Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Dain
Igrabbed at my chest, leaning forward as I tried to catch my breath.
“Oh my Mother!” Jed yelled. “What’s happening? Dad! Dad, help!”
Anton rushed into the breakroom, all vamped out and looking like he was about to take down a horde of bad guys. “What’s wrong?” His speech was a little hissy and growly from his obvious attack mode.
Jed said, “I don’t know. He touched an invisible thing in the box, and now, he’s like, freaking out. I feel a shit-ton of magic surrounding him.”
“I feel it too.”
I ignored both of them, concentrating on the magic that was spreading from my heart out into my veins. It didn’t hurt, it’d just been a shock to the system.
It felt… almost like the magic itself was hugging every single cell in my body.
It was… pleasant.
Nice. Comforting.
But where the fuck did it come from? And why was it attacking me with hugs?
Something heavy in my hand pulsed, making me nearly jump out of my skin. I glanced down at it, expecting to see nothing, and I gasped again.
It wasn’t invisible anymore.
It wasn’t a dildo.
That was my first thought.
And thank goodness for that.
I stared at the strange clearish… thing. It was fatter at its base and sort of jagged, thinning out to a sharp point. The ridges were uneven, a few of them looking like scars or something, like this thing had been scratched up over the years. And it was definitely years old. Like… many years old.
I knew that with a surety I didn’t understand.
But how was that possible when the thing was made of ice?
It was… it was an icicle… wasn’t it?
For a moment, I thought it was some kind of stone, but then I turned it over and saw rings on the bottom, almost like a tree trunk, but… made of ice.
Huh.
It pulsed with power in my hand, and I sucked in a breath. It felt… living. Or like it had been living before it’d been cut off.
But was it cut off from a plant? From a tree?
My eyes widened. Could it have been cut off from a living person?
The second I realized I was holding some kind of… living thing, I went to drop it on the ground and fling it away from me.
But I paused.
Not because I wasn’t grossed out—because I was; who the hell gave someone a piece of a living being, even if it was ice?—but because I didn’t think I could part with it.
It wasn’t stuck to my hand, but the second I thought about dropping it, my heart squeezed tight, like it wanted this strange thing close.
What the actual fuck?
“Dain?” Anton’s voice snapped me to attention.
I stood up straight and faced him, holding the strange thing to my chest.
Anton took me in, his eyes lingering on the strange item for a long moment before his gaze met mine. “Are you alright?”
“I… I… I don’t know.”
“Are you hurt?”
I shook my head. “No. I’m… it sort of felt… comforting. Like a big hug.”
Jed gasped, drawing my attention. He elbowed his father. “Is that what I think it is?”
Anton sighed. “If you think it’s a snow yeti’s icicle, then yes. It is.”
“Oh shit.” Jed huffed.
“What? What is it? What’s wrong?”
Jed grimaced. “Um… I think you might’ve just accepted an engagement.”
My eyes widened in horror. “What?”