Enflame (Book 6) ((Insight) Web of Hearts and Souls) (17 page)

I could see Landen struggle with his words, half of him wanting to tell him that here he could not be found by anyone, including the one that would more than likely end any onset of a triangle between him and his brother. If Aden found his someone, Draven would never fault him for a past. The only reason it was a threat right now in Aden’s mind was that he was very available and Charlie had always been there. Now, apparently, that ‘always’ has stretched across time. But Landen had to swallow his own advice and keep that information to himself.

“Because hiding from your brother is stupid. Work this out with him,” were the harsh words he chose to use.

“He’ll lose control.”

Landen stepped closer to him, narrowing his eyes. “I saw your mother, your father, your Nana. They said Draven has been coached to remain in control. They also said that you have a concert to play. You can’t do it from here, and you can’t do that if you’re not talking to Draven.”

“You saw my family?” Aden asked, mystified. “The last thing on my mind is playing.”

“Maybe it should be the first,” I mumbled.

Aden’s eyes expanded, taking in what he could see all around me and Landen, what we’d been doing.

“Why there?” he asked, clearly seeing the historic home in New Orleans where we’d been for the last few days.

Landen clenched his jaw. “If I could, I would tell you. Ask them.” He nodded in my direction. “She told your Nana that one way or the other, she was going to bring you to her to say goodbye in a moment that was not rushed. If you plan to hide here or fight in The Realm, then look Willow in the eye and say your goodbyes so she can relay the message.”

Aden clenched his jaw. “I’m not hiding from anyone, and I’m not saying goodbye
. Not until I have no choice.”

“Well, you are not going to figure it out standing here,” Landen argued.

Aden glanced at Austin. “Take me back. I’ll go into The Realm from there.”

“Are you ready for this?” Austin asked him.

“No.”

Landen looked at Austin, then to Aden. “The e
ntire wall was not knocked down. If it was, you would be insane. Take what was meant to hurt you and use it as a weapon, not a curse.”

Aden nodded once.

“Let’s go,” Landen said to me as he held my stare and we sent our souls back to our bodies, which were sitting in the field of New Orleans.

Before I opened my eyes, I heard, “Who do
you think you are? Back off, mate!”

“I’m his brother!”

“I’ll be damned! I’ve been his brother longer than you have breathed!” Phoenix scoffed.

My eyes flew open as I felt Landen push me forward. I looked up to see him standing between Phoenix and Brady.

Brady stepped back, almost in disgust. “What happened to you?”

“An awakening,” Landen answered as the compassion Chara had instilled in him absorbed his soul at the sight of Brady.

I stood slowly, evaluating the heavy emotions I could feel coming from Brady.

“What’s wrong?” Landen asked.

“Where do you want me to start? Let’s see...you take off without a word...seconds later, I find out my sister is dead...oh yeah, then my daughter—remember her? Allie? Oddly, at the eleventh hour, no matter how awake she is, she falls asleep, longer naps each eleventh hour...and if that is not odd enough for you, Libby, Preston, and Monroe fall into meditation at that hour, too, longer each time. They’re slipping away. And if you still care, Donalt’s death was announced, the mourning was lifted, and Drake is in a power struggle.”

I knew then why Clarissa had forewarned me about this echo: she must have known the children were bein
g consumed by a deep meditation. They were our clock. My foolish struggle between Landen and Drake had caused us to be blind to this big picture, and because we were blind, the echo could not move past the one planet that could have caused us to expand into a powerful arm that would surely bring victory. We thought we’d won those past trials, but really Donalt had. He was winning now, in his own twisted way.

“I knew about this,” I stated.

They all looked at me at once, in obvious shock.

“Well, not completely. I had a dream with Drake. He told me that in The Realm he saw a clock stop, with Libby and Preston beneath it. Just before I saw Silas in The Realm, he said that everything stops at the eleventh hour, that it’s hitting a shift or something and the echo couldn’t move forward. Clarissa told me not to worry about anything. I was told that it was the past echo, that the only way to know if what I was doing now was wrong was to move through what we’ve planned.”

“Clarissa,” Brady stated, in obvious grief.

“She is not lost to us,” Landen said quietly.

Brady’s eyes rushed over Landen as he pushed his grief down. “What plan do you have?” he asked, glancing between Landen and Phoenix.

Landen started to explain everything we’d been doing, what had happened to him, but I wasn’t listening; I could see Skylynn leaning
on a headstone a few feet away and I slowly walked over to her, feeling the stares of Phoenix and Landen on my back. She kept her blank expression as I approached.

“He should be out by now,” I said to her.

“That’s fast. You are good,” was her dry comment.

“He was keeping his distance from his brother.”

“His twin brother,” she said firmly.

I raised my brow
. “So you were focusing on the wrong image?”

“Maybe a time or two,
but I rarely focus on his image. only his energy.”

I leaned against the headstone next to her, noticing how both Landen and Phoenix were more focused on
Skylynn and me than easing Brady’s worries.

“They don’t like you talk
ing to me,” Skylynn said quietly.

“I can’t feel Phoenix, but Landen is just protective.”

“He has every right to be. He fought hard for you.”

“I know,” I said with a sigh.

She glanced to her side at me. “I wouldn’t have taken you away from them. I doubt I could have.”

I smirked. “I know. A woman scorned can say and do insane things.”

“Scorned? You act as if you have been down that road.”

“Maybe I have.”

“In what life? He has always chased you. You were the one that was blind.”

