkness at the speed of light.

“Keeper’s got his path cleared,” Tillman says not even a second later as his eyes start glowing and before I can open my mouth, he continues, “I’ll tell Caspian, and he’ll meet us wherever we are. He’ll be fine.”

We jog over to where the others are still surrounding Oakly as Jamie pumps everything he’s got into her. During my fight, he’s lost his E.F. uniform and his shirt is absolutely drenched in sweat. Between the heat in here, Oakly’s fever, and how much power he’s having to push out, he’s going to have a damn stroke.

“Time to go. Guys, get her on this,” Tillman commands as he maneuvers his hands around to make a gurney.

As gently as they can, Ry, San, and Nikoli lift Oakly up and place her on it while Jamie never removes his from her chest. Draken and Corentin wordlessly grab the ends so they can carry it while her men continue to hold on to her and the sight nearly fucking breaks me. She may be my Perfecta Anima , but they love her like a sister as well.

We’re a family. If one of us hurts, we all do.

Tillman guides us to the hall Keeper was in charge of clearing and as soon as we hit it, he appears in front of us.

Falling in line with us easily, he’s wearing a bloodthirsty smirk and gore that tells the story of what he’s been up to. He goes to say something, I’m sure inappropriate at this moment, but he stops as he looks at Oakly’s prone form.

“What’s going on? Why isn’t she awake?” he asks frantically.

“They’ve injected her with something. We’ve got to get her to a healing wing,” Draken says seriously as our footsteps pick up pace .

“What was it?” Keeper asks.

“We don’t fucking know,” Nikoli growls and I see the guilt and shame crawling all over him. He has no reason to feel like that, but I don’t dare say anything to him right now. They’re all going to be feeling a little of that no matter what.

“With all your consent, I will identify it.” Keeper immediately volunteers, and that causes us to stop in our tracks.

“What do you mean?” Jamie asks, panting.

“If you’ll allow me to taste her blood, I can tell you what is plaguing her.”

“You can do that?” I ask, shocked.

“I can. I can already smell that it’s not lethal or harmful to me. The Summum-Master tested many of his concoctions on me to measure their potency,” he says with a small growl.

I want to scream at him to fucking do it now, but ultimately, that’s not my decision.

Luckily, Jamie’s doctor slash scientist sides kick in quickly.

“Please. If you can identify it, it’ll make treating her easier when we get out of here, but I can’t pull my magic back. Without it…”

A small whimper falls from my lips, and I try to smother it down, but I had no clue it was that bad. Of course I knew it wasn’t good, but I didn’t know she’s completely relying on him at this point.

With a firm nod, Keeper gently lifts her hand to his mouth and softly pricks her finger. As respectfully as he can, he sucks down a couple drops of blood, then lays her arm back to rest.

The air in my lungs dries up when I sense the shift in his mood. His eyes quickly bleed to crimson before flashing back to his ruby orbs. He tries to compose himself, but he’s failing miserably.

“Just say it, Keeper,” I whisper, mortified.

“This is the drug they administer to those they intend to steal their gifts from. There…there is no cure for this.”

No.