Chapter Twenty #3
I didn’t want to touch it. If my father had left this for me to find, he’d imprinted something on it.
My ability to cycle through a person’s memories and their mind came from him.
I was average at it at best. My father was an expert.
Nothing like the Memory Wraith, but he could place a memory on an item, or manipulate a memory so that it was a twisted version of the truth.
I knew he’d probably done it to me over the course of my childhood.
I never knew for sure and he was never going to tell me that’s what he’d done, but if he was comfortable enough to kill me over and over again, then he’d probably been absolutely fine with manipulating a memory or two.
“He always said my mother was a healer, and that’s where I got my gift from, but now I’m not so sure.”
“Why?”
“Because how can I be a Shadow Witch? Where did that come from? My father definitely isn’t one, most of his magic is manipulative.
My mother was a healer, and an enchantress, like Dara, but I’m neither of those things.
All my power is tied to me and my lifeforce.
It’s never been boosted by the elements or a coven but is that just a pre-cursor to having power over life and death? To being able to go beyond the veil?”
Hands cupped my jaw and Byron tugged my gaze away from the necklace and to him. “Wilder, it’s okay. Whatever the answer is, it will be okay. Do you trust me?”
“Yes.” The answer came easily this time. I did trust Byron. With my life, my heart. With everything.
“Then use me to ground you. I’m your tether, I won’t let you get lost in whatever your father has left on there.”
“Do you think that will work?” I still didn’t have any clue about what to do with a human tether. I was acting completely on instinct when it came to Byron and my magic.
He shrugged and dragged his hand down my arm to grab my hand. He placed my palm on his chest and I felt the steady beat of his heart beneath my fingers. “I don’t know. Why don’t you try to make a connection? Close your eyes and see what you can feel?”
“I don’t know…”
He squeezed my hand. “You can do this, Wilder. I know you can.”
I raised my eyebrow at his confidence but if he thought I could do it, then I would damn well give it a try.
I closed my eyes and focussed on the steady rhythm of his heart, letting the slow thuds calm the chaos and doubt in my mind.
I called my magic to the surface, feeling its warmth burst to life behind my solar plexus.
It travelled down my arm to the point where my fingers connected with Byron, and I felt it hesitate.
I encouraged it with a little push and then felt it surge into Byron, connecting us like two sides of a bridge.
Byron gasped at the invasion and an image of a beautiful white sandy beach popped up in my mind. “What can you see?”
“An ocean, as blue as your eyes. A small dock and a fancy looking little boat.”
“That is actually a fancy yacht, but sure, we’ll call it a little boat,” Byron replied with amusement lacing his tone.
“Is that your island?”
“Mm-hmm, that’s where I’m going to take you when all this is over.”
God, it looked like heaven. The image was so clear I could almost taste the salt of the sea on the breeze. I opened my eyes and found Byron watching me with a mixture of fascination and desire. It was so intense, it sent a bolt of lust straight to my groin.
“Does this feel as intense for you as it does for me?” I asked.
He frowned in thought for a moment, his eyes flicking between mine.
“It’s strange. It’s like I can feel you, in a similar way that I can feel my twin.
I can sense you. Your thoughts, your feelings.
” His voice dropped to a rasp, and a smirk curled the corner of his mouth.
“Your desire. What does it feel like for you?”
“Like an ocean breeze. Calm and cool, but with a little threat lingering beneath it. Like it could turn into a tornado at any given moment.”
Byron huffed a small chuckle at that and then looked back down at the necklace. “So, feel like seeing what your dear ol’ pops left for you?”
I swallowed dryly and nodded. “No time like the present, I guess.”
“Talk me through what you see and use me to tether you to here. I’ll make sure you come back, Wilder.”
Trust me.
He didn’t say the words out loud, but I could feel them in the weight of his gaze.
“Okay. Let’s do this.” I reached forward and placed the tips of my fingers on the diamond drop.
Magic fizzled beneath my fingertips and I was instantly sucked into one of my mother’s memories.
I was seeing it from her perspective, living it as she had.
Her heart was racing, fear and adrenaline making her stomach churn and her hands tremble.
“What can you see?” Byron asked, his voice distant.
“It’s my mother, she’s scared. She’s looking for my father and heading towards his study.
She calls for Lawler but he doesn't reply. There’s the sound of a baby crying.
She stops, confused, but takes a deep breath and heads into the study.
” I could feel her fear like it was my own.
Bile rose to the back of my throat but I swallowed it down.
Byron pressed my hand tighter, pushing more of his calmness through our tether. “Go on.”
“My father is standing there, arms cradling a small bundle, and she instantly knows what it is. She’s a mess of anger and indignation. Humiliation and grief. She screams at him and he gets angry. He’s so angry. His face is all twisted and his words fly at her like venom.”
“What does he say?”
A sob burst from my chest as I felt her pain. “He tells her to raise the child as her own, but she won’t do it. She won’t raise some whore’s child in her home.” Nausea washed over me and I gripped Byron tighter. “He puts the baby down and turns on her, hurling a shock of electricity at her.”
Pain erupted through my chest as if I were feeling it alongside her and I cried out at the sudden jolt. Byron ran his fingers through my hair, keeping me from surrendering to the pain.
“The baby is screaming and she can’t stand it.
She wants to know whose it is, where the baby came from and my father says that he’ll be his golden goose.
His ticket to fame and fortune. ‘Who is he?’ she screams, but he just laughs in her face.
Fuck, I can’t breathe. His hands are around my neck.
I’m clawing to get them off but he’s too strong.
I know it’s useless, but I shoot him with a burst magic.
It’s enough to dislodge him from my neck but he’s stronger than me.
He’s always been stronger than me. I scramble across the floor, my nails breaking in the wood.
Hands clasp my ankle and he pulls me back to him, rolling me over. ”
A sharp pain sliced across my stomach, and I yelled out in agony, my knees buckling.
“Wilder, it’s not real.”
But it felt real. I could feel the knife twisting in my gut as if my father had stabbed me.
“He’s watching me. Watching the life fade from my eyes.
He says I’m weak and pathetic. That I could never give him what he wanted.
That he had to… God… he had to take it from the woman he found.
From the Shadow Witch. Then he walks away.
The images are fading. I’m dying and he turns his back on me, picking up the baby and leaving me to die alone. ”
I ripped my hand away from the necklace, stumbling back a few paces as I readjusted to being in the real world. Byron’s hands gripped me fiercely, and they were the only thing keeping me from collapsing to the floor.
“Hush, baby. I’ve got you,” he said as he brushed the strands of my hair behind my ear. “You’re okay. You’re safe.”
I heaved a sob and fisted my hand in his shirt. “I’m going to kill him. I want to kill him, Byron. I want to make him suffer like he made me and all those other people suffer.”
Hands held my face firmly and a sea of blue filled my gaze. “We can do that, Wilder. We can kill him. I’ll help you make him scream and beg for mercy until his last breath leaves his body.”
That was hot.
It shouldn’t have sounded hot. There was nothing sexy about the horrors I’d just witnessed but I was running on fury and adrenaline, rage and pain. “Ask me to run.”