Chapter 27 Riven #2
I knew with what she had shared with me, those two fuck heads made her life hell.
Honestly, that’s why I snapped as quickly as I did.
I’ve wanted an excuse to lay my fist against one of their faces—kill them really.
I’d love to end their lives, then gift her their heads—but the opportunity hasn’t risen since we don’t go to the Court anymore.
Creed and Amick sit together quietly at the table just as the carriage starts moving. My eyes search the rest of our small new home away from home, searching for my newest friend.
I don’t find him by his love petal, so I make my way down the small hall that’ll lead to their room. His door is open, so I just make my way in.
He picks his head up out of the notebook he’s scribbling in and gives me a small tilt of his lips.
“What’s up, Riv?”
“Are you as upset as Thayla is about being here?”
His eyes blink repeatedly as a harsh breath falls from his lips. He sets his notebook beside him and stares at me.
“The only reason I have to be upset is I miss my little sister, as does Thayla. Laney loves Thayla more than she even loves me and Laney was the version of the little girl Thayla wished she could’ve been. That piles onto what she’s already feeling.”
Damn, I didn’t even know he had a sister.
“So you think when we leave here, she’ll be fine?”
He tightens his lips. “Can I be very open and honest with you? And it not upset you?”
“You can’t upset me, Lam-man.”
“Okay then.” He stands, shoving his hands in his pockets.
“You, for some reason, have a fear of opening up to Thayla, on any level past surface. While she searches desperately for an opening to get to know you. She searches the silence in the Athenaeum for you. Did you know that? When it gets too quiet, too concentrated, she’ll stare off, straining her ears to hear your laugh.
It’s not for fear of being pranked or you scaring her. She’s waiting for you to show.
“You’re afraid she’ll reject you or change you.
Make you be a different version of who you are.
When the reality is, both your side of chaos and harmony are two sides she wants to match equally.
She wants someone who will see her at her most unhinged and not judge her, like all the beings of this region have done honestly for longer than the past year.
She also wants someone who can just soothe her when she’s scared.
Your brothers could do that, yes, and to some degree they already do, but that’s learned behavior on their parts.
For you, it’s natural. It’s a part of you.
“She already cares for you tremendously and I think you’re too afraid to acknowledge it.
She’s waiting patiently for you to see it, but you’re going to continue to push and pull her, Riven, and eventually, she’s going to cut the thread between the two of you.
She’s going to allow the cold and empty place inside of her to come to the surface once she’s pushed too far.
When she reaches for that place with you, there’s no crawling out of it.
I’ve waited and waited, patiently, for her to reach that place with Mellcom and Jeremiah.
“It took us being Chosen for her to reach it and I’m eternally grateful it finally happened.
I don’t want her to reach that with you.
You don’t have to spill your guts out to her in one minute.
You don’t have to make it a joke or an opportunity to tease and make her laugh.
It can be serious, even if it’s small, but it needs to be serious.
“You just have to give her something to understand and she will. She’ll take that tiny piece of knowledge and protect it until you’re ready to give her more, but you have to tell her that.
Tell her where you stand with her and ask for time.
She’ll give it to you without judgment or fear. I swear to you she will.”
He doesn’t give me a second to respond to his long-winded speech. His hand grips my shoulder as he walks by me, leaving me standing dumbfounded and pissy in his room.
I lied.
Lam-man can, in fact, upset me.
I pull on my roots, begging for the words to get out of my head.
Kyzen’s words sent me spiraling already. From that moment, my harmony locked onto me hard, and it wasn’t going to be satisfied until I had her in my arms.
I wanted to be more open in the cave when she couldn’t see me, but I couldn’t bring myself to say anything. I felt her fear like it was an extension of my own and I could only think straight enough to focus on one of us.
Lambrit’s talk, though, hits harder. I’ve been lectured by my brother my entire life. Being lectured by the best friend of the woman I’m obsessed with is difficult to ignore.
I hate that I know he’s right.
I hate it even more that I don’t know how to go about doing what he just told me to do.
The only time I’ve ever really opened up to my brothers, Annalise, Ellian, anyone was while using some dark humor.
Verlet is the only being that knows my truths. My brothers’ truths as well. And that’s because he was granted that knowledge without our permission.
