Blaize and the Maven: The Energetics Book 1 (18 page)

Tierra had looked at them with her head tilted and her eyes narrowed. She’d tapped her bottom lip with her fingers. Blaize felt her cheeks heat as she wondered if Tierra had realised what they had been doing moments before she returned.
 

Blaize really hoped not.

***

Cuinn wouldn’t think about Blaize.
 

He’d gone with instinct, something he never, ever did. He was a thinker—a decision-making style perfectly aligned with his energy. Every choice he made, every action he took, was planned and considered. And that kiss had definitely not been in the plan. Any plan.

It had been a bad idea to agree to another Adherent. Today was a reminder of the terrible events that had happened last time he took on an Adherent.
 

He went to the library and pulled out a heap of books that might have references to something trying to come through when an energetic pulled energy. What had it been? And had it been connected either to his farseeing of Blaize dying, or to the prophecies in general? So many questions and so few answers.

He worked late into the evening, sorting his way through books with very little to show for it. He needed to go back into the dreamscape himself to see if he could find any trace of the presence that had tried to invade Blaize’s dreamscape. But if he was going to track it, he needed access to Blaize’s Haven, and he needed her for that.

It was already late, and she needed the rest. He’d put it off until tomorrow. He sat in his chair by the window, and looked out into the dark, wet night. He needed the time too.
 

He needed to distance himself from that damn kiss.

Indigo hummed as she walked around her Haven. A fairy-tale castle, it glittered and shone. Her Haven was her most precious, safe place. A place where she could have whatever she wanted, and do whatever she wanted. Where she was free. A huge four-poster bed sat in one corner, a dressing table fit for a princess against a wall. She had a closet full of clothes, and more possessions here than any girl could need. Not to mention the room full of weapons.

She curled up on a window seat in the castle and played with the crystals hanging down from one of the lamps. She watched the light dance as it hit each individual drop. It had been satisfying to attack Blaize in the ether. She'd been waiting for days for Cuinn to take that bitch into the dreamscape. She couldn't understand why he'd waited so long. But her own slivers of the prophecy had told her that a chance would come if she was patient, so she'd waited.

And Indigo had nearly had her. She wasn't sure why she hadn't been able to destroy Blaize. Take her. The bitch was untrained and shouldn't have been able to fight Indigo off. Twice now, once on the human plane, and now on the etheric plane.

I'm a Practitioner. She's not even an Adherent.
She shrugged the thought off. She'd get her eventually. She'd seen it. She'd have her here, in this very room. Indigo looked across the wide expanse of the main room of her Haven. At the heart of her castle a chair sat in the middle of the space, chains neatly stacked underneath it. Ready.

There was a brief ripple in the energy of her Haven, and she looked up, her muscles tensing. There was only one person who could get in here without Indigo providing a bridge. Only one person she'd introduced to her safe space. She cowered in the window. She pressed herself into the cushion, pulled her legs into her body and hugged them tight.

The energetic locks and chains that Indigo had created fell away from the door and the tall, elegant man came through.

"Indigo, my dear. How are you?" His voice was a pleasant baritone that caused shivers down her spine.

"Fine. Just fine." She didn't want to upset him. Say the wrong thing. But it was so easy to say the wrong thing with him. In fact, it was hard to say the right thing.
 

"You failed to capture Blaize."

She stifled a whimper. "Yes. But I will. The prophecies say I will. It's just a matter of time."
 

She wanted his approval. Wanted him to think she’d done well.
 

"Indigo, didn't I train you better than that? You learned that the future is fluid, pliable, in your Adherent training. A prophecy is seen, the most likely of futures, but not the only possible future." He walked closer, his steps light. "We must do everything we can to ensure that our version of the future wins out. I want Blaize here in your Haven before the month is out. She must be destroyed; Cuinn damaged."

She nodded. Her back was against the window now. There was nowhere to go. He was still coming closer. He was unpredictable. Would he hurt her? Or help her? She was tired. Energy low. He could help with that.
But will he?

The sparkles in the room had dimmed. Her beautiful knickknacks dulled and discoloured in his wake. It amused him to tarnish some of her glitters when he came in. It always took her days to clean them again.

He was standing in front of her now. She looked up at his clean-cut jaw, his kind face. Should she stand up? She couldn't. He was blocking her way.

"We will. I will. She'll be here before the month is out," said Indigo, the words falling from her lips like a mouthful of bad food.

"Hmm," said the man. "Because bad girls get punished, but good girls get rewarded. Don't they Indigo?"

She nodded.

"Should you be rewarded or punished, I wonder?" His hand rubbed his chin.
 

She closed her eyes. It was a trick. It was always a trick. Whichever she said, he'd punish her.
I don't want to be punished.
She hunched down, trying to make herself as small as possible.

He put his hand out, and she reared back. She hit the window behind her hard, and it cracked with a loud bang. She pulled energy without thinking, repairing the damage. But she was weak and didn't have much energy to spare. Her head ached. She attempted to pull some energy from the ether. The headache grew worse.

He watched her, his mouth twitching in a smirk. "I can help."

She shook her head.
No
. His help always came at a price.

But his hand reached out, and clamped down on her shoulder. His grip bit tight, his fingers grinding against the bones. She suppressed a cry.

Energy bled from his fingers into her body. At first, it was blissful. A cooling balm. It replenished her energy and soothed the headache.

But he pushed too hard. Too much. His energy was so powerful. So strong. It began to burn. She moaned aloud. "Enough. Please."

He laughed. "Until you have Blaize here, you need this."

His energy invaded hers. She fell to the side, her body tightening into the fetal position. She looked up at him, eyes pleading for him to stop. A tear fell onto the cushions underneath her. He looked down, dispassionate.

