Chapter 47 Revelations
H is voice is so low and soft I thought it wasn’t aloud for a moment.
But his emotions hit me hard , the physical blow makes me light-headed, small black dots spotting across my vision as I quickly siphon them into me.
Whilst I regain my composure, I try to study his expression. His gaze is alight but his aura drowns him in shadows. The lights of the room have dimmed and I can hear the sudden scuttling of creatures.
His tense jaw seems to grind as he awaits my response.
“So can you,” I murmur.
We watch one another for a moment, but then the room cools and I feel his distress grow.
“That is irrelevant, ” he finally says, shaking his head on that final word. He continues shaking his head and I watch his silver strands fall over his eyes which are currently scrunched shut. “You’ve used it before.”
My gaze narrows at his sudden statement but I know I need to respond because the shadows have begun to creep forwards and my breaths are forming into mist. But I also know that’s not what he truly wants to say. I know there’s a question hidden beneath those words because I’d already been asked it before.
Did I control it or did it control me?
I take a slow, steady breath, waiting for his eyes to reopen, and then I nod. His shadows expand, the edges catching my boots and making me shiver.
When his darkness sinks into me, his terror about my answer does too, and I frantically add, “But I controlled it, it doesn’t affect me like it can others. I use it just like you. You saw me just then; I was fine, I didn’t lose control… it doesn’t make me a danger, I swear I can—”
“When.”
I can see the pain in his face and I’m desperate to erase it. Desperate to prove to him that melding minds doesn’t meld my own, that I was strong enough to have this power, that I didn’t need to be put into the Pit and locked away.
“When, Jasmine,” he repeats.
But I struggle to answer it immediately, quickly trying to remember when I’d last used it, when I’d needed to alter someone’s perception, make them do something they couldn’t—didn’t want to… which is when the memory returns.
I feel my eyes widen in remembrance of the guards in my dismal, little cell, smashing their heads over and over into the glass panes until bloody smears became rivers of red.
But that was different. Different to this.
Kacey was nothing like those men whose emotions were acrid poison. I could never truly control her, that type of control was reserved for the weak minded and cruel. But her, for Kacey, I could create pretty pictures, idyllic alternatives which eased her anxious thoughts. Things which my family said made me more than an empath.
Something more. Something that needed to be hidden.
“Jasmine.” He’s closer, I feel him before I see him. His metallic slivers are all over, curling around my forearms, clutching my waist. His once glowing gaze is masked in a haze of darkness and his brows are deeply furrowed.
As he repeats his question, his emotions continue to build and sour. “When?”
My eyes never leave his, magnetised by his gaze as it begins to twist into a storm of charcoal and mercury. My stomach suddenly feels heavy and I’m desperate to fill the thickening silence.
“Only when I needed to.” I wet my lips. Ezekial’s stare is so intense, so all-consuming, and his coils tighten their grip as my heart begins to race. “The first time I remember was to defend a patron. Then, during the attack at the club, on the Green Cloaks and... other times. I can’t remember them all— I just.” I take a breath. “Before this, the last time I used it was...” I swallow. “Those guards. The ones in my cell.”
I try so hard to stop the memory reappearing—but it’s too late.
Glass, silence, the girl, a bed frame, the guards. “Your knees”, blood, glass, more blood...
“Ezekial?” I try to call to him, but his eyes are closed, he’s lost to the memory now.
I stare, my breathing heavy, as his jaw grinds in a painfully slow motion. He’s watching that memory for the first time, repeating it over and over in his head, incessantly focusing upon the guards, their words...
Rage rips though me and I gasp, the immensity of it forces me to stumble back until I’m clutching the edge of a planting table.
“Shit, sorry,” he ushers, breaking his silent fury and closing the distance in two quick steps. His worried gaze traces all over me, fracturing the rage for a moment. “Did I hurt you? ”
“I swear I can control it.” I feel my eyes begin to water but I force conviction into every word. My heart is racing as I watch his expression mix with confusion. “I know what people think about mind melders, I know people think they should be locked away, but I swear I know how to use it, Ezekial. I saw you and I thought... I just wanted to show you, to not be alone with this part of me, to trust someone...”
“Jasmine.” Some of the burning fury flickers now, his eyes darting all over my worried expression as I await his judgement. “That’s not why I… I know you’re not a danger.”