The carriage rolls to a stop, and I grit my teeth, snatch my hair, then finally give up the war inside of me. My harmony floods my system, and I clench my fists. One last effort to fight it off before I give in fully.
Un-fucking-fortunately, clarity rushes my mind, my breathing regulates, and awareness around me amplifies tenfold.
I’ll admit, to my shock, my chaos still lingers on the edge, and my other half allows it as though it knows it may be needed thanks to the situation and place we’re in.
I enter the living room, far more subdued than I left it, and my gaze instantly falls on Thayla.
She’s tucked between Creed and Amick with a blank face, but a glare that’s burning with anger and despair.
Fuck. I want to wrap her up.
She flicks those multi-colored eyes to me, and for a brief, split second, something resembling gratitude crosses them.
“We aren’t staying here long. I don’t believe we’ll find the Binding here, but we’re going to check the barrier just to be sure, then we’re leaving. Everyone has their Amethyst?” Amick asks and everyone murmurs but me.
Kyzen stretches his arm out toward me, uncurling his hand to reveal the little baggies I put all the crystals in.
I nod, then hold the apologetic gaze he’s giving me.
It makes me feel like a fucking dickhead.
He always feels guilty for fussing at any of us. Even when we definitely need it.
“Let’s go,” Creed declares and everyone files out the door.
I fall in line silently, right behind Thayla.
I force my twitching fingers not to run down the back of her arm. Her turmoil is potent, and my power wants nothing more than to soak that shit up.
She runs her hand down Seismet’s body as Havar stops and stands in front of them. He won’t unhook them right now since we’ve only just started our travels, but in a few more hours, he’ll need to so they can rest.
Thayla’s gasp draws all my attention back to her, but I see what she sees not a second later.
Standing proud, taller than my eyes can follow, is a light lavender, shimmering barrier.
Its power is pulsing. Thrumming against my skin in waves.
“Its color was never noticeable. It’s always just looked…I don’t know, blurry.”
“Obviously, with our powers, we can see it for what it truly is now,” Lambrit adds, looking at her with astonishment.
I’m pretty damn shocked too.
The Abandon’s doesn’t have a color and the power that wafts off it is familiar. It feels just like any other barrier the God of Boundaries left behind.
This one does not. Not entirely.
It feels like—more.
“It’s most certainly not behind this,” Amick murmurs, raising his fingers just enough to allow them to skim down it.
“How do you know for certain?” Thayla asks.
“The Valorian power pulsing from this is minimal.”
We all turn back to the foreign forcefield with a lot more hesitation than we had a second ago.
“Then let’s just stretch our legs for a second and we can go,” Kyzen says.
I peer over my shoulder as a shift floats through the air and instantly sneer when I see Gladian and his Valtrue lurking a good twenty feet back.
Ugh. Wish they’d step through this weird thing.
My eyes continue to travel up and down the wall of power and to Thayla as my feet propel me closer to her. Her head keeps turning to the left and I can’t help but look where she looks.
A small rocky formation sits about fifty feet away. I spot the steam drifting in the air above the knee-high meadow grass and realize it’s a hot spring.
That’s the hot spring I’ve heard her mention.
Damn, she really did trek her ass all the way out here to get in that thing.
She stops her mindless walk, shakes her head, then faces the barrier fully.
Slowly, with a shuddering breath falling from her lips, she raises her fingers and caresses it gently. A small, sad smile crosses her mouth and my chest tugs painfully.
Not wanting to intrude too much on her moment—okay, yeah, I want to, but I’m trying not to—I mimic her and turn fully to the barrier as well.
Curiosity gets the best of me and the desire to feel what she’s feeling flows through my blood. I lift my hand, just as she did, and allow it to lie against the shimmering power.
Unlike her hand, though, that comes off and tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, mine gets stuck.
A giggle, this one not funny, but purely chaotic, slips through my lips as I try to rip my hand away. It doesn’t budge and that power beneath my palm starts to heat.
My belly starts to swirl.
Uh-oh.
That heat travels through my arm as it starts to pull me forward.
I dig my feet into the ground and latch onto my wrist with my other hand in an attempt to snatch it free.
“Oh shit,” I bark as the force grows stronger.
“Riven!”
My name tears from Thayla’s throat just as her arms wrap around me. Her back slams into the barrier, separating it from me, and trembles pass through the ground.
