them up into pieces. My magic siphons onto the sand, creating a wall of fire between us and the wolves. Their eyes gleam at me through the flames, but I hold myself tall, lift my chin, and make a point of looking directly at Tyler before I smile and turn back to my guys.
We won, motherfuckers! Take that!
Axel’s pained groans pull me back into reality and I hurry over to him. Memphis grabs four orbs from the wall while Scott bends down to inspect Axel’s wound. Thank goodness he’s a healer. From the amount of blood Axel has lost, and is still pouring out from just under his knee, this could’ve been fatal if Scott wasn’t here to help us. I’ve never been more relieved to have my professor here with me than I am right now.
Memphis hands me the orbs and nudges my shoulder playfully.
“You did good out there, kid.”
I beam up at him, trying my best to ignore the amount of blood that covers him. “All in a day’s work.”
Our light-hearted moment is interrupted by the sound of Scott snapping at his brother.
“Quit your fucking moaning.”
Axel’s eyes nearly burst out from their sockets. “Quit my moaning? My kneecap was nearly ripped out by a fucking werewolf. I can moan all I want.”
“You still act like a baby whenever there’s blood,” Scott mutters as he waves his hand over Axel’s knee.
Axel grumbles something intelligible under his breath.
“I can stop the bleeding and soothe the bone until we get back, but you’ll need surgery as soon as possible. You should be fine in a couple of days since nothing was broken, only scratched.”
“Oh, only scratched. Well, that’s alright then, isn’t it? Dickhead.” Axel grins and winks at me when he says this, but I can tell from his pale expression that he’s in a lot of pain and deeply worried. If he breaks his leg, he won’t be able to protect me, or himself for that matter, and I know that’s all he wants to do in this place. “Just help me stand up, brother.”
When he’s on his feet again, albeit supported by Scott and Memphis, I hand him an orb and kiss him briefly on the lips. It doesn’t appear enough for him. He grabs my neck and pulls me down for another kiss, a deeper, more passionate one.
“Let’s get you the fuck out of here,” he says once we pull away, and then we’re all pressing our orbs that return us to the light fae prison.
Lying on cold grass, the long strands brush my neck as I look up at the clear blue sky above. White clouds in various shapes float past me and I smell nothing but the flowers in the nearby field with the wind blowing through the trees. It’s so peaceful here, so relaxing and beautiful, and with every moment I lay here memories of the prison and the Blood Trials drift away. They seem like a distant version of myself now, because in these dreams, I’m okay. I’m not trapped and helpless. My mother didn’t betray me. My life isn’t the fucked up mess it’s become.
“When I was a small child,” Kaelah says as she comes to my side and lays next to me, “I used to lie in these fields and gaze at the clouds. I would try to guess what they were pretending to be and create stories for them.”
I turn my head to look at her as she watches the clouds, and she almost looks like one of them; beautiful and enchanting yet so far away.
“I would search for horses. They have always been my favourite animal. But my brother, he loved ducks.” A pained smile spreads over her lips. “Strange boy, he was.”
“You had a brother?” I sit up and instantly see a group of boys playing together, the images so real I could almost touch them. Three young boys chase after a ball, shouting and calling out to each other. Two of the boys have brown hair, but one has silver hair with piercing blue eyes.
Kaelah nods to him. “My brother is your ancestor, Izora Dawn. Your mother’s ancestor.”
I keep my eyes on the boy and watch him kick the ball into the trees. All of them are laughing as they chase after it, leaving us alone in the field. I suspect they never saw us here, anyway. “I was not the only special child in my family.”
“So we are related?” I ask Kaelah and she nods only once.
“Yes.