Chapter 109
Aurelia
Ichase after Xander with everything I have, my focus only on him and how fast I can make my wings move into the shadows. He can’t do this. I won’t allow him to sacrifice himself.
The air around that terrifying moving funnel swirls before me, violent and chaotic. I pursue it for all I’m worth, and when its winds draw me in, pulling at my huge body, I simply encourage it, powering right into its grasp.
Darkness swallows me whole.
I know Ghoul’s power; I understand the shadows he wields because I’ve wielded them too. But this feels like something more than any of us. As if Ghoul is just a vessel, a crack in the world that’s allowing the darkness to pour through.
The vortex spins around me, powerful, bitter, and dark with strands of that white lightning streaking like angry serpents.
I feel the vortex tugging at the pieces of me, scraping at my scales, pulling on something that is inherently me.
Fear crashes into my chest, suffocating as I crane my neck upwards to catch sight of Xander.
The end of his tail whips about high above me as he flies to the highest point.
The sight of him gives me strength, and I shove aside the animal instinct to flee, forcing my wings outwards and down against the current of the fierce wind.
Every wingbeat is painful as the residual venom of the bullet burns through my vessels, but I push on.
I’ve never swum with the current, and I’m not about to start now. I power upward, chasing Xander’s black scales, even as the vortex batters at my body, trying to force its will upon me. But I go where my dragon mate goes.
The force only increases as we reach the topmost point of the vortex, and a pressure like I’ve never known squeezes at my ribs. The roaring in my ears becomes painful, and I squint against the pain, the fear, the opposing forces to latch onto Xander’s tail with my teeth.
His big head whirls around to see me, snapping angrily, but the both of us get pulled by a force that won’t be denied. A force that feels like damnation.
My vision goes first. Then my hearing.
And it’s like death when I feel like my body has been taken from me and I am nothing at all.
Suddenly, I can breathe again, my lungs opening up to cold air, my skin freezing. It feels like dirt under my curling fingers as the pit in my stomach grows, icy dread opening up within me.
And when my eyes blink open, with terrible shadows licking behind her, I’m looking up into the face of my mother.