Fae Chronicles 01 - Fighting Destiny (42 page)

He removed the gag from Larissa's bloody mouth and my heart dropped, everything inside of me screamed in denial. "No, oh God nooooo! Lari….oh God," he'd cut her beautiful face up in several places. He snickered as he sank his blade in and watched her come back, aware of what was happening, she sobbed and shook her head trying to move it away from his merciless abuse.

I met her eyes and I sobbed along with her as I fought the hold of the pins. He was cutting her open and once again I couldn’t help, I wasn’t strong enough to do anything with the pins holding me securely to the wall. I screamed and fought the horror of what he was doing. He whistled, while he cut my best friend open. He was fucking insane!

His body moved blocking my view for a few seconds and then silence reigned as he cut whatever it was from Larissa's insides, the noise sickening. When he turned around, I closed my eyes. I didn’t want to see, didn’t want to know what he had done.

"Beautiful," he whispered and then I felt his blood coated hands on my shirt as he cut it up the middle.

I opened my eyes and met his, "I'm going to get loose and when I do I am going to cut the flesh from your bones and every organ out slowly, starting with the ones you can live without!"

He snickered again and groped my chest. I couldn’t see Larissa, I felt the rage pulsing inside of me and yet no magic came from it, the connection we shared was now completely gone. Severed.

"You will scream for me, I promise you. When I am done with you, you will do anything I want you to. I will control your body and mind. Are you ready to scream?" He smiled coldly as his blade came up to touch my skin.

I felt the knife cut through my chest and he was right. I screamed, I'd thought I couldn't anymore—I was wrong, the blade sliced through my skin like freshly melted butter. I looked down to watch his blade covered with my own blood now.

He snickered, enjoying the sound of my screams as he pulled the blade out and licked it. He opened his mouth, to say something and before he could, he was gone from where he had stood in front of me. I turned my head and watched as a hooded figure in an onyx colored cloak attacked him, cutting and slicing him with a wicked looking silver blade.

Blood spurted up with every angry slice the hooded figure took. I moved my eyes to Larissa but before I could finish making them move to her mutilated body, Ristan was there blocking the way. "Move," I cried, but he ignored me as he placed his hand on my chest and dropped his magic to seal the wound.

His skin turned bright red, his eyes matching crimson as he spoke strange words that caused his hand to glow as he pressed it against my chest as he applied more pressure. "Ryder, she needs more help than I can give her here."

"Not…me, heal…heal
her
, Please, I need her, fix her. You can do it, please. I’ll do
anything
Ryder,
anything
. She my family!" I sobbed uncontrollably.

His eyes met and held mine with sorrow in their ancient depths, "She's already gone Syn."

"No! You're wrong, fix her…oh God…no, no just fix her. I need you to just fix her. Please, oh God, you have to!" I sobbed sagging as Ristan started pulling each pin out of my skin and then Ryder was there.

"Syn, look at me," Ryder took in the pins still protruding from my skin and pulled them free before he caught me and pulled me close against his body, "She can't be fixed Pet and you don’t want to see her, not like this Syn." I sobbed, my body shaking with each one as what they were telling me sunk in. I couldn’t do this, I wasn’t strong enough. I buried my face against Ryder as I screamed with everything I had, my body shook hard enough that Ryder had to hold me with both hands to keep upright.

"Ristan, stay with the body and clean it up, bring her back to the mansion when you finish. I need to take Syn back to Eliran," Ryder whispered but I pushed away from him.

"Where's Adam, he was here. He was with her! Oh God," I fought nausea and lost. I bent over and threw up until nothing else would come out. I felt comforting hands pulling my hair away from my face and as I looked up I saw Larissa's lifeless eyes staring at me. Her chest had been torn open and her heart was gone.

Everything inside of me closed down. Something broke inside of me and just stopped and I stopped with it. Sightless I sat down at Ryder's feet as his eyes filled with grief. "Make me not feel it. I don’t want to feel it. Make it stop."

He reached down and picked me up until I was cradled in his arms, "Find the boy and make sure you remove the body first Ristan, no one else needs to see her like this. She deserves better."

