He nods as the car jolts to the side. I grip onto his shoulders, feeling a burn in my heart, as if something is trying to enter through my chest. I shut my eyes, picturing the grey stone castle. The car lurches again and Alex’s fingers dig into my hips.
“Gemma…” There’s warning in his voice.
I snap my brain into focus, picturing the peaking towers of the castle, the lake that ovals the ground in front of it. A shiver ices my blood. I sense the presence of the Queen. I feel death like a cold winter. Right as it consumes me, I take us away, leaving all of it far behind.
***
Foreseeing in a state of panic should be against the laws of the Foreseers. Because it doesn’t mix well. Somehow, I drop us in a tree. Plunging toward the ground, Alex manages to snag onto a branch. The sharp edges stab at my skin as I’m yanked to a stop, grasping onto him.
“Grab onto that branch,” he orders, giving me a gentle swing to the right.
I stretch my arms, hitch the branch, and grind to a halt, panting for air. Slipping my hand out of Alex’s, I hook onto the branch and swing my legs up, securing myself on top of a thick branch.
Alex heaves up and balances on another branch. “I’d like to know how you ended up dropping us off here.”
I catch my breath. “I have no idea, other than it might have been the feeling of death.”
He scoots to the back of the branch. “The feeling of death?”
I inch to the trunk, ripping away leaves in my path. “Yeah, didn’t you feel it?”
He leaps to a V in the trunk, extends his hand, and helps me to a flat spot. “Gemma, I’m not sure you felt death,” he says. “You and I’ve felt death before, remember?”
“I didn’t feel like I was dying.” I scale down the branch, my senses sharp to the sounds of the forest and the feeling that we’re not alone. “It felt like death—cold, empty, frightening. And those flowers represent death—or life after death, I guess. You really didn’t feel it?” My feet touch the ground as he jumps the last few feet, his shoes hitting the dirt with a thud.
“The only thing I felt was a lot of wind.” He plucks a fragment of glass from my hair. “And a lot of glass.” He pauses. “It was just a storm Gemma. And storms happen sometimes.”
We weave through the trees, hiking along the shore of the lake, in the direction of the castle. I can’t shake the feeling that there’s something following us, but every time I check over my shoulder, no one’s there.
“I know she was there,” I mumble, dodging a fallen tree. “I could feel her.”
“The Queen of The Afterlife?” Alex checks. “You know she can’t come up to the Human Realm, right? It’s forbidden.”
“Just because it’s forbidden,” I duck under a canopy of leaves, “doesn’t make it impossible.”
Alex scratches his head, at-a-loss for words. We make the rest of our journey to the castle in silence. At one point he takes my hand and caresses his thumb along the star on my wrist like he’s reassuring himself that it’s still there.
But what if it wasn’t? Would he still be my other half?
Chapter 5
“He found out,” I announce to Laylen as I arrive solo into the living room of the castle. The lamp is on and a fire crackles in the fireplace, lighting up the night creeping through the windows.
Laylen sets down the book he was reading. “Who found out what?”
I flop down on the couch and let my exhausted arms drape on the armrests. “Alex found out about our little rendezvous tonight.”
His face falls. “Is that why you’re covered in scratches?"
I glance at the red lines on my arms. “No, that was from a… windstorm.”
“Why did you say windstorm like that? Like you really didn’t believe it?”
“Because I don’t believe it was a windstorm.” My head falls against the back of the couch and I stare up at the domed ceiling. “I think the Queen of The Afterlife might be after us.”
“W-what,” he stammers. “How did you—again, what?”
I quickly give him the details of my dream.
“Son of a bitch.” His wide eyes look like pieces of blue sea glass. “I thought we were done with all that junk. You know, the death, the kidnappings.”
I shrug, picking the dirt out of my fingernails. “Maybe we are. It was just a dream. At least Alex seems to think so.”
Laylen sucks on his lip ring. “No he doesn’t. He just won’t admit it. But I can almost guarantee that right now, he’s upstairs trying to figure out if the Queen of The Afterlife can cross over.”
I glance over my shoulder at the hallway. “You think?”
“I’m guessing.” He rises to his feet, picks up the book, and tucks it under his arm. “Do you want to still meet up tonight?”
“Absolutely,” I say as we squeeze out of the room. “I have no desire to put my father’s rescue mission on hold.”
