Casteel
I was consumed by two things only…
Findingher.
And ending Kolis.
He could only hide for so long.
And her? I’d searched for her in the realm of the waking and knew where she was. But I couldn’t get to her.
Yet.
I did not rest. Not as the days passed. Not as the weeks came and went. I waited with the choking desperation, bitter panic, rage, and guilt that had coalesced into an even tighter knot in my heart. It lodged itself behind the icy mass that had already encased my chest and would not thaw.
And from that frozen abyss, it grew.
It started like a whisper in the night that couldn’t be found, constant and inescapable.
It reminded me of being on the verge of bloodlust, where the skin itched and jaw ached as the mind tunneled to a focus on one need and one need only. It reminded me of the long nights when drinking, fighting, and fucking wouldn’t stop the memories of being chained and taken. My flesh crawled justlike then. Pressure coiled tightly within my chest as it had when nothing silenced the taunting laughs.
But this was different. It didn’t feel unfamiliar, though. Almost like it had been there before Pensdurth. BeforeherAscension. Even beforeher. Maybe it had always been there, and it only now had woken up, becoming a fire in my bones and smoke in my veins. It haunted the edges of sleep and whispered while I was awake.
It wasn’t a want nor a need. It was anurge, one that demanded to be unleashed.
To upend the order of things.
To undo.
Unravel.
Unmake.
It was relentless and nearly impossible to contain, quieting when I let it take over. When I hunted. When I destroyed.
And this? Stillness and silence? It was agony and torture as I held myself immobile and made no sound. I let it gnaw at me as I willed myself to slip away into dreams, where I had a chance to find her.
I hadn’t found her yet, and that…
Fucking terrified me.
But I was relentless. With sheer will, I forced myself to sleep and into the dreamless nothing. And I stayed there.
It began with a slow drift into awareness. Then came a tug at the center of my chest, pulling me from somewhere between sleep and wakefulness.
Casteel.
Her voice found me, echoing like an incantation in my blood and carrying the faint, sweet, and heady scent of jasmine. Fractured sunlight pierced the dark, churning, muddy darkness, chipping away at it in sections until I saw gray stone and clusters of lilacs smothering the rock ceiling and hanging fromit. Through the cascade of lavender-hued blossoms, I glimpsed the pool of white-tipped, frothing water, and hair the color of polished garnet…
I sawher.
The sight of her stopped time. Crushed me under the weight of relief. Choked me with the desperation I still couldn’t shake. Shredded me with a rage so cold and unyielding that the icy knot throbbed in my chest. I was furious with myself. With Kolis, the Fates, and the very realms themselves for separating us. For stopping me from finding her. For everything she had been put through. For what I knew she suffered, and for the unknown that threatened to drive me insane. And I was furious with her. With her choices. Her decisions.
The sight of her destroyed me in one heartbeat and, the moment she became aware of my presence, remade me again.
I heard her breath quicken. Felt the sudden, rapid rise of her pulse in my blood. Water sprayed and hissed as she spun toward me.
Humid air got trapped in my throat. It felt like an eternity since I’d last seen eyes all the colors of the realms and that heart-shaped face. A forever ago since my gaze had traveled over the smattering of freckles along the bridge of her nose and the proud, often stubborn tilt of her slightly pointed chin. My gaze zeroed in on those full, bow-shaped lips as she searched for me. It felt like ages had passed since I’d last felt those lips against my flesh. Her wide eyes darted past where I stood and then swung back, slower this time.
