The sonic boom coming from the other side of the trees, knocks Serafin into the water as the trees bend with the force. I can feel the pressure pushing along my barrier, but it holds strong.
A horn blows and Atlas’ voice rings out, “Round up.”
The blue hair, pink skin twins run by, giving me dirty looks before helping Serafin out of the water. Fire blazes in her eyes as she passes me with the twins, and all I do is stare back at her. I doubt I’ll ever get through to her that it wasn’t my fault. I didn’t even know they were related.
Standing up slowly, I feel my skin tingle all over as the barrier disappears. The weight of my clothes has me checking myself over to see that I’m covered in mud.
“You should stay down there where you belong.”
I turn around and see Emer leaning against a tree. Just seeing her enrages me. The shit she pulled this morning and how she’s blackmailing Levi...If I could attack her, I would.
“I hope you enjoyed seeing the guys this morning because after Sunday it will be your last time. Once Levi is bound to me, it’s only a matter of time before I get the others,” she says nonchalantly as she looks at her nails.
“It’s pretty sad that you have to resort to blackmail to get a man that’s disgusted by you, but hey, to each their own.” I quirk a brow and pull at my clothes, trying not to show how much she’s getting under my skin.
“Once I get Levi under my thumb, the others won’t even remember you,” she says arrogantly, giving me a cocky smirk.
“I’m not so easy to forget, Emer,” I say confidently, clenching my jaw and fists, not caring if she sees them or not.
She scoffs. “Believe me, Rez.” My name sounds like it leaves a foul taste in her mouth. “There are ways to make them forget you,” she says, puffing up her chest as if she’s the only woman with boobs, and turning her back on me like I’m not a worthy opponent before nodding at the other set of twins in front of her.
My nails cut through the skin of my palms, but I barely feel the pain as heat flows through my body at her words.
“Rez?” Moni flies up next to me, but I barely pay her any attention as I zero in on the Queen Harpy from Hell.
How dare she insinuate interfering with my men!
I just want to throw her—throw her in the fucking river. Without thinking, I fling my arm out towards the rushing water with all the anger and venom I have in my body, and my jaw drops when Emer yelps. Her body flys through the air, snapping tree branches, and splashes into the river.
Moni lets out a hysterical laugh and falls to the ground as the twins run after Emer. I stand there for a second before a shadow descends over me, and my stomach bottoms out as I look up to find Janus standing above me.
His arms are crossed over his broad, naked chest, heterochromia eyes focused on me, and a slight smirk graces his lips as I hear him speak in my head.
‘I see you’ve finally tapped into your wild magic. Next time when you attack the she-gremlin, do it in private so I don’t have to punish you. Now, clean up the limbs she busted and stack them on the trail. I will collect them later.’He turns and walks away, leaving me dumbstruck. I’m about to say something in gibberish when he looks over his shoulder and says, ‘Good job!’
ChapterFifty-One
BREADCRUMBS
Rez
Fuck Emer and her emotional episodes. As soon as she crawls out of the water she busts out crying about the evil human that ran at her and pushed her in the river like a crazed animal, and she’s surrounded by her sycophants willing to pamper her. I’m not allowed to leave until I clean up Emer’s mess, so Moni decides to stay behind to help me.
Holy Shit. I have powers! What kind of powers? I have no freaking clue, but I actually protected myself and handed the Harpy Queen her ass.Insert internal booty shaking dance here, maybe a body roll. Aww yeah, I did it!I don’t know if I’ll be able to do that again, but this is the start, right? Didn’t Moni say her powers started with emotions? I was angry, right? No, anger doesn’t even begin to describe what I felt when Emer opened her mouth…Wait…Oh. My. God. I’m not human. I have magic! I’m really not human. I truly belong here in Purgatory. How does that change the fact that I’ve been trying to get back home? Is home really the answer anymore? Who do I even have back there? And what creature am I now, since I have powers? Does this mean I’ll be seeing more of my powers and someone can tell me what the hell I am?
I need some fucking answers.
“It’s okay, Rez. I heard everything and I would have done the same thing if I could,” Moni admits—pulling me out of my internal freak out—as she picks up a stick twice the size of her and starts to tip over. I quickly grab the limb and take it away from her.
“Moni, I appreciate your help, but don’t you think you should be bigger than two inches if you’re going to be picking up sticks? And weren’t you the one to set off the ‘boom’ earlier that rocked the area?” I joke.
“You have a point, and I didn’t mean to go boom, but I didn’t want to get stepped on either,” she pouts.
“Wait. Someone was trying to step on you?” I question, shocked that someone would try to do such a thing.
“Yeah, one of the twins was trying to step on me to see how flat she could get me,” she says, picking up a twig that I’m pretty sure was already on the ground before Emer came flying through.
Walking over to the river, I see a limb that’s lying between two rocks in the rushing water. Setting down the bundle of broken limbs, I balance on the rocks and lean down to pick it up. Movement catches my eye and I notice a watery figure swimming by, stopping my process.
