“What’s going on? Kimber, why aren’t you—” Roran’s eyes darted between the four of us.
What a group we were at that moment.
“Are you serious? After all that, heleft. Again?” Roran strode forward and stood next to Master Dorian. “This cannot be allowed to continue.”
“We’re all going to die anyway now.” I sighed.
“No, we’re not,” Rilen said, sitting next to me and taking my hand. “That’s why you ordered us up here, isn’t it, Dorian?”
Rilen motioned his brother to sit next to me on the bench. In a heartbeat, Roran took my other hand.
Each of them kissed my knuckles and reached their other hand for Dorian.
“This will only work with mates,” they chorused.
Dorian stepped forward. “Why do you think I called you up here?” He took their hands and completed the circle.
Power surged through me. The simple colors of magic that painted everything leapt to life, glowing and dancing again like I remembered them in the cave.
The green pulsed and flowed toward the Spine, the colors growing darker from the original soft mint. I couldn’t see the flow beyond because Master Dorian stood directly in front of me.
With his very prominent erection.
I swallowed and tried looking around him.
“Move, Dorian,” Roran snapped.
“Where?” His words bit back.
“Let go for a moment and walked behind us,” Rilen said. “You know she hasn’t had a chance to really be trained. She still uses her vision to help her.”
“Also, that’ll get your giant dick out of her line of sight and let her concentrate,” Roran barked.
With a disgusted grunt, he let go and walked around the bench. When he did let go, the magic sank back to just mere existence.
Bland and disconnected.
The twins shifted my hand to the ones they had been holding Master Dorian’s with and put the others behind my back. A moment later, Master Dorian’s hands slipped back into theirs.
The magic was back.
The flow of the magic toward the Spine was starting to speed up even as I watched it.
Grabbing a thread of the flowing green, I let my sense of it follow along, tugging gently. But the further I followed, the thicker and stronger the magic felt.
It was a consuming sense of unfairness and injustice. There was more due to me than just what I had. After all, I had—
I jerked myself out of it, snapping my eyes open.
Carefully grabbing a few of the strings near me, I pulled them close and popped them open like popcorn. It made them stick, unable to move or flow away.
Perfect.
I moved quickly through the local flow, popping them open, moving faster, and I got the hang of it.
Stop, please. This isn’t the time yet. The time is coming, but not yet. Please.
Everything I hadn’t grabbed yet slowed, listened.