“He was taken into The Realm a few days ago. I was more than crazy at that point.”

“What do you mean, ‘taken’?” she asked as her body tensed and she locked gazes with me.

“A girl named Bianca.
Landen thinks she’s a mirror. Aden and his brother, the girls with them, helped me get him out. That’s how I know them.”

“You know Aden?”

“I know Draven the best out of all of them. Aden seems like a good guy, though.”

“You see him like that because he is light and you are darkness.”

“Whatever. He has a balanced mind, loves his brother, and wants to free the damned souls.”

“Have you seen him play?” she asked me.

“I’ve heard him.”

“
Music...he led me to music.”

“What’s your story? How do
you have this connection with him but you have never met him?”

“I haven’t met him in this reality
,” she sighed. “I saw visions of when we did meet. I yearned for him before the visions ever came. I didn’t understand that. I used magic to figure out who we were, what this all meant.” Her eyes gazed forward. “I’m impatient, and I wanted to learn the craft faster than my mother would let me. I was so worried that I would never find him. In the end I put a divide between us. I became what I am. He was blinded to me.”

“I can’t feel you, but I see doubt in your eyes.”

She sighed again. “It’s not doubt, its worry. We all connect, Willow. I want to know why. I want to be past this hell, but it keeps pulling me deeper.”

“
You were in the other reality?”

“Briefly.” She smiled shyly. “Aden saved me, he saved
Guardian, too. They were friends then. Which makes what Guardian and I did all the more wretched.”

“Landen knew that?”

“I don’t think so. I wasn’t exactly clear on the matter either. But the more time I spent around Guardian, the clearer my visions became. I knew he would lead me to Aden. He was a life line I lost when he died to find you.”

I let out a shuddering breath. Realizing this was more than a web of spells we were fighting. It was a web of hearts and souls.

“Aden is fighting the same war, though. He’s fighting for his brother and his friends. You would have found him without Landen.”

“I didn’t know that until today, and I’m still not clear on how he is.”

“I don’t know either. I know he sees the damned, speaks words to them to make them remember love, but I think he’s been focused on saving his twin lately. They didn’t know he was dark.”

“How did he know how to get into The Realm?”

“Not sure. Something to do with a song. It opened for his brother. They followed.”

“A song,” she repeated.

“Right. Music runs through all of them, even Charlie, his brother’s girl. Her father was a musician, died before she was born.”

Skylynn stood and stared at me with wide eyes. “Charlie Myers?”

“You know her?”

“I know him.
Her father.” She reached her hands for her head, gripped her lavender hair, and let out a growl of frustration. She then let her hands fall as determination crossed her face, and she vanished.

Phoenix appeared at my side at that moment. I moved my head from side to side.

“Do you ever walk?”

“Are you calling me lazy? It takes more energy to appear than to walk.”

“Interesting,” I mumbled.

“What did you say to her?”

“Nothing, really. I think she knows the father of a friend of mine. He’s connected to that boy she’s looking for.”

“Name?”

“Charlie.”

Phoenix raised one
brow, as if in shock.

“Friend of yours?
”

“I’ve heard of him.”

“In a good way or a bad way?”

“Depends on the side you’re on. He backed away from what he was, fell in love with a light, then refused to take the power. Some think he made that act look far too easy to have truly been an Escort.”

“Really?” I said as my eyes raced across his image. There was more to what he said, but he wasn’t in the mood to explain it to me.

“What else did you say?”

“If you wanted to know, why didn’t you just come over here before?”

“Because girls talk. She wouldn’t have said anything if we were here.”

“Well, she didn’t say much.” My eyes rapidly moved across his image, trying to figure him out. “Skylynn was in the other reality.” I said in more of a question form.

He looked at
me as if I were insane, which led me to question if that story Skylynn just laid on me had any truth.

“Bloody Hell,” he muttered as a look of shock came over him.

“You all right?”

“Sunshine. I’ve been on this side for
a while. Its hard to call back details of the other side sometimes.”

“Was she from
there?”

“No.” he glanced at Landen. “She was
a victim. There was a bloke on that side that made sure Guardian got here the first time, when he was pulled back by someone who was clearly trying to hurt him, that bloke saved him. He’s saved Skylynn days before.” Phoenix became tense. “We were, are, Falcons on that side. We took in damaged souls, souls the rest of the world saw as a plague. We healed them. My family planned to take in Skylynn, we even brought her to the manor, but she vanished after one night. I’m pretty sure all hell broke lose not long after that.”

“You’re just now remembering that?”

“I told you details fade after time. I’ve been trying to figure out why Skylynn did what she did, why she cared so much. You just enlightened me.”

“What did she do? I thought you were mad at her?”

“Oh, I’m mad. Trust me.” He said with a shake of his head. “But the thing is, sometimes the best intentions lead you down the wrong path, sometimes they hurt people. That is what Skylynn and I have to contend with on top of all of this.”

Scarf girl. I’d bet my house that she was in the middle of what was going on with those two. I’d bet money she was Phoenix’s.

“Phoenix. Trust me when I tell you that it only feels like hell when you are alone. When you are with the one made of your soul, it’s still scary, but you know it’s worth it. If you don’t need to be here, then don’t be.”

“Sunshine. I need to be everywhere right now. That’s what I’m doing.
” He shook off whatever thoughts he was arguing with and focused on me.

“What else? Why did she leave like that?”

“The Charlie part made her leave like that, before that I told her how Landen got into The Realm, how a mirror took him.”