“But you know everyone else cares. You said it yourself. You want to feed them the delusions so they buy it all.”
“They’ll buy what I tell them. A whirlwind romance that culminated in a brief engagement. I’ll regale them of tales of how we couldn’t wait. You have your dress, so why prolong it?”
“I was engaged to Gray a few days ago. No one is going to believe this. That I fell out of love with my bound and just decided that I was in love with you enough to get married. It even sounds like madness.”
“None of that is my concern. What they think about you behind closed doors doesn’t matter to me. They’ll eventually learn that you’re a useful tool if they don’t already know that. They’ll herald you purely because I say so.”
Whenever I was stuck alone with Hunter and these conversations unfolded, the feeling of panic rose hard and fast.He’d mapped out the rest of my life and I had no say in the matter. No escape route. The onset of anxiety made my tongue and fingers numb. With Herculean effort, I reminded myself that I needed to breathe. That when Archer knew the wedding was happening, he would find a way to stop it. To hurry his process along and find what we needed. Until then, I would stall as much as I could.
“We’ll show them just what you are capable of. That you can get the mortals to praise us so that there are no more issues with our existence.”
“I’m not going to be the saving grace of Elysia,” I told him, barely keeping the scoff out of my voice.
“But you are,” he replied. “I’ll train you how to use those powers of yours to get the mortals to fall in line. You are exactly what all of Elysia has been waiting for.”
The weight of his plans settled on my shoulders. Hunter wasn’t just planning to use my gift to help him manipulate the Gods. He wanted to help me manipulate mortals. Ig had once said our types of gifts were the most dangerous, but I never grasped how dangerous they could be. Hunter was going to leverage my success as his own and everyone else wouldn’t have a choice in their participation.
“For both of our sakes, I would advise you not to do anything stupid, Quentin.” Hunter stopped in front of me and I tipped my chin to look him in the eye. “I need to run a few errands before tonight. I won’t be long.”
He used a hand to push me aside, and I stumbled over my feet. My appetite had vanished, and I watched as he walked down the hall and out of sight.
Pacing around the kitchen, I thought about Archer and tried my hardest to summon him, but the minutes ticked by and I remained alone with nothing to do but wait for my fate.
A few hours later,I heard the door slam downstairs, and I walked out of my bedroom.
“Quentin!” Hunter’s voice boomed through the space.
I hurried my pace towards the steps, but as I descended them, I slowed. I expected to see Mabel waiting there with him, but instead, he was flanked by Tobias. The God of agriculture was exactly how I remembered him. Tall and slender, with his glasses sitting askew.
“There’s been a change of plans,” Hunter said, uncaring about how I had stalled.
My blood ran cold. Hunter only changed plans if he knew his original one wouldn’t work. Earlier today, he had been certain we’d be getting married. He’d mentioned Mabel. And now we were standing here with a glorified gardener and Hunter looking like he could kill.
“What do you mean?” My eyes kept flicking between the pair.
“We’ll not be getting married tonight,” Hunter said. “You’ll be taken home. Tobias will escort you.”
“Home?” I repeated, trying to catch up with what was going on. “Why?”
But Hunter was done with me. “Return her home and then come straight back here. Understood? I’ll be in the square making the announcement.”
“What announcement?”
It was no use. My words were being drowned out by the sound of thunder cracking overhead. This was nothing like what I’d heard before. The sheer power of it made my ears ache and my head pound.
“Understood,” Tobias answered Hunter meekly.
He strode towards me with a weak smile as he grabbed my wrist. I didn’t fight him.
“Hunter?” I asked, looking over to him, but swathes of green the colour of fresh grass were beginning to obscure everything from sight. The familiar drop in my stomach ran through me as I was transported away from Elysia, and as Tobias’s aura cleared, my room greeted me. It was no longer a dream, but a part of my reality again. However, it didn’t offer the comfort I thought it would, thanks to the circumstances that brought me back to it.
“It’s best for you to stay here,” Tobias told me, releasing my wrist. “I don’t know how long it’ll be before we come to get you again. It’ll probably be soon, but just in case. Wouldn’t want to do anything to anger Hunter any further.”
He turned away from me and his aura began to protrude from his body, but I grabbed his arm. “Tobias, please. What is going on? Why has Hunter suddenly sent me home? I didn’t think I’d see this place again.”
“It’s the best place for you.”
“No. It’s the best place for me to be to make things easy for him. We both know he doesn’t do anything that doesn’t benefit him. So, what is it? What has he got you involved in?”
