Aligning Stars (Fate's Intent Book 1) (27 page)

Zayden looked over and appeared bewildered. “How did you know that?”

I was ready to just empty my eyes of these building tears but I got up, my voice was quick but loud with demands. “Show me. Show me right now!”

“Are you all right?”

“Just show me!”

Zayden looked around but no one said anything. Jaylyn and Ruby probably didn’t even know why I was so nervous but they would in a minute.

“All right but only if you calm down.”

“I am calm!” I may have lied and tried taking a more relaxing breath, forcing my voice to sound normal. “I’m calm. Show me—please.”

I looked into his beautiful blue eyes and I was waiting for it in a way but when it happened, the more I began to fear it. His pupil started to expand until it consumed the whole of his eye and they were solid black. I couldn’t even tell if he was looking at me anymore but it only made the reality of it more terrifying and I said nothing.

“Oh—my.” Jaylyn muttered. “Adele?”

I was still, looking at him with a blank expression, trying to think that somehow I was wrong. “I’m hallucinating.”

“No you’re not.” Zayden said. “This is real and I can feel you starting to panic.”

“No.” I started walking away, thinking aloud. “It can’t be. It just can’t.”

“Awe, Adele! Isn’t it great?”

“No, it isn’t!” I turned to Jaylyn a few feet away from being at the doorway to my room and my voice was severely anxious. “This isn’t great whatsoever! It’s totally, completely and utterly not great, okay?!”

“What’s wrong with you?” Zayden asked while his eyes changed back. “How did you know what color they’d be?”

I couldn’t say anything.

“She’s seen it before.” Ruby whispered.

“Seen it?” Darius wondered. “When?”

“In her dreams.” Jaylyn smiled.

Everyone looked at me and they probably could tell I was a little on the edge by the way I was standing. I was shifty. I couldn’t seem to hold still like I was shaking all over from nerves.

“You’ve dreamt about me?” Zayden asked, sounding a little amused.

“No! It wasn’t you. I mean, not completely. It was a part of you obviously that I’m not really happy talking about right now.”

“You’re not making any sense.”

I don’t know what happened. My frustration got the better of me and I let out a long sigh followed by a loud voice. “A child, Zayden! A little blonde boy about ten years old with black eyes just like yours! I’ve seen him—a lot!”

“Really? That’s weird.”

“Like
maybe
he was your future son!” Ruby smiled.

I wanted to hit her. She wasn’t helping at all but for some reason Zayden didn’t seem that surprised or he just didn’t understand. “Okay and you’re freaking out why?”

I was leaning more on he didn’t understand and I was breathing hard, only getting more and more intense. “Because—I have rights to freak out as you say.”

“Why?”

What was I going to say now? I didn’t want to but something just made me come out with the truth and I didn’t know where it would lead me. I had to turn while I said it so if I was going to cry, no one would see me and I headed for the stairs instead of my room. “He was
my
son.”

I didn’t even stay long enough to hear or see a response. I didn’t want to think about it. It couldn’t be true. We were too different, from two different parts of the world. I knew this was going to be up to me. I had to be the one to stop it.

Chapter 35

Jaylyn

Adele walked out of sight and Zayden sat in dismay.

“Whoa.” Troy muttered. “Really?”

“It’s true.” I said. “We’ve heard the dream.”

“But it can’t be real. We’ll have a child together? But that plan was expunged.”

“Then you obviously don’t know about the General.”

“What about him?”

I looked at Ruby with a smile and she slowly started to answer with her own. “He gets visions—of the future.”

Everyone had their eyes on Zayden. He seemed even more in shock than a few seconds ago. “Like a gift? Are you saying that gets passed through generations?”

“I’m saying it could be possible. We’ve been open to believing in the strange and unusual.”

He turned his head towards the stairs and I could only guess what he was thinking. It was about her for sure but I was wondering if maybe he wanted it to be true. I could feel his emotion change, mold into something softer than I felt from him before.

“Go talk to her.” Darius said. “You know you want to. She’s out there barely dressed and is probably soaking wet by now. Just imagine it.”

Zayden rolled his eyes towards him. “Please. That’s the last thing on my mind.”

“You should still talk to her.” I agreed. “Find out why she really is upset as she is. Basically, see if we’re right. Then come back and tell us everything!” I really wanted to know but I couldn’t be the one to go up there. Adele would easily get out of talking about it to me but Zayden may have been a different story if he kept persisting.

He got up without saying anything and we watched him walk up the stairs.

“You think you’re right?” Troy asked.

I turned my head back with this wide positive smile. “Well, since the rape scenario is no longer valid, let me ask you this—doesn’t Zayden
need
a son?”

His eyes widened and he looked towards the stairs. We all wanted to know now but could only wait. This wasn’t our question to find the answer for. It was Zayden’s. I just hoped he’d get it.

Chapter 36

Zayden

It was still raining but not in a terrible downpour. It was moderate and the sky seemed light as if the moon was shining brightly behind the cloud cover but it was night for sure.

I looked through the rain as best I could and Adele was sitting down in the wet mud right about where we had a conversation before. I sighed to prepare myself and stepped out into the rain completely.