Eons later, the pain stopped. He stepped back. She looked up at him through bleary eyes.

“That was necessary. I want you to search in the dreamscape for more of the prophecy. We need to increase what we know.” He walked back towards the door.

She couldn't speak, though as the pain faded her body rallied, electrified by the energy he'd shared with her. She began to shake.
 

He opened the door to exit. "And you're done with the waitressing job now. Burn those bridges."

***

“What happened between you and Blaize yesterday when I was out of the room?” Tierra asked Cuinn as he joined her for breakfast.
 

He shrank down in his seat and huddled over his coffee. “Nothing.”

“Ha! Don’t be ridiculous. I know something happened, I just don’t know what. It looked to me like you smooched. Am I right?”

Cuinn was amused enough at the word ‘smooched’ to sit up. “We didn’t smooch. Whatever that even means. We might have … touched lips. Briefly. Accidentally. It won’t happen again.”

Tierra came round the table and sat next to him. She placed her hand over his hand, which was still clutching the coffee as if his life depended on it.

“She’s not Sophea, Cuinn. Sophea’s gone. Blaize is strong in body and mind. And this time, the attraction isn’t one-way.”

“There’s no attraction. And I know she’s not Sophea.” His words were flat, and he ignored her hand on his. “I’ll give Blaize another opportunity to back out today. But if she doesn’t, I’ll do the binding ritual this week.”

Tierra’s eyebrows rose. “Really? So soon?”

“I need access to her Haven in order to find out what happened yesterday.”

“Cuinn! You can’t do a binding that could last for years just for research! You know this is a lasting commitment—you can’t go into it half-heartedly.”

“I know.” He sighed. “It’s not that. I can protect her better if we’re bound. And I’m not half-hearted. I’ve spent most of the night thinking about it. I can see she’s strong, Tierra. But the energy that knocked her out yesterday, it was … malevolent. Nasty. And I have no idea what it was. If we perform the binding, we’ll have access to each other’s Havens, and I can protect hers with wards as strong as mine. Nothing will be able to touch her.”

“But you’re going to give her the chance to back out.”

He nodded.

“You know she won’t. She’s too proud. She doesn’t have that aspect of Manipura fully under control yet.”

He shrugged. “I can’t force her either way. It will be her decision. But our energy recognised each other yesterday. And I have a … feeling about this. I’m worried about her now, as well as the prophecy.”

Tierra flinched. “What do you mean? Have you seen Blaize in your dreamscape? Is she involved in the prophecy?”

He still didn’t want to tell her. He might have made a mistake. Tierra would only worry. He hedged. “Maybe. I don’t know. I still don’t have enough information. But it’s hard to believe that whatever happened yesterday isn’t connected in some way.”

“I agree. But Blaize doesn’t understand what she’s signing up for. You need to tell her more about what’s going on. All the details.” She rose. “I’ll check on her. I’m not sure she’ll be up to lessons today.”

“That’s fine. I need to do more research anyway. I just wish I had more to go on.”

“Is there anything else I can do?”

“I don’t think so.” He stood and engulfed his cousin in a long hug. “Thanks. I’ll let you know if you can do more. For now, looking after Blaize helps.”

She hugged him back. “I love you, cuz.”
 

I’m lucky. Even with all that’s going on, I am lucky.

And I’d do well to remember that.

***

Blaize had woken several times in the night, each time coming to from some kind of weird dream. In every one, there was some reason to pull energy, to pull power, and each time, she had resisted—but then the dream ended badly for her. She fell from great heights, was hit by cars, drowned, and had been bitten by a poisonous snake. When she woke up at dawn, she felt just as tired as when she’d gone to bed.

An hour or two later, Tierra knocked on the front door and came in. She put her hands on Blaize’s shoulders and assessed her. “Did you sleep?”

Blaize nodded.
 

“Just not very well. A lot of bad dreams.” Blaize tried to shrug it off. “Want some tea?”

Tierra’s mouth twisted in sympathy. “I’m sorry love. What were they about?”

After a long exhalation, Blaize said, “I think something is trying to get me to use my power. I keep being sent dreams where people I love are put in danger, and a voice I don’t know tells me that all I need to do is use my power, my energy, to save them. And I feel if I draw on my energy, then something bad will happen. I don’t know why I don’t just use power to stop it—after all, it’s not really pulling power in a dream, is it?”
 

Tierra was frowning and biting her lip. “Your auxiliary is Ajna, and sometimes those who have Ajna as one of their energies can make things happen in dreams. It’s just another version of the dreamscape. We need to tell Cuinn about this urgently. It’s bound to be connected to what happened between you yesterday.”

For an embarrassing moment Blaize thought she meant Cuinn’s kiss, which showed just how off her game she was. Heat touched her cheeks and she turned to the kettle to pour hot water over a tea bag.
 

She spoke over her shoulder. “You think? I just assumed that yesterday was because I wasn’t very experienced.”
 

What did Cuinn tell you happened?” asked Tierra.

Blaize brought the cup of tea over to the sofa where Tierra was perched and sat at the opposite end, her legs curled under her, the tea on a table beside her.
 

“I’m not sure. Something about me pulling power too strongly? I don’t really remember.” She avoided Tierra’s eyes as she said this last, her hands worrying at the edges of a cushion.

Tierra frowned. “The two of you need to have a proper conversation. Considering what’s going on, there are some important gaps in your education.”

Tierra leaned forward. “I understand why Cuinn's doing it this way, to help give you the choice about whether you want to enter into a Maven-Adherent relationship. But I don’t think it’s helping.”