Page 42 of Divine Oaths

Suddenly, the engines halted. It was only for a moment, but in that second, something pulled me from the arms of the machine. I—or, we—fell with a crash. My elbows hit the hard ground and the length of my arm was seared by skid marks as we tumbled beneath the machine. It was pulsing and quaking, but strong arms shielded me from the worst of it. When I looked up, I found myself staring into the depths of warm brown eyes.

“Jojo,” I whispered. But the mirage faded and it was Kasem who stared back at me.

I pressed my eyes shut, fighting the fear that coursed through my body. His grip tightened around me, his left hand firm along the small of my waist, his right acting as a barrier between my head and the ground.

With his tall height and how we were curled together, our legs were intertwined. Blood rushed to my cheeks at the feel of him and the weight of his body on top of mine. Even as I tried to shift away, my lips brushed his exposed collarbone, my mouth just inches from his neck.

Kasem swallowed at my touch, the curve of his Adam’s apple stark against his throat.

Despite myself, I sank into the warmth of him, relieved, terrified, and bitter, even as our racing hearts beat in time with each other.

If it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t have to be here. I’d have full control over my powers without pain. I wouldn’t have this all-consuming doubt about Jojo and what happened that night in the alleyway.

The machine loomed above us, trembling, enraged at the missed encounter for blood.

Before I could speak, Kasem took my hand.

“Want to explain why you have this?” he said. He held up my wrist, where his bracelet dangled.

When I tried to answer, the only thing I could do was search for words; a string of disconnected sentences escaped my lips.

“The accidents. Gus’s shop. Help.”

Kasem frowned, incredulous.

“You want my help,” he said. “After you, my brother, and Alaster tried to get me expelled?”

“That was all them,” I said, breathless. “And it was probably just Alaster who orchestrated the meeting with the president. I never lied about what happened. You helped me. But you saw the figure—and you were hiding it.” It had tried to kill me in the maze. It’d tried again here in the woodshop. When I said these thoughts aloud, the color drained from Kasem’s eyes.

“You’ve been marked.”

“Marked,” I repeated. “What are you talking about?”

My gaze fell to his right cheek. Moments before, in the president’s office, it’d been scratched and bleeding. But the skin there was freshly healed, the only trace that he’d been injured at all barely present in the faint trail of red against his jaw. Again, my migraine gnawed at my head. I reached for him, and he flinched.

Gently, I brushed the back of my palm against where the wound had been. His skin was cold, as if the chill in the air had seeped into his very bones.

“It’s gone,” I whispered. “It healed. But it was just there.”

He wouldn’t meet my gaze.

Impossible. This was entirely surreal. Even with my visions and ability to see into lifelines, I’d never seen something like what I’d witnessed in the maze and the woodshop, or even now. Something like… magic. Something not of this world.

Kasem wrapped his fingers around my wrist. I hadn’t expected his hands to be so big, so encompassing, and as he moved my hand away from him, he wouldn’t look at me.

“Let’s go somewhere where it’s safe,” he said. “Come with me.”

Instead of standing, we stayed beneath the machine, crawling to the other side of the room where another door stood ajar. Metal shards cut my palm, but I could barely feel them. All of me was focused on escaping, which might have been easier to do if Kasem would let go of my hand. But he didn’t and I didn’t want him to, afraid that if he let go, somehow I’d be devoured by the machine and the figure without eyes.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

What’s done cannot be undone

WHEN FINALLY WE EMERGED FROM the other side of the room, Kasem released his hold on me. We stumbled outside and into a garden that hadn’t been tended to in years.

The greenery was wilted, the shrubs skeletons of roots and branches. A small pond that had once been at the center of the garden had completely dried up. Bones of fish lay in ruins there, and the grounds were cracked and decrepit. Another exit loomed ahead. Westfield was a never-ending maze of courtyards and corridors, exits and entrances.

“You do realize this is your fault,” Kasem said.