Shattered Promises 02 - Fractured Souls (18 page)

Every single one of my nerve endings tingle and my back stiffens as I jolt away from his nearness. I end up landing on Laylen’s back. Luckily, he’s strong and he flips us around, grabbing my hand, and pulling us to our feet.

I start to spin around toward the Faerie, when he grabs me by the waist and an overwhelming floral sent stenches up the air.

“Try anything funny,” Nicholas hauls me against him, “And I’ll have you out of here before you can even take your next blink.”

“Fuck you,” I say and bend my arms up so my fingers reach his hands, then I aim them downward and dig hard.

He doesn’t so much as budge. “Feisty, I like it.”

“Nicholas,” Laylen says calmly as he stations himself in front of us with his arms slightly out to the side. “Let her go now before you end up getting hurt”

He spurts a laugh. “Hurt me how? I can have us out of here before you even take your next step.” Keeping one arm secured around my waist, he holds up a crystal ball filled with rubies.

Laylen steps forward, but then halts, debating what to do.

“Wise choice,” Nicholas says, putting the crystal ball into his pocket and then wrapping both his arms around me. Our bodies are aligned completely and I can feel things that I really don’t want to feel… bulging in certain places. It’s disgusting and vomit burns at the back of my throat.

“What do you want?” Laylen asks with his hands just to the side of him. He appears composed, but I can see that he’s flexing his fingers, as though he’s considering taking a hit at Nicolas. He could probably reach him in a few more steps, the pillar being the only thing between us. However it’s still enough time for Nicholas to take us out of here and the last thing I want to do is end up alone somewhere with him.

Sliding his hand up my ribs and then my neck, he sketches a finger across my cheek. “I have what I want right here.” He dips his mouth next my ear. “Are the nightmares getting worse?” he breathes, stroking my upper arm. “Can you see the symbol clearly?”

I go rigid. “W-What?”

He laughs against my ear.

“You’re going to pay for this,” Laylen says in a low tone that conveys so much warning it actually sends a chill down my spine.

Nicholas strengthens his hold on me, his chest rising and falling as it repeatedly crashes against my back. “I’d like to see you try, you pathetic excuse for a Vampire. You can’t even bring yourself to drink blood.”

Laylen’s lips expand to a slow grin. “Want to bet?”

Nicholas laughs. “You’re so enter—”

Laylen launches forward so fast he’s nothing except a blur and, seconds later, Nicholas is jerked from my grasp. Laylen doesn’t bite him, but he does bring his fist up against the side of his head and knock him out cold. Nicholas’s body slumps to the ground and Laylen steps back, wiping the sweat off his forehead.

His fangs descend and then retract as if he’s deciding whether he wants to bite him. Then choosing not to, he slumps over, grabs onto Nicholas’s arms, and drags him behind the pillar.

“The last thing I ever want to do is taste his foul blood,” He says, standing upright.

“I don’t blame you.” I pause, watching Nicholas’s chest rise and fall as he sleeps off Laylen’s punch. I can’t help thinking about what he whispered moments before Laylen leapt on him, though. How did he know? Not just about the nightmares, but about the symbol? “We should probably hurry before he wakes up.”

Laylen nods and then takes my hand as we head back to the path. We walk for what seems like an eternity and the more time that passes, the more worried I get that someone’s going to discover us. I’m starting to get discouraged, which is a horrible feeling, when I feel it. A spark. It’s soft at first, like a delicate kiss, but it increases in intensity the further we continue to go down the path until finally my body is drowning in heat.

“Alex is close,” I whisper, glancing around at the walls and floor. “I can feel it.”

“What?” Laylen asks, studying me with a mystified expression.

I’m completely engulfed in feeling it again, so welcoming and familiar. I’ve never had familiar before and it makes me feel content. “I can feel him through the electricity.”

“The electricity?”

“It’s a story for another time.” I tug on his hand as I start to speed up down the path. “Now come on. We have to hurry.”

We run, following the invisible current of electricity, going further into the cave. With each step, the current grows and becomes more charged and at the same time I become more eager and excited. God, I’ve missed this. I’ve never really missed something before and knowing I’m going to have it back soon pumps adrenaline through my body at a toxic dose.

