Chapter 49 Homecoming
Homecoming
I tumbled butt-first onto the grungy taupe carpet of my apartment, missing the coffee table by inches.
In seconds I was on my feet again, reaching for the golden circle of light that had spit me here, but it was already shrinking, folding in on itself.
“Wait!” I said, reaching inside myself for whatever power I’d used to open it in the first place. But it didn’t listen to me. The portal just kept getting smaller and smaller, giving me no glimpse as to what might be happening on the other side.
Octavian and Alastor—and Radven, if by some miracle he was still alive—were probably fighting for their lives. Not only did they have a pack of vulgen to contend with, but also whoever—or whatever—had been causing those increasingly large spikes of essence nearby.
While I—the reason for all of this—was safe at home. In my small, ordinary apartment, with the pale, gray light of pre-dawn seeping through the windows and a handful of birds chirping outside.
This was wrong.
The golden circle was smaller than a basketball now, and it was shrinking fast. Once again I reached inside myself, trying to grasp whatever power I’d used to create the bridge in the first place, but it just slipped through my fingers.
Desperate, I did the only other thing I could think of—I tried to grab the portal and hold it open manually.
My fingers tingled as they moved through the golden light. The portal was almost tangible. In some places I could feel nothing at all, but in others it felt like trying to grip water. Or melted gelatin.
But I couldn’t hold it open. I pushed my right hand further in, feeling for anything I might be able to grasp, but the light still shrank around me.
And then, with a sickening suddenness, it squeezed down on my hand.
I yanked my arm immediately, but the portal tried to keep it, the golden light suctioning to my skin like a vacuum.
Oh god, I’m going to lose my hand. Nausea hit me as the light collapsed in on itself, squeezing my hand so tight it felt like my bones were breaking. I screamed, continuing to yank back with all my strength, cursing myself for being so stupid.
And then, with a soft pop! it abruptly released me.
I fell back, cradling my throbbing hand against me. Despite the pain, nothing looked broken, but when I thought of what had almost happened…
Another wave of nausea hit me, and I stumbled into the bathroom—reaching the toilet just in time to throw up bile.
With a groan, I sank down onto the laminate tiles. I had nothing left in me. I was drained in every sense of the word, and I wanted nothing more than to curl up on the floor and sob myself to sleep.
This is wrong, I kept thinking. No matter how many times I tried to tell myself that I’d done the right thing by coming home, that this was what was best for the brothers and for Therador, I couldn’t make myself believe it. This didn’t feel like helping them—this felt like running away.
Nausea hit me again, and I curled over the toilet, even though there was nothing left to throw up.
This is wrong.
I shouldn’t have left them. Shouldn’t have let Octavian push me through the portal.
I could have helped them. It would have taken a few minutes to build up enough essence to do anything, but without the restriction of the pearls I could have blasted all of those vulgen away at once, or possibly even taken on a member of the Circle if I’d had the chance.
Don’t be an idiot, said the voice of reason in the back of my mind.
If you’d tried to use essence back there, there was a good chance you would have hurt one of the brothers in the process.
You still have no idea how to actually use your power.
You were just in the way. At least now you’re not a burden or a distraction to them anymore.
Logic, unfortunately, offered little consolation. I lowered myself onto the floor completely, my cheek cradled on the scruffy bathmat.
I must have passed out after that, because the next thing I knew I was jolted awake by a knock at my apartment door.
Now? Really? I never had visitors. Why were people suddenly showing up at my door when I felt like crap and was deep in a cycle of self-flagellation?
Probably just a lost delivery guy or something, I thought, rubbing the side of my face.
I had few close friends around here—at least none who’d feel comfortable enough to show up at my door with zero notice—and I’d barely said two words to any of my neighbors since I’d moved into the building.
This felt like exactly the sort of situation where I was completely justified in pretending I wasn’t home.
Decision made, I laid my head back down. When the nausea and pain passed, I’d figure out what to do next. But until then, I was just going to close my eyes and breathe.
The knock sounded again. Louder this time.
If I’d had more energy, I would have yelled at them to go away. But it wasn’t worth the effort.