Ryder sifted us into the medical ward
again
. He said nothing as he placed me down on the sterile table. "Eliran, she needs you."

"Again?" Eliran said as his eyes scanned the damage, "Ristan did well sire," his eyes met mine and grew round in surprise to find them glowing.

I felt my life draining away. Everything inside of me just wanted it to stop. The pain. The death. I'd given too much, I just needed to sleep.

She sleeps, free from the pain that took her into this catatonic state. Broke her mind and ripped a hole inside her already battered soul. She had seen too much her mind broke, snapping —as the past clashed together with the horror of watching yet another person she loved be tortured to death.

"I want to know why the fuck I couldn’t feel her Ristan, only her fucking pain, how'd that sick fuck block me from her," I snap, I feel useless, something I have never felt before. Never want to again.

"No clue, I didn’t see this play out Ryder. Her future is unclear to me still, blocked. She's powerful and has a big part to play in saving Faery, beyond that I can't see anything."

"Fuck Ristan, I don’t care about the fucking future. I want to know why she won't wake up right now!" I explode. I hate the vacancy I see in her eyes. She's empty, there's no more fight inside her eyes and I hate it.

"She's catatonic, she has to heal from within," Eliran said as he walked into the room we sat watching her from. Adrian and Adam had both shown up along with their Guild elder.

The two men had wasted no time with questions. Adam had shook with denial and then climbed in the large bed we'd laid Syn in. He'd cuddled her against his chest as tears ran from his eyes. He'd lost his mate, I didn’t fucking blame him for needing to hold her, I didn’t like it either. They comfort her, even when she cannot feel them.

"I want a full research team on the metal pins. I want to know where they came from, how he got them and what effect they have had on her. And I want the information yesterday. Eliran, use the mage if you need to. I want him in pain and screaming to tell us everything he knows and why he went after Syn."

"When do you plan on telling them that Larissa's killer is still alive?" Ristan asked his eyes narrowing as he turned to look at me.

"I don't. Adam would want him dead. I need him alive to tell us who else he is working with. He wasn’t alone, he said the others would come—I want them all dead. I'll tell
her
when she's strong enough Ristan. Right now I just need her to wake up."

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

I hear them, their hearts beating. Hands touching, connecting with me, I can sense it all. But nothing makes sense. Nothing brings my mind back from where it has gone. I'm awake but nothing computes, nothing is real. Here there is no pain, Larissa is alive and if I open my mind…if I wake it up I'd have to feel it, have to admit it.

Sleep claims me again, I allow it.

I wake; Adrian is talking to me, trying to pull me from the peace inside my mind. I close him out. I don’t want to feel anything anymore. He leaves and Adam takes his place, he says nothing. He holds me and cries, it threatens to bring me out and I go back to the darkness.

Someone cradles me, his scent calls to me. It's Ryder, his lips caressing mine gently as he demands I wake up, that I come back to him. His hands comfort me as he holds me against his chest and I sleep, held in his arms. I feel safe with him and yet I shouldn't.

I pace inside my mind, knowing I have to come out sooner or later. It would be so easy to just never wake up, to give in to the blackness that takes the pain and holds it at bay. I felt the fracture, the crack inside my mind that I slipped into. It was seductive, the emptiness was comforting.

They take turns, holding my useless form, comforting it. I wish they'd leave it alone. Every time I need it, it refuses to save the people I love, every time. The magic didn’t come, the Fae inside of me failed to help me as well. I hate them both. Everything inside of me is useless. What is the point of having powers if they don’t come when you need them the most?

Adam lays down his hand, stroking my face and staring into eyes that see but don’t register anything. He smiles through his tears, choking on them. "Syn, you gotta wake up. I need you. I can't live without you too. She's gone baby. You're stronger than this. You’re the strongest person I know. I need you. Dammit Syn, I need you."

I close him out.

"Syn, you need to come back, you need to wake up and eat. You're wasting away. It's been a days now. We have to bury her soon, you have to be there to let her go," Adrian whispered as he holds my hand tightly.

I close my eyes and sink back inside.

Hands touch my face. I open my eyes as Ryder and Eliran stick plastic devices to my forehead and click on a machine. "She is in there, see these waves here?" Eliran speaks to Ryder. I go back inside, "What the hell?"

