Enflame (Insight #6)(84)

“Drake coming?” Brady asked after a few silent moments.

“His choice. I don’t need the circle to get in,” Landen commented dryly.

“He’s coming,” Chrispin offered. “He told me he was.”

Landen and Brady gave him a curious look. Chrispin was usually distant when it came to Drake, but I could feel a bond building between them, between all the brothers on that side of the family. I guess we were falling into our own paths.

We slowed down as we approached the driveway I knew we had to turn into.

“What the hell?” Brady said, slamming on the brakes.

Landen and I both looked behind us just in time to see the Jeep Draven was driving fall back on its front wheels. It was like someone had picked it up and dropped it.

Landen pushed his door open to rush to them and make sure they were all right. I followed. They all seemed fine to me. Confused, but fine. I did notice someone familiar standing in the shadows across the street. Her violin and lavender hair made her stand out.

I started to walk her way to scold her, feeling Olivia behind me. I was almost in front of her when she vanished.

“Willow? Where are you going?” Olivia all but shouted.

“Nowhere now.”

“What are you looking at?”

“Landen’s ex. Did you not see her?”

“No,” she said, looking all around.

I assumed I was seeing the veil and she wasn’t.

“What’d she do, attack the wrong Jeep?” she asked, looking at me, her pupils dilating.

I was starting to think that Madison had managed to teach Olivia to see. It didn’t really surprise me that Olivia would pick up on it instantly. More than once she had found a new vision on this path we were on.

“Aden?” she questioned.

“You can see,” I responded in a vacant tone.

“I’m really bad at it. Seriously? Aden? But I thought she was—”

I stopped her from going on. “It’s a weird story. They’ve never met.”

I glanced back to see Draven’s Jeep pulling into the driveway. Landen was walking toward us. Clarissa had appeared, and she was embracing Brady, whispering words of comfort in his ear.

“Oh my God,” Olivia said, noticing her.

“I have a feeling I’m about to be zapped away. Go talk to her, and I’ll see you when this is over,” I said to her.

She looked at me like I was crazy, but two steps later Landen had his arms around my waist, and a whisk of warm air moved us to the field with the graveyard.

“Skylynn tried to hurt them. Make her show up now so I can repay the act,” I snapped at him.

“If she wanted to hurt them, she would have. She didn’t mean anything.”

“She picked up the Jeep and dropped it!” I said, stating the obvious.

“Listen,” he said, reaching for me to send a calm through his humming energy. “The past few days have been really hard on her.”

“That’s odd. They’ve been awesome for me.”

I don’t know if it was my tone or my words, but his eyes seemed to smile at me. It was like my anger had ignited something inside of him.

“Aden...she is bound to him. If or when he is close to death, she grows really weak, and lately Aden has been a bit daring.”

“Then he was safer with Pelhan,” I pointed out.

“Safe, but not helping. He is a part of what Draven and Charlie are dealing with. Tonight is going to be hard, like last night. I may have to leave you to help them, and I’m fighting with that right now. I have been.”

All at once, it made sense to me: he was keeping the paths we were on out of my view for not only the fear of crossing them, but also so he would not have to face the reality of them. In the past we’ve always faced death, the threat to others. But this time was different because in no way could anyone fall tonight. If they did, it would cause a massive chain reaction, one that may not hurt us today but eventually would catch up to us.

“You help them. Do not let me be your crutch. I can defend myself. If you hold back, we’ll fall later.”

“I knew you’d say that,” he said as he leaned his forehead against mine. “I’m going to fight hard for you, for all of us.”

I reached up to steal a kiss from his humming lips. His arms tightened around me, pulling me in to a deeper embrace.

After a whisk of warm air, I heard, “Well.” It was Phoenix, who huffed, “I see that you two are in no shape or form concerned about this spell.”

Slowly, I pulled away from Landen, smiling shyly. “That makes you a blind man, then.”

“Oh, so that was a kiss goodbye or something? I do not approve. More effort next time, mate,” Phoenix said to Landen, only to get a harsh glance in response. “You want to see what we are up against? Something tells me this is the right time.”

“Lead the way,” Landen said, reaching for my hand.

The wave of the veil appeared a few feet in front of us. We followed Phoenix in, hearing the painful screams of the dead as we passed through. Once we entered it, there was no one to claim the screams we heard.

“Where is everyone?” Landen asked.

“Gathering for a show, it looks like. I guess everyone likes a good concert,” Phoenix said, nodding toward where the house was. He was right: there were thousands upon thousands surrounding the home.