Then she dies as I have planned, and you will be left to wonder if you could have done the impossible.
And with that, he was gone, taking with him the uneasy sense of trouble. As the charm's fierceness died to a more muted glow, I imagined Amaya sheathed, then knelt beside the woman.
Miss? Are you all right?
She didn't respond to the soft question, so I lightly touched her shoulder. She jumped, then shimmied away from me, her brown eyes wide and staring.
It wasn't so much the fear in her expression that surprised me, but rather the mark burned into her forehead. It was raw and weeping, as if it had only just been done. It was also K-shaped, with a tail that looped, reminding me oddly of a serpent. Two wounds marred her wrists, slicing up the center of her arms. While these were neither raw nor weeping, they'd split the skin open and looked painful. Two red marks also appeared to ring her calves, but from where I stood I couldn't really see if they were open wounds or not.
Adeline had said you couldn't be harmed on the astral plane, and yet this woman had been injured, and one of those wounds lay right where the stranger had been touching her. I doubted it was a coincidence.
Who are you? Her mind voice trembled with the fear so obvious in her pale features.
I'm a friend, I thought softly. There was a man attacking you—
Attacking? She frowned. What do you mean, "attacking"? We were having sex, for fuck's sake!
Sex? On the astral field? How the hell was that even possible? That's not what it looked like. Besides, you were screaming in fear.
She gathered the remnants of her clothing. Just because I don't like it vanilla doesn't mean it wasn't sex.
I frowned. She was making all the right sounds, but there was something not quite right about her eyes—something beyond the fear. It was almost as if someone else was staring out of them.
I shivered. I need to know where you live, Miss—
Like I'm about to tell you that! And with that, she disappeared.
I swore softly, then closed my eyes and imagined myself back in my body. I whooshed back with surprising speed, my eyes springing open as I gasped in shock.