Gray obeyed as I stepped back to give her space and for me to observe.
I squinted my eyes. “Relax your shoulders.”
The princess took a deep breath, the stiff tension in her shoulders falling away, making her appear more natural.
I nodded in approval, pride filling my chest. It was small, basic even, but it gave me hope nonetheless.
For the rest of the second hour, I walked her through several more stances. A quiet and soft tension rested between us, andthe more time I spent around her, the more I felt compelled to find any reason to touch her with her permission.
When we finished, I walked beside her to gather our things. “You did great today. You’re gonna be dangerous.”
Gray huffed. “Yeah, we’ll see…”
“You will. Just have some patience and keep showing up like you did today,” I assured her, glancing at her from the side.
Gray reached behind her head, grabbing the tie that held her hair in a messy bun, dragging it down and letting the waves fall loose around her shoulders. She stared at the ground as she walked, running her fingers through tangled tresses and shaking them out.
I found myself staring, absorbed by the magnetic energy that she didn’t know she possessed. My heart faltered, and my breath stuttered in my chest, yearning to reach over and comb my fingers through her waves. Somehow, I’d gone from feeling overly protective to crushing on the princess.
“Ugh, I’m so sweaty and gross. I need to shower,” she grumbled as we reached our things. She bent, gathering her water and hoodie.
As a teen, having just gone through puberty, I had to block out the intrusive thoughts of her in a shower. I cleared my throat. “Yes! A shower. Should be good, right?” I chuckled awkwardly. “You’ll appreciate it when you’re in class.”
What. The. Fuck. Slate?I forced a smile and averted my attention to the door, wanting to dart through it to save me from myself.
The princess assessed me with a quirked brow and tilted head, clearly trying to figure out why I was so bad at flirting. Or maybe she was wondering why I suddenly turned into a dork who had zero social skills. Which I did, or at least I used to until I started receiving inappropriate thoughts of Gray in the shower…
Gray narrowed her eyes. “Yeah. A shower. So, I better go. Don’t want to be late.”
I took in a much needed breath. “Yeah. Can’t do that.”
Chapter 15
Chrome
Bleak darkness consumed me from the edges of consciousness. Slits in my vision allowed me to see the blurred cell they contained me in.
The familiar bite of the metallic cuffs suppressed both sides of my magic, as usual. The visceral hunger of my depleted well of power raked its daggers deep within my brain, carving it away layer by layer. I groaned, my arms and legs trembling from weakness.
As normal, I sat trapped in a void. I didn’t think I was meant to, but I could barely see through the darkness. However, my hearing was muted. The repugnant stench of death and rot had long since settled in my nostrils. It still made me want to gag. And the typical iciness of the prisons seeped into my bones as I combatted my chattering teeth.
I fought through the hopelessness by focusing on those closest to me. Peri’s bright smile and honey-colored eyes swam through my mind. I clung to them, giving me strength to keep fighting so she’d be safe.
The princess’s empty and haunted eyes flashed next, reminding me how much she needed to get away from her father. I seemed to be the only one capable of truly killing him, so I had to be strong for that at least. I wondered what her eyes would look like when she was happy. Would they twinkle, and would a full smile transform her mask into something that would undoubtedly bring me to my knees? My heart ached, and a deep longing tugged on my soul to be the one to bring that joy to her.
I presumed hours, or potentially days, had passed in the cold and dense darkness. I had no way of telling time. But I clung to visions of my sister and the princess; the sun and the moon. It became my method of staying afloat, grounded to reality, so I didn’t drift away into a state of otherworldly madness driven by the magic deprivation.
Aren’t I supposed to search for something while down here?
A niggling feeling kept poking at the back of my mind, begging to be acknowledged, but I had no way of doing that. It was like trying to catch a spot of light in the fog. It refused to materialize.
A groan climbed from my throat as the frustration took its toll. I didn’t even bother removing the bandage around my arm. Now that my healing was suppressed, it was best to keep the prison’s inevitable infections from creeping in.
There was something I needed to do down here, but my brain couldn’t form a coherent thought long enough to remember.
My magic needed to replenish—both kinds—as Grim had made very sure that I was past the point of empty. Even through the cuffs, I could still cast out my awareness, seeking new energies to pull from. If I sensed a living being, it would be an enticing aura that could fuel my Elemental side. If it were anything electrical, it would tempt my Kinetic side.
As desperate and depleted as my magic was, I couldn’t stop it from hunting for any source nearby. Ironically, one would thinkbeing in a complex prison consisting of multiple cells, it would be easy to find a life force. But there was nothing. Not even a trace of electricity. No doubt Grim had his magic locked in place to absorb any energy.
