AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I shut my eyes and reached out with my shadow senses. “Wildlife, but nothing that seems interested in us,” I said. “At least, as far as I can tell with my powers. I’m not very good with them yet.”
“Good enough to drag someone else through shadow more than once. Even Nic can’t do that,” Dio pointed out.
“Yeah, it kind of sucked for everyone though,” I said.
“Let’s practice sometime when lives aren’t actually at stake. Maybe we can make it better.” Dio traded a last look with Geraint before my knight went back into the woods to keep watch.
Dio turned his attention back to me. “I’m sorry my leaving put Geraint in danger.”
“It put you in danger, too.”
“And if you had come after me instead of your knight, I would have put you in danger instead. I shouldn’t have left.” He took a breath. “I doubt I’d make a different decision if I went back and did it again, but I am sorry.”
“That woman is a dreambound, and she wants to destroy the realm because she thinks it will allow her to return home. She’s not going to stop until she’s annihilated everything.”
“She’s the cause of all of this?” Dio raised his eyebrows.
“I think so, yes.”
“We need to let the others know.”
“We need to figure out what’s wrong with Baz, too. It’s going to take all of us to stop her, I think.”
Dio nodded, his curls falling into his face. He brushed them away. “I think they stole his essence. If I’m remembering correctly, I fled to the conscious realm and separated from mine to avoid them getting a hold of it.”
“Yeah, what was up with that creepy cornfield place?” I shuddered.
“The fields would have consumed anyone who crossed with ill intent. I set it up before I broke myself in half.”
“Can you get rid of the corn?”
Dio shook his head. “Once the corn is summoned, it remains.”
Why are cornfields so freaking creepy? I rubbed goosebumps that rose on my arms.
“Speaking of essence. Can you please see if you can feed me some energy? I’m sorry I refused earlier.”
“Of course, Dio.” The last of my residual anger fled. He was trying.
I moved farther from the ravine, a cool breeze with a fetid note making my skin crawl.
“Maybe we should move away from the giant rift in the ground.” I stepped back.
“Yes.”
I took Dio’s hand, and we moved into the woods. Geraint checked in with us once to let us know he was keeping an eye on the ravine, then let us have our space. I didn’t know what I’d done to deserve the knight in my life, but I sent up thanks I had him, and Nic, and it seemed now Dio.
Once we were far enough away that we felt safe, I reached up and put my hands on Dio’s chest. His energy was weak, but it responded to me, curling around my fingers like a cat rubbing on someone’s leg.
“How come I didn’t know you were also a winged cat?” I grinned up at him.
“We obviously couldn’t tell you.” He grinned. “Although I had always wished we could. I almost did a few times, but we were already breaking so many rules.”
“Well, I got shadow powers from Nic. What will I get from you?”
Dio tilted his head. “Are we going to have sex, then?”
I smoothed my hand over his cheek. “If you want to. I assumed that was where we were headed.”
