Page 193 of Eternal Surrender

Scattered memories. . .

My head was foggy. I ran my hands over my chest, my ribs, my arms. I was afraid, quietly, painfully afraid that I would find something wrong, something misshapen, some early sign of ruin. But there was nothing.

I was as I had been.

For a moment, Orpheus and I looked at each other.

We were enemies still. Broken, breathing, and only resting for a second before it began again.

We had shared too much to pretend otherwise. Thoughts. Feelings. Dreams that did not belong to one alone. We had felt what the other felt. Lived it, as if it had been our own skin, our own breath. There was no clean edge after that. And some part of me missed him. Missed the dark in him. The sharp, devilish thing that knew me as I was, and did not look away.

Something told me all of this had changed him too. Stripped something away and left the rest of him harder.

And that made Orpheus more dangerous than he had ever been.

Unsure where the others were, I had to protect them from him. From his silent ways, his rage that moved like a storm with no sky to hold it.

I crashed Orpheus’s head against the stone and he struck out, shoving me. He was on his feet again now, flying up into the air toward me, punching my jaw with a crack, knocking me backward.

Stunned, I paused, realizing there was only one stone.

Instead of the night sky, there was a high vaulted ceiling painted with intricate frescos, dramatic scenes portrayed from the book of Genesis and at my feet marble flooring inlaid with emblems.

More striking still, my shirt was off and these trousers weren’t my own; I was barefoot. Orpheus too was dressed like me, trousers only, chest bare and shoeless.

He scanned his surroundings, seemingly as baffled.

Orpheus flew at me, grabbed my shoulders and thrust upward, slamming me hard against the ceiling, his fingers squeezing my throat. He let go, and we tumbled to the floor.

I rose to my feet and readied for another attack.

Orpheus was standing a few feet away, his face twisted in confusion. “I can’t. . . do it.” He stared at his hands.

Trying to read him, I culled his thoughts for how we’d gotten here.

Orpheus flinched as though struck by an invisible force, his face contorted in horror. “I can’t kill you.”

“Where are we?” I muttered.

His eyes searched the chamber again, looking for anything familiar.

“Sunaria’s alive,” I said, stirring his memory

With a suspicious gaze, he considered me. “What the hell happened?”

“I see you’ve woken up.” Fabian was standing casually beside the megalith.

“What is this?” Orpheus yelled, fury came off him in waves. It was as if he only just remembered it all. The nightmare we had walked through. The things done. The things seen.

Fabian stepped nearer. “Orpheus, a part of you is within Jadeon, and he in you.”

“What did you do to us?” he snapped.

“Separated you,” Fabian said.

Orpheus backed up. “Where are we. . .”

Fabian threw me a reassuring glance. “St. Michael’s Mount.”