I search his face, brows furrowed in confusion. “Then why are you so… angry?”
“Because I know what someone has to go through to get that type of darkness inside of them.” The fury returns, his coils tightening their hold to the beat of his heart which is beginning to race again. “And I’m angry that Kane didn’t tell me, he never told us what you… what they...”
I start to slowly understand. The rage, it wasn't because of me. It was for me.
“Well, I can kinda see why.” I try to break the heavy weight of his rage with my impromptu remark, try to mould it. But the fury burning in his blackening gaze makes the metallic colours look like pieces of molten lava. “But why does it matter?”
“It matters to me.” Is his immediate response, his chest suddenly rising and falling in deep breaths.
Although I don’t understand it, I still try—again—to ease some of his rage but it’s so physically palpable it becomes a heavy pressure against my chest.
He’s just so close. I can see the tendons pulling his throat, the slight stubble lining his jaw, the flickers of molten mercury burning in his gaze which is still watching me.
“I need you to pull back on your anger,” I say between a deep breath, battling the pressure his fury is creating whilst he does nothing to create more space. “Ezekial, this is too much for me to siphon, I don’t even understand where this is coming from, there’s no need for you to—”
“What did they do to you?” The venom in his question has the same reaction as a knife carving into my flesh.
I gasp at the ache digging into my chest and struggle to remain standing under his tidal wave of white-hot fury.
I feel his coils tightening around me again, latching onto my legs, worry now rushing into the mix and calming some of his anger, just enough for me to form words.
“I can’t…” I pant, taking another deep breath as I face him. “I can’t remember my past life, I can’t remember it, I can’t remember what… caused it.” I hoped that would bring solace, twist his fury, fade it into something more manageable, into one of concern and possibly relief.
But it doesn’t.
I warily watch as his hands slam down on either side of mine, barricading me onto the metal table I hadn’t realised I’d edged onto. His face towers over mine, dark strands mixing with the light, and the shadows of the room darken his harsh features as he eliminates all space. Our lips almost touching.
Then, his eyes flicker into complete darkness.
“But it still happened.” His voice is a terrifying echo which makes my own eyes erratically flicker in and out of colour. “I need to know who. I won’t rest until I break them before your eyes, until I have them begging for your forgiveness in bloody gasps. I need to see them plead for something you’ll never allow them to have.”
My heart races in a combination of fear and recognition.
I remembered this Ezekial.
The version which vowed death and destruction, that instilled a bone-deep terror in me before he was ripped away and taken to the Pit.
“ And when their light is almost out.” His nose skims mine as his words rumble over me like thunder and I shiver from the sensations. “I’ll make them relive everything over and over and over again. I won’t let them die. I’ll keep their minds alive until nothing remains but ruined matter.”
This is the Ezekial they’d all warned me about.
“Code red,” I send out to everyone but Ezekial. I have no idea if they’ll hear me because I can’t feel any of them, but I try anyway, I have to.
I flinch when Ezekial’s hand suddenly caresses my cheek, the action is so gentle in comparison to his deathly appearance and reverberating words. My small reaction causes something to flicker in his gaze but it’s immediately smothered out.
“I can’t bear to imagine what they did to you.” His echoing voice is haunting now, the pure sorrow drenching his words as they sink into me. His fingertips trace my skin so cautiously as his black eyes trace every feature of my face.
I’m transfixed by every part of him, my fear no longer present as my tendrils sweep out and latch onto the creature of darkness before me. I feel the cooling wave rush over me, I feel his own darkness calling to me and, finally...
I relent.
My vision sinks into darkness and the room turns with us .
“Or you,” I reply, my own hand reaching out to hold his, to hold the fingers still caressing my cheek like I’m fragile glass. “What did they do to you?”
He’s distracted by my question, my touch, his furrowed brows lifting slightly as he pulls back a fraction, and the pressure against my chest softens. “That doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me.” My voice doubles, echoing around the shadowy realm.
I search his face, desperate for this answer, desperate to know what they did to him so I knew what vengeance to seek out and...
My eyes latch onto the silvery scar, the one threading through his ashy brow and normally lightened iris which is currently burning as darkly as the other.
“Did it cause this?” Tentatively, I reach out. My fingertips coated in black as they smooth over the puckered skin. When I do, his eyes close and the pressure fractures even more. “Who did this to you?”