She had her knees brought into her chest and had her head resting on top of her folded arms. She must have heard me approach but she didn’t move. At first, I just crouched down to her, keeping my feet on the ground to hold myself up. “Plan on staying out here all night?”

“I don’t want to talk to you.” Her face was covered so she wouldn’t look at me.

“I don’t understand why you’re getting upset over this.”

Her head instantly snatched up and she had that stuttered panicky tone in her voice like before. “Please tell me that’s a joke?! You should be trying to kill me so that never happens! We’re at war! We’re forbidden to be together let alone have a child! We could get killed for that! It was probably part of your rape plan because I would be the one killed, not you but maybe that’s something I care about!”

“You’re making it sound like it could actually happen. I’ve ended that plan a while ago.”

“Oh, excuse me. You’re the one that’s been wanting to kiss me but I guess that means it’s because I’m not good enough to sleep with now.”

“What? No. Of course not. I just don’t get that because you had a dream about it—”

“More than once.”

“Okay. Yeah, but that doesn’t mean that it’s going to come true.”

She sighed and looked away, resting her head back down on her folded arms.

“What? They told me the General can see the future.”

She stayed exactly the way she was and kept her eyes off me. “Yeah, I’m sure they did. We weren’t the first to ever see Madam Carla. My father has been there back before I was born and got the
Dividing Foresight
. He has visions of the future while being completely conscious. He once told me something when I was just a little girl that I’ve all but forgot about until I kept having that same dream over and over. He told me that when I got older, I’d begin to see things too but only in my dreams.”

I don’t know why but it started to sound more real and I didn’t really know what to say.

“You don’t have to say anything.” Adele muttered. “We make our own futures and I’ll make sure this one never happens.”

“What if that’s not what I want?”

She looked over. “Why would you?”

“It’s bound to happen to me sometime. My father has always made sure I knew that.”

“Not through someone like me.” She turned her eyes away from me again.

“He wouldn’t have to know that.”

“But I didn’t see you. What if you’re dead? There’s a list of people that would make sure of it.”

“Your father?”

“He’s near the top but you’ve already proven you could go through him. He’s not the one to worry about.”

“Well, this is a late moment to find out you’re with someone.”

“I’m not with anyone. It’s just—”

“Whoever it is fancies you?”

“I used to think so but he’s leaving me here to suffer so I’m not so sure.”

“What do you mean?” She said it like someone could have possibly known what was happening and I didn’t understand it.

“Nothing. The point is he’s usually protective of me. Ryon would kill you for hurting me.”

“But I would never hurt you.”

“He would see it that way if you put a child in me. He’s really sweet but sometimes he thinks he has to protect me too much. He’d do anything for me and that even includes saving me from you even if I didn’t want to be saved.”

“And do you want to be saved?”

Adele looked back over. I wanted to know the truth because her words sounded like a lie. “I just want to go home and forget about all of this.” She got right up and started walking back towards the stairs.

I got up after her and followed. “Love, wait.”

She stopped just before going inside and looked at me. I was walking to her completely drenched from the rain and she didn’t move. “What?”

I tested her. I stepped closer until our bodies were almost touching and she didn’t push me away. “You know you won’t.”

“But I’ll still try.” Her voice was starting to crack like she was on the brink of crying. “We can’t—”

“We can do whatever we want.” I brought my hand up to her face, just trying to get her to see my way for once with my urgent voice. “Nothing will ever happen to you while you’re with me. I would never let it.”

She couldn’t look away from me. I knew that my words affected her but not like this. She pressed her lips up into mine and I was caught by the surprise of it. Both of her arms were tight around my wet bare skin and our tongues touched only for the briefest of moments.

“I’m sorry.” She backed me slowly away from her with a hand at my chest. I listened. I wasn’t going to force anything.

“Don’t be but I think we can both agree that we needed that.”

“And also agree that it didn’t mean anything. This is the last thing I need in my life right now.”

“No. It’s exactly what you need but it should come from me.”

“You don’t know what I need.”

“I seem to know better than you.”

Adele sighed and started to move away from me. “Come on. It’s getting late and I have a headache that I’d love to get rid of.” She stepped out of the rain on to the stairs and I started to follow. She dried us off, mud and all and brought her hands up to her head again.

“Are you all right?” I placed my hand gently on her back to let her know that I did care and wasn’t following to get anything out of her.

“Fine. They’re called headaches for a reason.”

“At least it sounds quiet.”

“Yeah. Too quiet.”

We reached the bottom of the stairs and it seemed the others had moved to the opposite sides of the room to the two beds while we were gone.

“Someone getting comfortable?” I asked.

Troy was laying on his stomach, facing the foot of the bed with his head rested up on his folded arms. His eyes were closed and Jaylyn was straddled over him, giving him a back massage on the right side of the room. On the left, Darius was sitting up against the wall with Ruby laying on her back in front of him as he rubbed her feet.

“Yeah, I don’t think this is what I was expecting to see when you said
quiet
.” Adele muttered.

“What?” Ruby tipped her head back and looked at us with her upside-down view. “You should be happy we’re quiet and not hounding you about what you talked about out there.”

Troy laughed and opened his eyes. “Smooth.”

Ruby looked at him and rubbed her fingers down the visible skin of her chest. “If you only knew you’d instantly forget about those blonde curls.”