Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
“Beth, come back to me, my love.” Jayden cups my cheeks.
“Gonna get shocked,” I mumble.
“Your magic doesn’t hurt me, remember? It’s okay, I’ve got you. No one is going to hurt our friends, I promise.” He runs a hand down my arm in a gesture meant to soothe but the crackling lightning turns to white-hot flames.
I gulp in a few calming breaths, but a scoff nearby snaps my gaze to the man in question. The man who wanted to cage my friends.
“If you don’t shut your fucking trap, Axel, I will step out of her way and let her fry you to a crisp,” Jayden barks.
“I tried to but they fought back.” Axel says the exact wrong thing.
“He meant your fucking mouth, jackass,” Raven snarls. “You just made it worse.”
White spots dot my vision and my chest heaves with the exertion it’s taking to hold back my magic. I have never been so out of control or seen the full extent of my power before. This is what the seer meant about having the power to either save or destroy the world.
Jayden stares into my eyes, a pleading glance to calm it down, but then a voice I don’t recognize shouts, “Get the anti-magic cuffs or we’re all dead.”
Jayden whirls around with a snarl and his shadows wrap around me. Raven steps closer, blocking me from the idiot fae males that think to cuff me.
“You’re dead anyway if you come near my mate with any type of cuffs.” Jayden’s voice is low and deadly.
His shadows creep across the ground, leaking out of him. I have to stop this. I have to calm him, but it’s taking everything I have not to let my magic run wild. If he was looking at me, I could see the black in his normally blue eyes.
His shadows slither up my legs from the ground, wrapping around my body and stroking my back. I take a shuddering breath. The calming gesture is soothing the magic in me enough to pull myself together. Reaching out, I press a hand to the center of Jayden’s back and his shoulders slump.
“I’m okay,” I say.
“Thank fuck.” Raven visibly relaxes as well.
“Not good enough,” Jayden growls. “They threatened you.”
I turn Jayden to look at me and it’s just as I expected. His eyes are swirling pools of shadows and the shadows continue to crawl across the ground, agitated because Jayden has lost control.
“They won’t touch me with those cuffs. I’ll unleash the full force of my magic on anyone who tries it, but now I need you to come back to me, my love.” I cup his cheek.
The blue leaks through the black slowly as we stare at each other for long minutes. Now that I’m not sparking everywhere, my friends form a circle around Jayden and me while I calm him, protecting our backs in case they try to sneak up behind us with damn magic-blocking cuffs.
I didn’t even know that was a thing and it sounds like a terrible way to live. Blocking my magic is not something I ever want to have happen to me.
“Are you good?” I ask as Jayden presses his forehead to mine.
“Yeah, you scared the life out of me losing it like that.” Jayden blows out a relieved breath.
“They have humans locked in cages, Jayden. Like animals. And they tried to do the same to our friends. I seriously lost it. This is barbaric.”
“They didn’t try to shove me and Greyson in the cage,” Raven says. “They did try to shove the others inside, though.”
“I wasn’t having it and pulled my battle ax,” Dax says. “Raven pulled her twin blades and we got into battle formation.”
“Good quick thinking. I still want to know, what is the meaning of this?” I snarl, turning to Rosaline.
“They are not like you. The four of you are a part of the prophecy the seer gave us. The others are not.” Rosaline crosses her arms like that is the end of the discussion.
“So? What does that have to do with you betraying us and behaving like humans and demigods are no better than animals?” I glare back at her.
“We will keep them contained until the four of you complete your mission.” Rosaline waves a dismissive hand.
“Like hell you will,” I say. “You think you know so much about what’s happening, but if you lock the rest of my friends in that cage, my mission will fail and it won’t just affect us as you said. Your world will burn as well.”
The warriors step back from my friends, glancing at each other in confusion as I speak the truth. Draven is a key part of this damn mission, and they just tried to lock him and the others up. Adrian as well. What if he has another vision and he can’t tell us from his fucking cage? Fuck no.
“What do you mean?” Rosaline asks. “How are they supposed to help you? They are little more than human themselves.”
“Only a Hermes descendant can enter the temple with the item of power inside protected by magic.” I wave at Draven. “My seer friend here, needs to be there in case he has a vision. So, you see? You can’t contain shit and I’m disgusted you even tried.”