My stomach bottoms out as the force behind that barrier whips through my body, stealing all the oxygen from my lungs, and sends me tumbling through the air.
Not me. Us.
Panic grips my chest as Thayla’s screaming pierces my ringing ears. I wrap my arms around her, tucking her head as close to me as I can as we plummet through the sky.
“Riven,” she bellows into my chest.
“Hold on, angel. I got you.”
I tighten my arms around her as our descent speeds up.
I brace myself for impact, preparing for bones to break. My harmony shoots through us, relaxing our stiff muscles, and my knees curl up as my head tucks close to hers.
A painful grunt rips from my mouth as my back hits what feels like a solid surface a second before we sink.
My mouth fills with water hot as fire and my ass hits the rocky bottom. Reality slaps into me as Thayla tries to kick away and propel to the surface.
I keep a firm grip on her as I push myself up.
We both sputter and cough the second our heads come out of the water, but I keep pulling her until my fingers can grip the edge.
The moment I do and let her go, her hands are all over me as she screams.
“Are you okay? Answer me right fucking now. Are you okay?”
Her hands roam all over me. My chest, my cheeks, the back of my head. She pats me down everywhere she can reach.
Still coughing up water as I try to catch my breath, I lay my hand on top of hers when it settles on my heart.
“I’m fine. I’m okay.”
She snatches her hand back, then proceeds to pound the absolute fuck out of my chest with her fists.
“You stupid, fucking asshole. What in the realm were you thinking? You could’ve been accepted. It could’ve taken you. It could’ve taken you from me.”
A brutal sob tears from her, and she covers her mouth with her hand to hold it in. The momentary shock wears off quickly and she goes back to laying waste to my chest.
She pushes and punches, breaking apart right before my eyes.
No. Don’t give up on me.
I snatch her wrists and hold her as close as I can as she tries to fight me off.
“I’m sorry. Don’t cast me out.” I grip her jaw and force her to look at me. She tries with all her might to get away, but I hold on to her harder. “Thayla, please. Don’t give up on me.”
Her eyes grow wide, then she’s snatched away from me. The water kicks up over the side as Creed pulls her into his arms, checking her over from head to toe.
Kyzen appears next, running his hands all over her.
A pat to my cheek has me blinking repeatedly, then my jaw is manhandled as my head’s forced to the side.
“Answer me, Riven. Are you okay?” Amick shouts, pulling my eyelids apart as he checks for something.
He nods, spins me to the side, and pushes his hand under my shirt as he feels up my spine.
“What hurts?”
My soul.
“Nothing. I’m okay.”
He turns me once again to face him, staring through me like he’s searching for the lie.
“Careful, little brother, this is starting to feel a lot like you love me.”
His eyes draw down. “Firstly, you’re twenty-six seconds older than me. That barely constitutes anything. Secondly, I do love you, Riven. Fiercely. You just don’t know how to accept my kind of love.”
Fuck me. Drive the dagger deeper.
Words escape me, but it doesn’t matter. He and Kyzen get out of the hot spring at the same time and reach their arms down to grab Thayla.
It shocks me still to find her staring at me as Creed lifts her out of the water.
She shakes her head. “I won’t, Riven. I never will.”
A lump forms in my throat, but I swallow that shit down as Creed turns to me and attempts to hoist me up.
“Stop that. I can do it.”
“Just shut the fuck up. I’m the God of Death, yet I almost died just now watching that shit.”
His eyes shift from white to gray repeatedly for a moment. I decide it’s probably best not to argue with him if his hungry power is already pressing in on him.
I push myself up on the side of the rocky formation and he shoves my ass—literally, two whole handfuls—over the rest of the way. I don’t even have a second to get my bearings as Kyzen grabs my arm and stands me up.
“You all right?”
“Yeah, I’m good. Little dizzy but nothing too crazy.”
My head and back are throbbing. So is my ass bone. And chest.
“Fuck, man. I tried to slow you down, but that blast held us all still. We couldn’t move until you hit the water.”
Fuck that crazy-ass power.
“My harmony shot out of me and relaxed me enough to break the fall. It’s all good.”
He nods, releasing a relieved breath.
“Let’s get to the carriage. We’re done here,” Amick says, tucking Thayla in close to his side.
Her eyes meet mine.
We’re very, very far from being done here.