By the time we reach a door, the current is flowing so powerfully that I know Alex has to be behind it. I’m actually shaking from the energy coursing through me, it owns me, consumes me, possesses me to the point that nothing else matters.

I need to feel more of it.

I need to see Alex.

What I need is to feel like I’m breathing again.

I let go of Laylen’s hand, turn the door handle, and push the door open, starting to smile. However, what’s on the other side makes my mouth turn back down and my stomach churn. All the excitement evaporates and my eagerness alters to paralyzing fear.

There’s a massive crystal ball about the size of a football stadium flaring brightly within the enormous space of the cave. Attached to the crystal, solely by chains, are people. Alex is front and center, chains wrapped around him from head to toe, binding him to the crystal ball.

And he looks dead.

All of them do.

Chapter 18

They’re all dead. Alex is dead. I can’t breathe. I can’t live.

“Calm down, Gemma.” Laylen’s voice is soothing, yet distant. I feel my legs turning into rubber and the room begins to sway. “They’re not dead.”

I straighten my legs back up. “Are you sure?” I choke out while I stare at Alex’s slackened body; his shirt’s off and his jeans hang loosely at his hips. His head is tipped down so all I can see is his hair.
Is he awake? Dead? Alive
? “They look… he looks dead.”

“Yeah, I’m sure. The crystal’s collecting energy from them,” he explains, his hand brushing my back. “If they were dead, they wouldn’t be useful.”

I nod and then I’m running to Alex at a pace I didn’t even know I was capable of. When I get closer, I realize that not only are chains securing him to the crystal ball, but so are tubes. They’re embedded all over his body, sucking his life and blood.

I immediately start pulling the tubes out of his skin. “Laylen, can you break through these chains?” I ask as he moves up beside me. With each tube I remove, a hole and blood trail is left on Alex’s skin. They’re not too deep, though with so many, they have to be painful.

“I think so,” Laylen says, gripping onto the chains.

Alex’s eyelids suddenly shoot open and my breath catches. His normally bright green eyes are dull and he looks incredibly weak. I’ve never seen Alex look so weak. It is strange and heartbreaking as well as completely disconcerting. It makes me realize how much I like the confidence he portrays most of the time and how safe it makes me feel. I realize a lot of things at that moment; about me, about him, about us. I can feel something shifting inside me; chains breaking, my body drifting closer to him and farther from another.

“Are you okay?” I ask, cupping his cheek.

He opens his mouth to speak, but no sound comes out and his head bobbles around, like his neck is too weak to support it.

Laylen bends the metal links and snaps the chains like twigs. I reach up to help Alex and he falls onto me like a hundred and eighty pound bag of bricks. I almost buckle to the floor, but Laylen catches him and supports the majority of his weight.

“Excellent catching skills,” Laylen jokes, flopping Alex’s arm over his shoulder.

“Hey, I never claimed to have them,” I protest, grunting as I attempt to carry some of Alex’s weight. “Besides, I’m not a half-Vampire, half-Keeper who is freakishly strong.”

“Would you two stop joking around,” Alex says with a smidgeon of humor in his voice as he leans against me and I slip his free arm around my waist. “Can you get us out of here before we get caught?”

I start to retrieve the crystal ball from my pocket, but Alex shakes his head and then nods at the massive crystal ball exploding with energy, a enormous glowing orb radiating around the pallid, seemingly lifeless people. “Don’t use your power too close to this… it could kill you.”

I nod and we head for the door, Alex dragging his feet as we walk. Laylen holds up most of Alex’s weight and we move quickly, distancing ourselves from the gigantic crystal ball. Once we’re a safe distance away, I retrieve the crystal ball from my pocket while Alex works to hold himself up and gather his own balance. Laylen grabs onto my arm and I touch Alex, making sure they both go with me.

I’m getting ready to shut my eyes when the glass of the crystal frosts over with flakes of crisp ice. I hear a crackle moments later and I glance up just in time to see a stampede of black-cloaked Death Walkers storming our way, glazing the land with a sheet of ice and rapidly dropping the temperature to well below freezing.

I start to shake and chatter, the electricity simmering to a murmur as they ascend toward us, their yellow eyes glowing fiercely.