Rosaline turns pale again as she glances around the group of us in confusion. “I misjudged the situation. My apologies. Come with me to my home and we can talk about a way to get you all back to your home realm.”
“I don’t think you understand the gravity of what you’re doing here,” I say. “Every single person on my team is important. The queen has hundreds of monsters at her disposal and we have almost lost to them on more than one occasion with six of us.”
“Separating our group is a damn stupid idea. Especially if the war in our realm affects this one as well.” Jayden crosses his arms. “In our last mission, it was the six of us and we were overrun. If the other team hadn’t shown up when they did, we would all be dead.”
“The queen would have won and the worlds would all be gone right now,” I agree.
Rosaline’s hands visibly shake as she reaches up and smooths back her pink and gray hair. “Yes, I must have misinterpreted the seer’s prophecy. I am deeply sorry for upsetting you and almost ruining everything.”
“You wouldn’t have ruined it,” I say with a malicious grin. “Because we would have never left our friends and we would have burned this village to the ground to get to them. Don’t fucking test me again.”
“I understand. Please, will your whole group come with me to my home so we can discuss things less publicly?” Rosaline bows at the waist.
I glance at Jayden and Raven, debating on whether we should just fight our way out of here and take our chances finding a portal or some way out of here on our own.
Shadows pulse around Jayden’s arms and his sword glints in the sun.
Raven is still in a relaxed fighting stance with her swords at her sides gripped tightly.
They are ready no matter what I decide, but I deflate because it will be faster with Rosaline’s help than wandering around a strange realm hoping to stumble on a way home.
“Fine, but it’s the whole group or nothing. We will not be separated again and if anyone thinks to touch one of my friends, I will unleash my magic on them.”
“Understood. No one will touch your friends. Please follow me.” Rosaline moves forward but Axel grabs her arm.
“Are you sure about this, wise one? They are quick to temper. Let me and a few of my men join you.”
“We are only quick to temper when provoked. You provoked us on more than one occasion.” I raise a brow.
“You are guests in this realm. You should be more hospitable,” he spits the words at me.
“Guests? We have been treated like prisoners the entire time we’ve been here,” I scoff.
“Axel, you will not be permitted to join this meeting. You have antagonized them since they showed up and your attitude is supremely unhelpful,” Rosaline says.
“But Rosaline, you must be protected,” Axel pleads.
“As long as she doesn’t betray us again and try to lock up or hurt my friends again, she will be perfectly safe.” I shrug.
“No more games or betrayals, I promise.” Rosaline nods.
“Good, then protection isn’t needed. You need something from me and I need something from you to make it happen,” I say and wave for her to walk ahead.
We all file into the living area of her large home and find seats for the discussion to come. Why do I get the feeling this isn’t going to be as easy as transporting ourselves back to our home realm?
Not everyone can transport and I have only transported a person one time and I have never tried inter-realm transport. That’s a little too dangerous for me to try on a whim. That’s a skill to learn if it’s even possible when the realms aren’t counting on me to save them.
“The way our realms are clustered together and separated by the veils between worlds, we are in one of the farthest realms in the cluster from the nexus, which is your realm, so we don’t have direct travel from here to your realm.
” Rosaline waves a hand and a gust of wind carries an old book to her on the breeze.
“Cool,” Raven whispers. “She has air magic.”
“This book has a map of the realm cluster with the realms labeled. So we know where each one is in relation to us and the nexus. The only ones we can travel directly to are the ones that share a veil.” Rosaline lays out the map and points to a small circle labeled Faerie.
“The portal that’s closest to our current location leads here.” She points to a larger circle that isn’t labeled.
“What realm is that? There’s no label,” I ask.
“No one knows. None who have gone through the portal have ever returned. It’s why we have contained the humans until you succeed in your latest mission. We are not comfortable sending powerless humans into an unknown realm.”
“How close is the next portal that will lead us back?” Jayden asks.
“The problem with that is it’s a two-day trek to the next closest portal that goes here to the realm of dragon shifters. Time works differently here, though, so what may be two days for you could be two months for your realm.” Rosaline wrings her hands.
“Wait, did you say dragons?” Raven perks up, bouncing in her seat. “I want to see a dragon.”
“We don’t have time and they might not even help us get home. The unknown realm touches ours so it probably has a portal.” I shake my head at her.