Tasting Darkness

Lycus moved to Kalen’s side, his hand ghosting over the others’ shoulder. He leaned against him, trying to pull him away from the darkness that threatened our mate.

His depression was heavy like a blanket and was not only suffocating Kalen, but also us. Without Aleera he was a mess, he needed her to remove the shadows that threatened to overtake him.

Tobias on the other hand had lapsed into silence since we found ourselves back here. Silent and troubled, he was lost to his thoughts, every bit the same as I was, trying to reason out her plan. Aleera wouldn’t have risked abandoning Kalen.

Even if she did have a plan for all this, her actions would still have consequences. She’d forgotten the most important thing about our unit, without her, there was no us.

If anything happened to her and her plan went wrong… There was no way we could survive her loss, not now when we were all connected to each other and finally complete.

Loud screeching caws echoed close by and my eyes moved to where Tobias stood still staring out the window. Did he not see it? From his blank, empty stare I figured he was trapped in his own mind, but I did. A flash of bright plumage in this dark hellscape.

Ryze landed on the windowsill. She screeched again at Tobias and almost automatically, he scratched her feathers. She shook her head and called to him again, but he continued to stare. Ryze screeched angrily before biting him hard enough to make him jump.

“What is it, girl?” I asked, approaching the pissed off Ryze.” Why did you leave her?”

The bird ignored me and when I reached the window my attention was diverted by the training fields.

They were covered in Aleera’s Phoenixes, which all peered up at our window.

Kalen looked up as their calls penetrated his prison of darkness. He gasped at the sight of all of them. He moved quickly, shoving me aside, so he too could stare at all of them.

Hope bloomed within him and flagged shortly after. He must have thought that she would have returned with them, but that would be too easy. His hope wilted away as she hadn’t made her triumphant return as he had hoped.

Ryze nudged my hand, nipping at my fingers. She screeched at me, trying to get me to show her my palm. Her feathers ruffled and she bit me harder. “What?” I snapped.

“Finity,” she tried to speak, but the Phoenix still clearly hadn’t mastered speech. “Leera,” she added, biting my finger again, did it have to be the same one?

I hissed at the abuse and quickly turned my hand to show her my empty palm. I had no food for her right now. Her tongue flicked over my wrist, and fresh power surged through my hand as my infinity mark lit up with fiery energy.

The beacon was set off and through the connection, I felt it. It was a small glimpse, but the bond confirmed that she was alive. I had my own glimmer of hope. However, she was moving farther away, until she faded away completely.

What? My brows furrowed as I reached out again but there was nothing there anymore. Ryze ruffled her feathers before zapping me once again with her magic.

The jolt of power danced through me, forcing my muscles to go rigid, but it blessed me with the clarity I so desperately sought. “We aren’t powerless, she sent them home,” I mumbled. Her intentions were crystal clear. She wasn’t sacrificing herself, she was leading us to them.

“The Phoenixes,” I whispered.

Lycus wandered over to me. He finally had on a pair of shorts. He peered over my shoulder, staring at the legion of magical birds.

“What about them?” He asked, his voice sounding oddly detached compared to what I was used to. He cocked his head, seeming to think. The cogs were turning in his pretty little head.

A deep chuckle escaped Tobias, and he shook his head as he stared at his glowing red wrist. The surge of power Ryze had given me, shone on my mates as well.

“She sent them home to us,” Tobias declared, pushing off the wall beside the window and snatched his jacket off the couch.

“Where are you going?” Kalen asked as I followed suit.

“To get our mate back, we aren’t the only thing bonded to her, she sent them home,” I explained to Kalen, with a nod at the birds.

Kalen scrambled to his feet and took a step forward, then stopped. He peered back at Ryze and the glimmer of hope from before bloomed through him.

He shook his head as a crooked smile reached his l!ps. “She was never trapped,” the words left him in a laugh. “She was trapping them,” he grinned.

I tossed the door open and Tobias rushed past me and disappeared. Lycus continued to stare obliviously into the distance. Thank God he was good-looking, it really helped with his sheer lack of brain cells sometimes.

I raised a brow at him, waiting for him to catch on to anything we just said. Kalen was long gone with Tobias. I waited for the moment the light bulb would go off, and his eyes bled black to that of his beast.

“She is leading us to them!” Lycus announced with a grin, there was so much pride in his voice, I almost felt sorry for breaking his moment of brilliance…

Almost Yet as we made it outside her army awaited their caws loud as they circled like a tornado above, each screech renewing and sparking determination in each of us, every loud caw lending us power.

We weren’t powerless, we had the phoenixes, we had the bond I could feel her feeding us energy through it. I don’t know how she had managed it, but I got the distinct feeling telling me she was biding time, searching and looking for something and when she found it, she would call on us. We would be ready when she did.