He raised an eyebrow in my direction. “Daniel was always meant to be overlord, did you know that? He has the true range of power at his disposal. But I needed the position for a short time. I needed to be able to vote for the overlord children to go to Earth.”
That must have been what they were talking about with him finding the first secret keeper. Laous had a very long-term plan in place, which meant he probably had a plan B and C ready should anything derail this one.
“What did you do to Daniel?” I asked, hit with a mental image of how he’d been knocked down. An intense sort of worry bloomed inside of me and I was surprised by the strength of it. I had no idea why Daniel affected me so strongly. He’d done something no one else ever had. He’d gotten under my skin.
“I temporarily disconnected him from the network.” Laous sounded very proud of himself.
He wasn’t going to get a look of awe from me though. I was mostly just confused.
“Here in Overworld, we have a living network,” he said. “Like your internet, but it’s natural, running through our land. Connecting us all. Giving us gifts. Powering the people. It’s this network I plan to control when I find the starslight stone Earth currently possesses. Once I have the stone, I will control everything.”
He’d used that stone on the chain to interrupt this “network” temporarily. What else could he do with it? And if that small sliver was starslight, I was afraid to imagine the power he’d have with a large stone.
Laous took a step closer to me. I’d been so busy watching his expression that I missed the blade in his hand. He rested it against my throat, and there was nothing I could do to resist. My hands were still secured behind my back.
“Playtime with the grubbers is over,” he said. “I’ve enjoyed your fear and false bravado, but now I need to find the third secret keeper.”
I knew what that meant. I tried to jerk back and twist in my chair. My entire body lifted as my chair went up onto two legs, before crashing back down again. That random movement startled Laous and the blade bit into my skin. Before I could do or say anything, he shrugged, and with a flick of his wrist sliced right across my throat.
5
It took longer to die than I would have expected. In the movies, a throat gets slit and then the person is dead almost immediately. Right? But that didn’t happen for me. There was just pain, so much pain, and then blood seemed to be everywhere, making it difficult to breathe. I felt like I was choking to death on my own blood, in slow motion.
Laous must have released me from the chair. In my pain-filled state, I realized I was draped across the tiled floor, red washing across my vision, tinting the world into a single tone of death. There was a roar, loud, and then it faded away to leave nothing but an endless silence. I kind of missed the roar.
Why am I still alive?
The warmth of my blood disappeared as I was lifted, hazy white light replacing the red.
“Stay with me, Callie.” The deep rumble of a voice was comforting, so I clung to it, letting that soothing sound and the haze of white take me away from all the pain. The rasping of my breath became more labored with each inhalation, echoing in my ears. Wetter. Blood spattering. There was one last shuddering breath … then only silence. I didn’t hear anything more. I didn’t see anything more.
I expected to fade away. Only … I continued to be tethered to life, despite the lack of heartbeat or breath in my lungs. Because even though I was not breathing, someone near me was, and it somehow filled my body with oxygen at the same time. The pain in my throat subsided; the blood stopped painting my skin red, and instead refilled my body, moving through organs, repairing injuries.
I wasn’t unconscious. I wasn’t conscious. I had to be dead, only … that didn’t feel quite right. Was there another state of being I’d somehow missed in the facts of life my mom taught me?
The hazy white disappeared from my vision, to be replaced by a bright blinding light.Light at the end of the tunnel?This had to be it, the moment I ceased to exist. The moment I faded from the world.
“Callie, open your eyes.”
They’re open!I wanted to scream. I had no voice to do so, but in my head I was yelling at the rumbly-voiced male. I was busy dying over here. Who the hell was he to order me around?
Out of nowhere, my heart started beating again; my chest expanded as air surged in and out of my lungs, this time by my doing. The white light faded, and I finally realized my eyeshadbeen closed, so I let them spring open – only to find that there was still nothing but white surrounding me.
“Whhh-a…” My first attempt at talking didn’t go so well, but as I tilted my head back to see the richest cinnamon and gold eyes staring at me, I finally found my voice.
“How … am I not dead?”
It was almost impossible for me to read the expression on Daniel’s face. I had never seen anything like that look before, a blending of fury and pain, staring down at me like he was seeing more than just my face. He was seeing into the darkest recesses of my heart and soul. Usually I’d be trying to hide that side of me, but I’d just died … almost. Or something had happened to me and I was feeling exposed and raw, unable to shield myself behind my usual barriers.
Feeling started to return to my arms and legs, and with that came awareness that I was cradled across Daniel’s lap. He held me tightly, his long legs spread out in front of him, muscles visible through his dark pants.
I tilted my head back again, and I didn’t even question how comfortable it felt to be resting against his shoulder. More feeling returned to my body, and I knew in a moment I would have to move off him. But until then I was going to let someone support me – for the first time ever. Reality could stay away for a few more seconds.
Daniel’s eyes flashed a pure gold; I had to blink and make sure I was seeing that color correctly. “I’m so fucking sorry, Callie,” he rumbled. “I never thought Laous could get the drop on me like that. I let you get taken. I let you down.” His long lashes hid his eyes briefly, before he met my gaze again, the brown bleeding back through the gold as he tried to calm himself.
“He hit me with a piece of starslight stone, a very powerful piece which he stole from Emma. It malfunctioned my powers, knocked me off the grid, and disconnected me from the network. When that happens, our powers need to reset. Like a knockout punch. It takes some time for all faculties to come back into working order.”
“Did you know the stone could do that?” I asked.