He doesn’t open his eyes and the fury previously emitting from Ezekial becomes my own, it spears into me and I feed it. A burning need to know who caused this injury, who caused pain enough to inflict this scar, this power, it scorches me.
Someone enters the room but I don’t allow them to enter this realm. My eyes dart around our shadowy barricade as I reinforce it, make the atrium nothing more than a blur of shapes.
I won’t allow anyone near him.
“Jasmine, I’m sorry. I lost my control.” My name upon Ezekial’s lips makes the fury flutter, his hand delicately grips my jaw and turns me to face him again. I’m completely enamoured by his darkened gaze which has lightened with wisps of silver. But mine remains unaltered. “But you brought me back and now, we need to leave the realm.”
“No.” I try to shake out of his grip but he doesn’t allow it, holding me in line with his face. I feel someone else enter the room, then another, and my panic flares. “No, they can’t come in here, they can’t get to you here. I won’t allow it.”
“This isn’t you,” he murmurs so softly, “these are my thoughts, my rage, this is my darkness consuming you.” His fingers caress my skin in touches so gentle I can’t help but lean into it. “You need to let us out.”
“No, I won’t let them in, I won’t let them touch you, I won’t let anyone touch you ever again.” There’s something wet rolling down my cheek, his fingers move it away and leave warmth in its wake. His gaze is so much lighter, so much softer, and his emotions sink into me like lapping waves .
Then someone else joins us.
“No!” I snarl. My power lashes out instantly, surrounding and engulfing the trespasser in violent vines of darkness.
I try to drown them, rip them from the realm, I force everything I have into that action, into that thought, I enter their mind and repeat the word over and over and—
“I killed them.” The impact of Kane's voice is instant.
My vines retract, slinking back to me and bringing a soothing coolness. Then I’m surrounded by it, thin lines of icy ink tracing every piece of my skin which cause me to sigh.
When Kane steps into view, beside his brother, the burning fury I fought so hard to cling to, the rage previously filling my lungs, flutters at his words.
“I killed them all.”
My sight locks onto Kane, his dark gaze boring into mine as I speak to him. “Did they suffer?”
“Yes.” The single word, the confirmation it brings, makes the fiery fury splutter. Then he steps closer, his coils slithering over Ezekial’s as I sink into the comfort his darkness always brought me. “But it will be nothing in comparison to how your inflictors will suffer.”
Even in this cooling bliss, my heart pounds at the beautiful, deadly threat and at Kane’s emotions. I’d never felt them so vibrantly before, always masked behind a heavy layer of shadow, until this very moment.
The pure conviction of his words, the irrefutable truth of what they meant, what they revealed about his feelings… it all cracks my darkness.
“Brother, are you grounded?” Kane’s depthless stare never leaves mine as he speaks internally.
“Just.” Ezekial’s hand never leaves my face and mine never leaves his, even as he replies to his brother, “You should have told me.” I watch the sorrow in his mercury gaze as the darkness dissipates completely from his sight.
My eyes continue to trace the crescent scar.
“Now isn’t the time. We need to leave,” Kane repeats Ezekial’s earlier words but his hold power, they coax me into listening as his aura surges around me. “The others are worried.”
My brows furrow at his words and I feel Ezekial’s fingers caressing my cheek again, bringing me back to him as he explains, “Julien and Sai.”
“I’ll let them in.”
“No.” Kane closes the distance between us, now his hand is touching me, he’s holding my chin up and forcing me to stare into his never-ending stare. “You’re not ready for this. ”
I’m about to interject, anger building again at his dismissive words, but his power flares around me and I’m falling into him.
It’s just me and him in this world now. Ezekial must have left the second my hold on him fell. Was I really keeping him here?
My chest aches.
“But you will be,” Kane assures me, his soft words ebbing the ache as he holds me in his arms just like the last time, just like during our training, his eyes peering down into mine and flickering with grey. “I will ensure that nothing , in any realm, will ever harm you again.”
The belief in his words and steady gaze smoothers out the remaining embers of my rage. I’ve become enraptured by his touch, his hands holding me like I’m too valuable to let go.
“Pretty words from a man who once wanted me dead,” I manage to whisper, adding a tiny flicker of a smile.
Even with his calming embrace, my heart races when his places me back onto something solid, ensuring our eyes are level before he speaks. He’s so close I can see more flickers of grey glinting in his onyx irises like black tourmaline.
