She tips her head back, looking at me expectantly, but I’m uncertain of what she wants, and, hell, whatever it is, I don’t want to fuck it up.
She must sense my confusion because her forehead suddenly puckers. She takes another look at our surroundings, the rocky cave walls and the archway filled with light in the distance.
“Oh,” she says, her face falling and her voice flat. “It wasn’t real.”
I wait for her to say more, but she’s quiet as she pulls away from me.
Before I can speak again, a shout sounds in the distance, drawing us both forward once more into the unknown.
27. PEYTON PRICE
Idart through the exit from the tunnel before I’m forced to pull up short.
A vast field of roses stretches out ahead of us, but these aren’t the neatly pruned bushes that grew at the front of the Academy. These are a wild, tangled mess with sharp thorns protruding from every angle.
Jonah and Vanguard stand to my right, their backs pressed up against the rock wall that stretches out from either side of the tunnel’s entrance, the field’s edge only two steps away.
Vanguard huffs as he plucks a long, sharp thorn from his thigh.
I guess he must have tried to step into the foliage. It could have been his shout of pain we heard from within the corridor.
As Striker steps up behind me, I try to process the remnant memories of the other life I experienced within the cave.
I had fears in that other life. There was danger there, just as there is danger now.
But I also had love.
I had happiness and joy, and I’d clearly fought for that.
Chosenthat.
I find myself staring at my hands even though I should be paying attention to the threats that could be lurking within the roses.
As a full Fury, can I choose love?
When I was a prisoner at the Academy, there was a book in the library calledHell and Damnation. It contained descriptions of supernaturals who had risen from hell itself.
Within the pages about Furies, it said:A Fury is incapable of love.
Now that I have my sisters, I know that at least some of the information in that book wasn’t true. It stated that Furies were born of the primordial deity, Nyx, the mother of death, and it’s possible that Nyx did give birth to the original Furies. But my sisters have made it clear to me that Furies are created, not born. Likewise, we do not give birth to Furies ourselves, not like Valkyries always have Valkyrie daughters.
It makes the dream in the tunnel so much more removed from my reality, but does that really mean I’m incapable of love now?
I try to shake myself from my thoughts as Vanguard speaks urgently.
“The final realm is on the other side of this field,” he says, pointing toward another rock wall about two hundred paces away. “Once we enter that realm, you need to be aware that time will change again. While a day in this part of the maze is a month in the outside world, a singlehourin that final realm is also a month in the outside world. I’m telling you this now because as soon as we reach that wall, we’ll need to move fast. We’ve been in the maze for three hours now. That’s more than three days out there?—”
Vanguard suddenly wobbles on his feet, his knees buckling.
Jonah reaches out to him, his hand closing around Vanguard’s upper arm and keeping him steady. “James?”
Vanguard’s voice slurs, but he seems determined to push on with what he is telling us. “My master trusts me to fight my own battles, and he’s accustomed to me disappearing sometimes for weeks, but in this case… Since the last he knew I was meeting you, Striker and Peyton… He is unlikely to wait more than a single week before he takes action. If he hasn’t already?—”
Vanguard’s knees give out completely, and it’s only because Jonah’s holding on to him that he doesn’t hit the ground. “Damn. That thorn must have contained poison. I’m certain my power will deal with it soon enough but in the meantime…”
His words blend incomprehensively together, his eyes roll back, and Jonah lowers him carefully to the ground, keeping all parts of his body from extending across the stony path into the field.
Jonah looks at us with a warning. “I suspect these are carnivorous plants. First, they will sting, and then they will eat.”
