and I shrugged slightly, trying to hide the fact that I had no idea what was going on. When we left the academy and exited the woods, we found Lucian’s Range Rover. Cheng’s eyes sparkled and he couldn’t take them away from the SUV.
“Don’t scratch it,” Emanuel ordered us both and I handed the keys to Cheng.
“I’ll try my best.” Cheng smiled.
I gave him a hug, well a waist hug. He was huge, but then again he was the King’s dragon.
“Thank you, Emanuel.”
“Take care, Elena.” He smiled. “If you need anything, let me know, okay,” he said as he took my Cammy and paired it with his. He walked toward another SUV and turned around as he opened the door. “Take care of her,” he yelled at Cheng.
“Which one, the Rover or the girl?”
“Both.”
Cheng laughed.
Constance and Master Longwei together with Becky, Sammy and the guys went down with us. Cheng repacked our luggage from a tiny car over to the Range Rover. George and Dean helped. When they were finally done, we started to say goodbye.
Constance was first. “Just come back, please,” she whispered into my ear. “Take care,” she said out loud.
“I will,” I said with a soft smile.
Master Longwei was still speaking to Cheng in Latin as I grabbed Becky next. Her grip was extra tight and she didn’t want to let me go.
“I’ll come back, even if I have to set their asses on fire. I promise.”
She giggled into my shoulder. “You better.”
Sammy didn’t say anything, she just grabbed me around the neck. I knew she was thankful for the things I was about to do for her brother. George gave me a hug. It was the first time he’d hugged me of his own will, the other times were to keep me from killing someone. “Take care, Elena. Please come back for Becky and Blake’s sake.”
I giggled. “I’m not planning to die in there.”
“Good girl.”
Dean was like Sammy, he said nothing but I could feel his worry and concern behind his hug. The two of them made a perfect couple.
I climbed in as Master Longwei handed something to Cheng. He came around to my window and stuck his head into the car. “Don’t think that I don’t know what this is all about, Elena. You can thank me later when you come back,” he said and pulled his face back out the window.
“What no goodbye?” I joked.
“I don’t believe in them. I’ll see you later.”
“Later it is then,” I yelled as Cheng turned on the engine.
I closed my eyes and lay with my head against the back of the chair. The last time I’d been in this SUV was with Lucian. It was that day at the gallery, the day that he played me that song of Blake’s. The one that spoke to my soul.
He still hadn’t appeared to me after the last time, and it felt like it had been forever.
Cheng honked again and I looked back and saw all the people I cared for waving one last time.
At least they would be safe from whatever was out there. I picked up the heart charm that dangled from my necklace and brought it to my mouth. My lips touched the rough edges. Please, don’t let me go through this alone. I said a small prayer and hoped that Lucian and God could hear it.
HENG BLEW OUT a huge gush of air. “This looks like a good place to stay over for the night. Tomorrow we can find a way to enter the Acker Woods.”
We’d been driving straight for a shit ton of hours. My legs felt numb and I really needed to stretch them. “Is it still far?”
“No, Elena, but I need my rest, and so do you. We’ve been driving for the past 20 hours straight. We both could do with a bath as well.”
“Hey, are you trying to tell me something?”
“Yes, you smell,” he joked and I threw an empty can of soda in his direction.
We walked over to the small guest house. A funny feeling had rested inside my gut for the past day. I didn’t know what or where it would lead to, but something was going to happen.
Cheng opened the door and we walked into an old tavern type of place. It had wooden tables and a podium which I assumed was used to play live music. It felt as if I’d stepped back into the seventeenth century. Everything screamed ancient. The tapestry and even the faint lantern that lit