Page 217 of The Gods Order

My lips tighten.

“Passed out? Is that what we’re calling it?”

“Don’t, Amick.” He sighs.

“Don’t tell me to don’t, Creed,” I say, tossing the book on the bed and leaning forward in the chair I moved to his bedside.

I rest my elbows on my knees as we hold each other’s stares. For someone who just slept twelve straight hours, he woke in a foul mood.

He caves first with another long breath.

“I’m sorry,” he mutters.

“I don’t need your meaningless apologies. I need you to be more careful.”

“Gods. Waking up and being lectured is exactly what I wanted.”

“I’m not lecturing.”

The snap and crack in my voice have both of us falling still. I roll my shoulders out and stare at my tangled fingers.

“That was…” I trail off, attempting and failing to shove all these reckless emotions down deep inside of me. “I had to place a spoon in front of your nose to see your breaths. I could barely hear your heartbeat with my ear pressed to your chest. Do you know how petrifying it was to watch you lie here so still?”

His throat bobs as he gulps, and I shut my eyes for a fleeting second.

Watching Mellcom snatch Thayla through our father’s Veil and seeing Creed lie on the ground like a corpse will be two images that haunt me for the rest of my life.

Terrifying fear that she would never come out of that corrupt cloud had all logic leaving my mind. I slaughtered with no regard and allowed a foreign side of myself to rise to the surface. Even in my angriest moments, I can think straight.

Not then. There was no reasoning with myself whatsoever.

The moment she burst through that gray wall, screeching for us to run, reality came back to me.

I was able to control myself until the Veilatara allowed us to see Creed.

As I laid my ear to his chest, I vowed that if I didn’t find a heartbeat, the task of us saving this realm would be nullified. I’d do everything in my power to destroy not only our father, but the Valories as well.

Luckily, he’s very much alive and figuring out how to destroy our creator while keeping the realm safe isn’t something I have to do.

Today.

I may not say it, but I can’t explain how relieved I am to see his angry gray eyes stare back at me.

Too bad I can’t provide him with the opportunity to leisurely come to completely.

“Thayla is lying in her bed. We finally convinced her to take a nap before we go. I doubt she’s actually sleeping, but I haven’t gone and checked on her, Kyzen, and Riven in about five hours.”

“Before we go where? What happened?”

“A lot,” I mutter. “Nothing realm ending. Kira took some damage, which might buy us a little time. Val starshot the Binding from the Abandon when he got to all of us, so luckily the mission wasn’t for nothing. He also revealed that all the other Bindings are hidden within the rocky formation at the hot spring. Derivius and Meridamus are stalking around Valveilious, listening for whispers. And Mellcom is our biological brother.”

His mouth parts as his face falls blank. I’m not sure why he’s shaking his head back and forth as if I’d tell him a lie.

“The fuck he is. What the hell are you talking about?” he asks.

“Biologically, he is. Though blood doesn’t much matter to me.”

I don’t waste another breath on pointless small talk and tell him everything that was said while he was out. From the moment the Veilatara parted, revealing his prone body, to everything Thayla told us about what Mellcom said in the Veil. Her intense and revealing moment with Meridamus and Val, and her demand to go see her mother.