I gasped as heat surged from deep inside of me and a cry flew from my lips at the same time as it did Leah’s.
“Don’t break hands!” Erwin coached.
I fell to my knees, panting as the pain surged forward, causing me to sweat. Leah fell beside me, our hands in a deathlike grip.
Brayden rushed forward but Erwin held out a hand. “Don’t touch them. It will be okay, it’s burning off the curse, dissolving it. The memories will hit fully, then fade away forever.”
Then, all at once, a movie played before my eyes.I was a bystander in the film:Lena and Wren playing together in a garden as young children. Blake and Natalie were there too. In a flash, I was downloaded with both Lena and Wren’s life memories. Every intimate detail of each woman, whether I wanted them or not.
“Kiss your wife.”
“You are my everything.”
“Chocolates.”
Tabitha, Charlene, Maxine, Veronica, Naomi, Skylar and Hannah. I saw all of Lena’s forms. Brayden married her and made love to her in every single one, holding her as she died in his arms.
All of these lifetimes of memories flooded into me and a sob ripped from my throat.
When the memory of Wren lying over Lena’s body forty years ago surfaced, I latched on to it. Wren was bleeding, injured, and Brayden had left to give them some time alone.
Wren took the stone out and placed it on Lena’s chest. “Blood of my blood, heart of my heart,” Wren cried, and I felt the magic of the Greywolf stir inside of her. It was wild and unrestrained and the second she placed it on the stone, it shot out of her like a nuclear bomb.
Lena’s body convulsed, magic seeping out of her every pore, lighting up the walls with a buttery glow that then turned blue. Blood dripped from Wren’s nose and then they both unexpectedly collapsed.
Dead.
We were both sucked out of the memory at the same time.
“Not much time left. I already see the memories leaving,” Erwin stated.
No.
Leah stood, continuing to hold my hand, and took the power stone in her other. Brayden was staring at us, wide-eyed. Tears were still flowing down my cheeks. It was chaos but there was no time to even think.
Leah slammed the stone on Brayden’s chest and I placed my hand over hers, my fingers touching the stone as well. With our other hands clasped together, we created a circle of energy.
“Heart of my heart,” Leah and I both said simultaneously, ditching the blood of my blood line since Brayden was in fact not blood related to us. The amount of power that filled me up in that moment was inexplainable. My body shook and I felt so much raw magic flood through me I was sure I was capable of anything right then.
It was hard to explain what Leah and I both did next. It came as instinct from centuries of using Greywolf power. Our memories were fully accessible, and so like a seamstress would sew back together a broken garment, we stitched Brayden back into his power.
It was as if magical lightning fell from the sky, shooting Brayden in the arms, legs, head. A magnificent beam of blue light shot down, splintering into a hundred streaks. Every single one of them zapped his body, pulling him up to suspend him in midair.
I started to get confused about why my hand was on his chest and what we were doing.
“Oh my light,” Erwin breathed.
Brayden looked like a Tesla coil, hundreds of little lightning bolts battering his skin as he shook and convulsed. Fear gripped me.
“We’re hurting him!” I yanked my hand back and stared at Leah in shock. She looked as surprised and confused as I did, peering at the red stone in her hand with knotted eyebrows.
“I…”
Brayden crashed to the ground with a thud and the blue light left him.
Castiel approached Leah. “Hello, love. Everything is fine. The spell worked and you’ve lost those past memories. You were giving Brayden his power back.”
Dawning understanding showed on her face, and it was like a puzzle piece clicked in my mind. Yes. We came here to get the curse off of Leah and I, but in doing that we’d lost our Lena and Wren memories.