“Shit,” Laylen says when he turns and notices them. “Gemma, get us out of here.”

“I-I’m t-trying,” I chatter as I fight to hold my hand steady, noting the tint of blue my skin is taking on. The Chill of Death. I’ve experienced it once and I don’t want to ever experience it again.

As I attempt to find my energy and some sort of emotion to feed off of, I spot a blond haired, golden-eyed half-Faerie in the midst of the Death Walkers. Traitor! Not only does he play us, but now he’s also siding with evil.

I grasp tighter to Alex as his skin starts turning and alarming shade of purple. He’s too fragile, even with his Keeper blood, to withstand the cold and I need to get us out of here. I shut my eyes and picture Adessa’s living room, the purple velvet couches, the strange figurines everywhere, and the black and white checkerboard floor. Then I let my mind and body sync with the faint spark still thriving between Alex and me. It’s so weak, yet the emotions it brings out of me are more potent than any other emotion I’ve ever felt.

I want to hold him. Make him feel better. Kiss him. Touch him. Breathe in his scent. Feel him rocking inside me, being part of me, being connected with me in every way possible.

“Gemma…” Laylen’s voice is full of fear and panic. “Jesus, please...”

I hear a sharp noise like a thousand glass cups shattering against concrete and I open my eyes. Fragments of porcelain crack apart from the ground and fly through the air, unable to withstand the pressure of the ice.

My eyes open wider as the porcelain rushes towards us in a wave of sharp glass, the ground breaking apart. I hear Alex and Laylen shout out my name as the pillars snap in half and topple over, slamming against the ground and bursting across the ground.

We’re running out of time and soon we’re going to be sucked into the floor or taken out by the Death Walkers who are managing to avoid the opening with little effort, their feet hovering over the floor. Nicholas has disappeared and I wonder if he has gotten sucked down into the hole that’s forming.

Alex suddenly slides his arm off Laylen. Laylen continues to watch the wave of glass roaring closer to us with wide eyes as Alex limps toward me. My heart rate starts to still, my breath suffocating as my blood pressure drops with the temperature.

My breath puffs out in a cloud and envelops my face as Alex places a hand on each of my cheeks.

“Pretend they’re not there,” he says. “Pretend it’s just you and me and no one else.”

The look in his eyes and the delicacy in his words send a torrent of calmness through my body along with the desire to be near him. I can feel us being magnetized together as my body and mind connecting with the energy of the crystal.

I reach out and find Laylen’s arm as Alex continues to hold onto my face. I think I’ve done it, but a set of bony, stone cold fingers seize hold of my arm and the energy is blown out by a vapor of cold.

I scream as the Death Walker wrenches on me and my Foreseer power counters, strengthening. I feel like I’m going to rip apart and I’m not even sure if I’m still holding onto Laylen and Alex. My body becomes numb, brittle, tired, and worn.

I let out another scream as images pound through my head. Mountains… Adessa’s… desert… snow… lake.

They move so fast I lose complete control and disappear into the midst of them.

Chapter 19

When I open my eyes again, I’m lying face first in a field of grass. I push up, brush the dirt off my legs and arms, and then glance around at the lake, the cloudy sky, and the shallow hill as well as the stony castle near the horizon.

I start to walk forward, wondering where everyone else is when Laylen rises from the grass. His blond hair shimmers in the sunlight snaking through the cracks in the clouds.

“Jesus, how the hell did we get here,” he says then makes a repulsed face when he spots the grey stone castle towering in the distance. “And why here?”

“I’m not sure,” I say, stepping in front of him, the grass circling around us. “I lost control or something… the Death Walkers’ ice was making my power shaky.” I shield my eyes with my hand and glance around at the field and then the trees. “Where’s Alex?”

“Right here.” Alex coughs. He stands up in the grass just a little ways away from us and then hobbles toward us. There are dark circles under his eyes and he, of course, still doesn’t have a shirt on. The holes in his skin are more defined and his Keeper’s Mark is bright against his somewhat pale skin. His brown hair is damp with sweat and he looks like he’s about to hurl.

He spits in the grass and then hunches over, bracing his hands on his knees when he reaches us. “What the hell happened back there? And why was Nicholas with the damn Death Walkers in the City of Crystal?”