"What?" Ryder demands.

"It's like she just completely shut off, I've never seen anything like it. There are no brain waves. She's gone."

"Gone how?" Ryder explodes.

"Like she's dead, but she still has a pulse," Eliran says as his hands grab my face and searches it. I open my mind, his machine beeps, I close them…it goes silent. I like the silence of my mind. I go there. Hiding.

I wake up. Ryder's holding me in his lap. His nose buried in my hair. He's whispering encouraging words and then nonsense, words that bring me to the surface but won't allow me breech it. I'm safer inside. I'm not ready to break through. "I need you to wake up. Your friends have been mucking up my home. They refuse to leave, or bury Larissa. You’re strong enough for this Pet, I need you to wake up. I need you to stop shutting down, or I'm coming in there to get you."

I close him out.

Alden comes. He whispers and rubs my hands together. Comments to Adam about body heat, I'm not controlling it. I'm losing more than retaining now. I shut him out. I failed him too.

"Syn," Ryder's voice shakes me.

I turn around to see him standing in the darkness with me. He's dressed in his cloak blending in with my darkness. He steps from the shadows and examines me closely. I don’t speak, I don’t need words here. I slide down the wall of my mind to sit again.

He strides forward and does the same, sitting beside me, his hands finding mine and holding them. Comforting and yet not forceful. "Adam needs you Syn, he's grieving. They need to bury Larissa soon. They're scared and need you right now."

I turn and take him in, his eyes look tired. And his hair is a mess, as if he's been running his hands through it for days without brushing it. Dark circles surround his eyes as they flow over me carefully. Studying me. "I need you Syn, need you to help me break the fucker who did this. He's alive. I need you to come back to me, can you do it Syn?"

I can't breathe.

My heart kicks into overdrive pounding relentlessly in my chest.

I watched him die, I watched Ryder
kill
him.

I blink and cry out as everything comes back. The pain. The agony. Larissa is dead—because I
failed
. Tears burn my eyes and I try to hold on to Ryder's hand but he's gone and once again I am alone in the darkness. But now, I can see light.

Someone is crying, screaming with pain so deep, raw and utterly bare that it consumes and takes a hold of me. Hands pull me close as more tortured screaming erupts from within the room that sound like a wounded animal. My ears bleed from it. The pain is too much, the shaking is too much.

"What's wrong with her?" Alden demands.

"She's waking up," Ryder replies from where he's holding my tortured soul as it emerges from the depths of despair it had been locked inside. His arms tighten around me, his scent calming but nothing takes away the pain of knowing I failed Larissa and she died because of it.

I blink as feelings of pain wash through me. I claw at my mind demanding it let me go, let me out. The screaming in the room is me, it's my own. I sob, my entire body shaking against Ryder as he holds me against him. Adam is trying to hold my pain away with the bond but he cannot, he releases it with a shudder the instant he felt it.

"Put her to sleep, fuck, it's too much—too much pain!" Adam snarls, his body shivering from the pain he's tasting from inside of me.

I push away from Ryder and look around the room as the scream subsides. I fight my breathing and my mind as it tries to fracture again. I meet Adam's horrified eyes, he knows what I felt and I hate it. They didn’t tell him what happened inside that room…he knows now, he saw it when he tried to pull my pain away, it's playing on repeat inside my head. He shouldn't have tried.

The room is full of my friends and Ryder's men. They pity me for what I will have to endure, what I have to live with. "Where is she?" I demand to know.

"Syn…" Alden says softly as if calming a child.

"Fuck. That. Where is she?"

"She's dead," Ryder says.

"I—," my voice cracks and I shake it off. I fight the tears and the nausea that threatens to come out, "I know. Where is her soul?" I meet no one's eyes. I don’t want pity right now. I want to know where her soul is.

"We don’t know. We couldn’t find it." Adrian says watching me.

I meet Adam's eyes. He shakes his head sadly, I exhale and nod. It's okay. I didn’t want her to be released to the Fade. I wanted her to be born without this life, I wanted her to be able to live and grow old, without having to fight next time.