I don’t wait to see the true extent of the damage. I’m too much of a coward for that. Instead, I take the stairs and flee the scene of my crime.
Terrified of the wrath brewing inside me, I run like the wind, streaking through the hallways like a watery shadow. The castle’s many servants cower as I blow past, the horror etched on their pale faces plain to see. Only a monster causes those reactions. Maybe I deserve to be locked up, chained to iron, and kept in a tower.
Skidding to a halt by the double doors to my suite, I throw them back and retreat inside. I try to ignore the terrified voices echoing in the hallways. I cover my ears and claw at my hair. I do everything, but the terror never quells. Not in me and not in them.
A shrill squawk from behind startles me. I spin to find Kes beating her golden wings at me, talons exposed. One look at the alarm in her eyes, and I scream in frustration. She has to leave. She’s not safe.
Without thought, I raise a hand and catch her about her breast. The strike sends her flailing across the room. She crashes through the doors in a plume of feathers and terrified twittering.
The glass windows shudder with each of my ragged breaths. Consumed by the rage in me, I can only watch, unable to breathe, unable to think, unable to stop it.
Another growling exhale brings on the sickening sound of glass cracking. I let out a terrified cry, then cover my ears.
The windows shatter before I can fully protect my head. A few shards scratch the skin of my cheek. The wind circulates through the now broken windows, but it doesn’t matter how much I gulp down the air, I still can’t breathe.
Wind howls, furniture scatters, things smash against the walls, but all I can do is hold desperately to the barest shred of my sanity . . . to my humanity . . . if I even have any of that left. It’s just as much an illusion as everything else in this twisted story.
“Is this what you want? Is this what I am?” I scream into the chaos, unsure whom I actually address. “Make it stop! Please, make it stop.”
But it doesn’t stop, and I can’t figure out how to make it. They’ll have to take me out, like a crazed animal. But maybe I deserve that.
“Lexi!”
That voice. It means something.
Arms wrap around me, one secure around my waist, the other across my chest. A solid and unmovable force melds against my spine. It holds against me. It gives me form, and suddenly, I’m not spinning out of control in a dark abyss.
“It’s okay, Lexi.” The voice, soothing, masculine, trickles through the roar in my ears. The command authoritative but not controlling. I listen like my life depends on it. Truthfully, it probably does.
“I’ve got you. Don’t be afraid. You’ve got this, sweetheart.”
Killian.
I want to shout his name, but I still can’t find my breath. I’m choking on the pain, but he holds me tighter still.
He gives me a firm shake. “Breathe, Lexi, just breathe.” His lips scrape at my ear, his breath hot on my neck. His stubble grazes my cheek. His lengths of hair tickle me.
I trust all those little things.
He is real. He won’t let me go.
Killian’s palm spreads across my chest, the gentle force pushing me against his so I feel his steady breath. It rises and falls, unfazed and entirely unlike the erratic pattern of my own. I breathe in deep, matching the pressure of his hand on my chest, and like magic, my lungs open and fill with calming air.
I focus on nothing but the steady rise and fall of Killian’s chest. The perfectly rooted sound of his beating heart creating a calm rhythm that makes everything slow down.
“It’s okay,” he keeps promising me, a tinge of exhaustion in his voice. “I’m right here. I’ve got you. You’re safe.”
“Don’t let me go.”
I find I’m trembling when the initial surge of energy ebbs away. It leaves me as weak and listless as the tiny droplets of rain that seep tiredly from the window ledges. It’s rather unnerving how powerful water can be in one moment and how utterly still and ineffectual in the next.
“I’m not letting go, Lexi. I never stopped.” He swears it, but I feel myself slide through his grasp.
Instead of letting me collapse to the ground in my exhaustion, he keeps his promise. We both fall together, or more so, he guides me to the ground, pillowing my landing. I’m a dead weight in his arms, and he gradually gives way, carefully keeping my head protected on his forearm as I lie pinned beneath him.
The two of us breathe deeply, our foreheads touching. His beautiful green eyes shine with vibrancy through the darkness of this terrible place, and I register he must’ve expended some power of his own to curtail the chaos of mine. I reach up my fingertips to touch his cheek.
“You didn’t let go,” I say, my voice all horrible and husky.
“Neither did you,” he says, his voice something above a breathless whisper.
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