Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 115347 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 461(@250wpm)___ 384(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 115347 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 461(@250wpm)___ 384(@300wpm)
So. To save her loved ones and the realm itself, all Viori had to do was die? When she’d only now begun to live?
“I’ll do it. I’ll save the day,” she announced, only to gasp. An image flashed through her mind. Then another and another. She cried out, clutching her temples and pulling her hair. Every image featured someone she loved dead or dying. Micah. Kaysar. Cookie. Even Amber. Graves. John. Drendall. Oh, look. There was Jareth and Pearl Jean. The orphan girl. Her parents. The images flashed again and again. “Make it stop. Make it stop, make it stop!” So much pain. So much blood. So much death.
Micah’s warmth enveloped her. “I’m here, Red. I’m here. Breathe with me. I think Fayette is pushing images into your mind. But they aren’t real. Believe nothing you see. Know that she cannot sustain this type of projection for long. It’s painful for her, and she’ll eventually drain. This will stop soon.”
“She can twist the truth, yes,” Viori cried, “but that doesn’t mean she’s doing any twisting right now.”
“Make this cease now!” Kaysar demanded. “Viori, calm yourself. Sleep.”
But she didn’t sleep. She heard the compulsion in his voice, felt the incredible power of his glamara, but she experienced no urge to obey.
“Viori,” Micah said, gentler with her than usual. “You told me to trust you. Very well. I will trust you if you will do the same for me. Believe me rather than a treacherous oracle.”
He kind of—definitely—had a point. But the images kept coming and coming and coming. Pain. Blood. Death. So much death. Emotions followed, and she couldn’t halt the deluge. Fear turned to panic, and panic turned to hysteria.
“Viori,” Micah repeated, and this time he used the harshest, coldest voice she’d ever heard.
“I trust you,” she rasped. Hearing the words helped. She did. She trusted him. He had always helped her, never hurt her. Never lied to her. Calm infiltrated the panic, which downgraded to fear. The fear faded...
“Good. Now sleep, Red,” he commanded, and something inside her stood to attention. “Sleep for me.”
Yes. A short rest might do her a world of good. A cloud of black descended over her mind, and she knew nothing more.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
MICAH CAUGHT VIORI as she sagged in his arms and hefted her slight weight against his chest. All the while, shock bubbled in his heart and fury boiled in his veins. She had chosen him. Kaysar had failed to calm her, but Micah had succeeded. She might have meant what she’d said; she might love him. While she’d given him the words, a part of him hadn’t dared to believe. Before, he’d considered himself an idiot. A coward. A lovesick fool. But...
If she loved him as much as he loved her—he sucked air between his teeth. He did. He loved her. He loved her, and Fayette and Norok dared to attack her. Micah’s fury overtook his shock. The warrior and oracle did not deserve death. Only eons of pain and suffering. But in the end, death was what they’d get. That, he wouldn’t compromise on. No backup plans. No alternative path. He needed to put an end to this, and he would settle for nothing less.
Kaysar looked from Viori’s calm, even features to Micah’s ironhard expression, then hissed, “Norok and the oracle die.”
“Yes,” he agreed, earning a look of grudging respect. “I will stop at nothing to get this done.” Their war was with him, not with his wife. Why attack her here and now? To provoke an attack as soon as possible? Wish granted. “They die today.”
Do no harm to the innocent. Protect what’s yours. Always do what’s right. Never be without a backup plan.
Rules he’d lived with all his life took center stage in his mind. Norok and Fayette were not innocent. They were not right, and they were not his. They’d allowed their hatred and bitterness to order their steps and direct their paths. Something Micah had been dangerously close to doing himself before Red had entered his world, saving him in a thousand ways.
“How do we prevent Amber’s visions from coming to pass?” Cookie asked, nuzzling into her husband’s side.
Micah didn’t know the answer. The image of his broken, beaten body flickered in his mind. He wanted to live. Demanded the life his wife had promised with her vow of love. Determination infused every muscle, every bone. Nothing less than a true marriage would satisfy him. So die? Now? No!
A new image hit him like a physical blow. A repeat of the first one he’d seen. Viori, held in Ragdar’s arms, limp and splattered with blood. Every muscle in Micah’s body tensed.
“Fayette has turned her sights to me,” he grated.
“Let’s see if I can distract the hag while you guys figure something out.” Wearing an eager smile, Amber popped her knuckles and rotated her head from side to side. “I’ve been practicing.”