He gives me a small smile. “I didn’t think so.”
We part ways at the top of the stairway. I smack myself in the forehead, realizing I forgot to tell him that I invited Alex too. When I reach Alex’s room, I enter without knocking. The bed’s made, the ceiling light’s on, and the bay window is wide open, blowing in the cold air. I rush over and lock it.
“Alex,” I call out, hugging my arms around myself.
The bathroom door is closed. I know better than to walk in there without knocking.
“Alex,” I say, keeping my distance from the door. “Are you in there?”
“Yeah.” He coughs. “Can you come in here? I need your help with something.”
I step back. “No thanks. I think I’ll wait out here.”
The door swings open and fog pours out. From the doorway, Alex greets me with an annoyed look. “Really.”
“You’re in the bathroom.” I shrug. “How am I supposed to respond?”
He shakes his head and tugs me inside the confined area. The shower’s running and the heat fogs the elongated mirror. The porcelain sink is speckled with blood and muddy boot prints track the tile floor.
“Are you hurt?” I ask, noticing he’s grasping his side.
He holds up a finger. “Now don’t freak out.” He exhales loudly and yanks off his shirt.
I fling my hand over my mouth. Across his muscular chest is an enormous gash, bleeding profusely. “Why didn’t you say anything earlier?” I breathe through my hand.
He lowers my hand from my mouth. “That’s the part I need you not to freak out about… It just happened.”
My eyes scan the bathroom walls and the corner shower. “Did you fall or something?”
He turns on the sink faucet and dips a hand towel under the water. “When we got back, I felt this sting across my chest. When I looked, the cut was just there.”
I hate blood, but not wanting to come off as an unsympathetic jerk, I gently touch the edge of the cut, forcing back my gag reflexes. “Are you sure you just didn’t feel it until we got back? It looks like a piece of glass could have done it.” Actually, it doesn’t. It looks like a large, jagged knife took a beating to him.
“I’m sure it wasn’t from the glass.” He presses the wet towel against his chest and winces. “I actually felt when it cut me.” He points to the medicine cabinet behind me. “Could you get me some peroxide out of there?”
I open the cabinet and hand him the peroxide. He unscrews the lid and douses his skin with the bubbling solution, his face twisting in pain. He shoves the bottle back at me, every muscle in his body taut. I set the bottle on the counter and take out a roll of gauze. I turn my head away and hand it to him.
“I think it might need stitches.” He takes the gauze.
I fix my eyes on the wound and measure the severity. “Maybe, but I’m not an expert.” My fingers outline the gash. “Alex, this is deep. Like really, really deep.”
“I know,” he says. My hand begins to fall, but he traps it against his rock-hard chest, blood leaking out and staining the fiery Keepers mark circling his ribcage. “That’s why I need you to go in the basement and get the first aid kit.”
I nod and leave him in the bathroom to strip off his clothes and climb in the shower. The basement is full of cobwebs tangling the ceiling beams and dark corners. There are narrow rows of shelves. I search them, looking for a white box. I spot it at the top. Planting my sneakers on the bottom shelf, I prop up and snatch the box. My fingers bump a glass surface. A small ball rolls off the shelf, crashes against the cement floor, and splits in half. I step down and pick up the pieces, anger snarling in my veins.
“He said he didn’t know where it was,” I mutter, turning the pieces over. The glass sparkles with a teal shimmer. “The Crystal of Limitation—he said we’d be better off finding another way.”
Clutching the broken halves and the first aid kit, I stomp up the stairs and into the bathroom that connects to Alex’s room. He’s in the shower, the curtain drawn closed, but I don’t care.
I chuck the kit on the counter loudly to get his attention. The curtain inches open, and Alex peeks out, dark hair dewed with water, a wicked glint in his eyes.
“Want to join me?” he asks with a mischievous arch of his eyebrow.
I set the sections of the crystal on the countertop and his face falls.
“Gemma, I can explain,” he says hastily.
“I don’t want to hear it.” I storm out the door. The water shuts off and by the time I step over the threshold, his hand comes down on my shoulders.
He whirls me around to face him. A towel rides low on his hips, water drips down his solid chest, and his eyes sting with fire. “Would you let me explain first before you go stomping off?”
I’m flustered by the sight of him half-naked, but refuse to surrender my rage. I fold my arms and impatiently wait.