The longer I lay there, just breathing, the more the pain retreated to tolerable levels.
My crushed hand still throbbed every now and then, but I had every reason to believe that, beyond a handful of bruises, I’d escaped serious injury.
My nausea was fading, too, and the pounding in my head was settling down into more of a dull ache.
But as my bodily discomfort faded, I was left with nothing to distract me from my guilt.
I’d agreed to come home to keep more people from being hurt on my behalf, and instead the opposite had happened.
If I hadn’t been so useless and taken so long to create the bridge, the brothers might have had a chance.
And I wouldn’t have been left feeling like all of this had been in vain.
Another knock. This one so loud it echoed through my still-sensitive skull.
“Come on, Goldie!” shouted a familiar female voice. “Open up!”
My eyes flew open. I knew that voice, but I couldn’t quite place it.
She wasn’t done. “If you don’t open up in the next twenty seconds we’re busting down the door! Don’t think we won’t do it!”
With another groan, I pushed myself back up to a sitting position. How did I know that voice? And what could possibly be so urgent that she was threatening to break down my door?
I preferred to know the answer to that question before she—and whoever was with her—caused any property damage and lost me my security deposit. So even though it took every ounce of energy I had in me, I climbed to my feet and shuffled back out into the main room of the apartment.
She pounded on the door again. “You’ve got ten seconds, Goldie. If you don’t—”
“I heard you the first time!” I yelled back, my voice hoarse.
I stepped closer to the door, leaning up on my toes to peer through the peephole.
It was probably a stupid idea to open my door to someone who was threatening to bust it down, but after all the beasts and sorcerers of Therador I couldn’t bring myself to be afraid of whoever stood on the other side.
Mostly, I was pissed at them for pulling this stunt now, when I had much bigger problems to deal with.
A young man and woman—both in their twenties, I guessed—stood just outside my door. The warped, cloudy glass of the peephole made it impossible to make them out clearly, but I was pretty sure I’d never seen either of them before.
Curiosity winning out, I pulled open the door.
Even face to face, they were completely unfamiliar to me.
The girl was absolutely striking. She was several inches taller than me, with light brown skin and stylish dark hair that was shaved on one side and chin-length on the other—with electric blue streaks, no less—accentuating her heart-shaped face and dark eyes.
She was dressed in black jeans and a black tank top and had about a dozen rings on her fingers—except for the last two fingers on her left hand, which were missing just below the first knuckle.
The guy was a giant. He could have rivaled Octavian for height—but that’s where the similarities between the two men ended.
He had the sort of build that could have been muscular—but he was rocking more of a dad-bod instead.
His short, light brown hair was a mess, but in a floppy, almost endearing way.
In fact, he had an endearing energy about him, from his graphic T-shirt to his slightly round cheeks.
He was a pasty shade of white that suggested he didn’t spend much time outside.
“Hm,” the girl said, crossing her arms and looking me up and down. “You’re not as short as I expected.”
“Uh…thanks?” I said, still trying to place her voice.
And then all at once it hit me like a slap to the face.
I looked from her to the guy, then back to her again. “Wait. You’re…”
“That’s right.” She grinned. “The Mesmerizer, in the flesh. Who did you think was banging on your door?”
“I didn’t…” I wasn’t even sure how to finish that thought. Here they were—Esmer and Isaac, my two best friends, right before my eyes. They were somehow both exactly like I thought they’d be and nothing like it at all.
Exhausted as I was, I was having an impossible time processing this.
“Not to be harsh, but you look like shit,” Esmer said. “But glad to see you’re alive, at least.” Her eyes kept traveling down to my torn dress. I didn’t blame her for staring—I knew I looked like I’d been run over by a train on my way home from a costume party.
“I was ready to bust your door down from the start,” Esmer went on. “I was sure you were in trouble. But Isaac made me knock first.”
“You don’t just bust into someone’s home before assessing the situation,” Isaac said, and he had that same nerdy teddy bear energy in person that he’d had over our voice chats. “That’s how you end up in jail. Or dead.”
Esmer rolled her eyes in exaggerated exasperation. “See what I’m dealing with here?”