“I was wrong.” I blink, urgently trying to match those words with the man before me. There’s more colour now, elements of the room—the atrium I remember—reforming into more solid shapes as he repeats, “I was wrong about a lot of things.”
More colours, warmth… It all begins to filter back until my skin feels sunlight caressing my cheek. Kane’s gaze lit by a ray of light, glittering like specks of diamond dust as I drown in his sincerity.
I’m unceremoniously dragged off the table and into someone’s arms. My tendrils try to react but delightful crackles rush all over my body before I’m submerged in a violet glow which halts the defensive action.
“Fuck, Red. Next time you send out a distress call, think you could do it before you go into avenging, dark goddess mode?” He smirks down at me, dimples prominent and markings intense. “Y’know, give me a chance to get here first? Trap me in the dark with you too?”
Sai suddenly tackling me from the table, his immediate questioning, combined by his devilish smirk, and power zipping all over me, after only just leaving the Dark Realm, causes a pivotal delay in my processing. Only now, I realise he’s holding me against his chest. My legs are wrapped tightly around his waist and his mouth is so close to mine, in front of everyone .
“Sai, put me down,” I hiss internally as my eyes bulge at him, then flicker behind to make my message clear .
He just laughs and the heavenly sound skitters all over me. “Daddy Darkness and Lord-Loses-His-Shit can go fuck themselves, I’m just helping to ground you, babe.” He somehow tightens his hold and the current running through me eases every ache I didn’t know I had. “How ‘bout I flit us out of here and you can return the favour, huh? I’ll let you ground into me all you want.”
“ Put me down or I’ll ground your head into the floor with my foot.”
He groans, it isn’t subtle or quiet, and my eyes become painfully wide as I squirm in his hold.
“Shit, Red. Don’t threaten me with a good time,” he curses the words in a hiss, out loud. “Especially when your thighs are wrapped around me so tightly. Fuck, move like that again for me, baby.”
I’m seconds away from fulfilling my threat, my tendrils rolling over his arms and powering my legs, when I feel warm knuckles caressing the side of my throat and everything stills.
It’s instinctual. I physically can’t stop my reaction, I can’t help that my eyes close from the comforting sensation, I can’t help that my skin becomes engulfed in a deep warmth that eases all my violent thoughts and soothes the nervous tension running through me.
That’s what I tell myself, anyway.
“Anchoring Ezekial during his shadow state is extremely impressive, Little Bird.” His deep rumble only increases the flames, even if the words mean absolutely nothing to me.
“You stopped Zeek from losing his shit,” Sai happily interprets when he notes my small frown. An annoyingly perfect, dimpled smile on his face as his icy blues glow. “You know, from going all scorched earth like the last time he touched you.”
“And I truly do not intend to overshadow this moment. However...” I feel a soft tug on my hood which makes my head fall slightly backwards. Now, Julien's deep wine red eyes peer down and into mine. My breath catches as he delivers me a small smile revealing the edges of his teeth. “Who does this belong to?”
He tugs again, tightening the neckline around my throat and the question sends a warning rumble through my body. I’m unsure if it’s from Julien's voice or Sai’s power but I feel a familiar slicing sensation, one I’d felt earlier.
“It’s just a hoodie,” I say in a soft reply but his deep red eyes never waver, shimmering with flickers of black, and neither does the slicing.
“Then you won’t mind replacing it with one of mine.” Sai’s voice holds a sliver of mirth but when I pull my head back up to look at him, I realise he’s serious. His vibrant gaze flickers with black swirls as they search my face before landing upon my lips. “We can go back to the house now or we’ll just take it off here.”
Is he serious?
“ Deadly. ”
Julien fills the space behind me until his chest is against my back and Sai pushes me even closer, I’m enveloped between them and our powers swirl around us in violent flickers.
“Something’s wrong.”
I try to seek out Ezekial but all I catch are the brothers’ backs as they head towards the larger part of atrium where we left Kacey. There’s no time to ask questions and I’m still in Sai’s arms as he immediately follows.
Until we see it.
Sai’s grip softens and I drop from him instantly. He and Julien take large steps in front of me, their bodies partially blocking my view in a protective stance that has my tendrils sweeping out cautiously.
“Is that…” I start, trying to search through the thick smoke now filling the atrium.
The atrium which once held a beast.