Enflame (Insight #6)(86)

“Ready?” I heard Landen say in my thoughts.

I gave a weak nod to say I was.

“Love you,” he thought.

“Love you,” I thought as I focused my eyes and remembered The Realm, sending my soul there.

The field didn’t come into view like it had every time before, and I wasn’t standing in some quaint circle of people I knew and trusted...no, I was in the middle of the war.

Stunned, it took me a second to understand that. I assumed I would be walking toward the fiery pentagram, but I wasn’t. I was watching Drake walk away from me.

I screamed his name, but he could not hear me. I started to run after him, and a few steps in, my perception changed. Now I was walking toward the pentagram that had Skylynn, Phoenix, and Landen around it. Xavier was not near me, and I was at least a few hundred feet away. A force that I could not see was drawing me closer.

The next second, I found myself in a sprint, chasing Drake again. I was trapped in some kind of loop, and that made my emotions go insane, causing wind to blow and thunder to crash.

I ran right past where Clarissa and Dane were lying, but then I turned, remembering they had to make it to the pentagram, too. Before I could focus that thought, my perception was shifted again, and I was walking toward the pentagram.

I couldn’t figure out why I was in both places, if it was just me, or if Madison was shifting back and forth, too. If she was, did she have any idea what the goal was? I glanced across the field and saw that there was no image of me down there, which told me I was playing both parts on my own.

Where is she?

An instant later I was back on the field, feet from Clarissa’s body. I dove across the grass to her.

“Tell me you know who I am! That you are real!” I screamed at her and Dane.

“I do, but she is still dying...I’m weak,” Dane said to me.

I let my hands rest where his hands were on her stomach, touching them both, sending as much energy and determination as I could through my touch. I was too scared to let all my power seep out. I wanted to save it for the pull on the door.

“You have to get to the pentagram. Can you carry her? Shift your way there or something?”

He didn’t have time to answer. I was shifted back to my walk to the pentagram. It was so frustrating. I could see Drake’s charge across the field, Dane struggling to carry Clarissa to us.

The next second, I was shifted back. Knowing that Dane was trying, I went after Drake, screaming his name.

He turned to see me. “Get down!” I yelled. I saw him fall as I flashed back to the pentagram.

Now closer to the fire, I thought I saw something within the center of the burning mark. It looked like a person. There was a whirlwind of dark and light energy swarming within the fire, so I had no way of knowing if what I was seeing was real or not.

The next second, I was back. Drake had crawled to where I was.

“We have to get to the pentagram. I don’t know where Madison is, but I can’t be two people.”

He glanced around the field, noticing how far Dane had gotten.

“Come on, love,” he said to me, clasping his energy around us, protecting us from anything that would be shot in our direction.

A few hundred feet away from our goal, I realized I was not shifting anymore, and a glance told me why: Madison was now walking toward Landen.

“No, no, no!” I screamed in a panic. “Drop your energy! She is in my place, and I’m in hers. This is wrong—so wrong!”

Drake seemed to doubt my words. I was sure he thought that the other girl could be an illusion.

“Let me out!” I screamed again.

His energy fell, and at that second I was where I was supposed to be, walking toward Landen. I heard Madison scream out in protest. Drake was trying to hold her back, telling her to be careful, but she was too focused on getting to where I was.

I didn’t have time to figure out why. Instead, I focused on the flames of energy. Deep inside, I felt the power of Mother Nature wanting out of me, my emotions wanting out of me. I used that feeling to focus on the whirl of energy, tasting the blood that was flooding into my mouth. Whatever control I had was seconds away from falling. I sent everything I had at that whirlwind, pushing it down, demanding that a door in this Realm to be opened.

Seconds after that, the light and darkness started to spin faster, at a downward angle. My confidence grew. I could see Landen and the others now, their focus on the words they were whispering across their lips.

All at once, Skylynn fell to her knees and screamed, “Guardian!” in agony.

Landen broke his focus and looked down at her, then somewhere in my direction. He vanished the next second.

I was dumbfounded, in shock. How could he just leave like that? Leave me here, forced to walk into these flames, for the sake of Skylynn’s pain?

The emotions in me erupted, filling the air with an electric current. A step later, I saw something in the energy I was pulling down, something I should not have: Monroe.

Then it made sense: Madison was trying to pull her out when she was in my position, and I’d pulled her away from that. One glance toward where she was told me I was right. She was screaming her name as she and Drake ran toward us.

I had no idea what to do, or how to do it. She was standing in the middle of the power we were pulling out. It was almost like she was channeling it, moving faster than I could have. I pushed against the force that was keeping me at a slow pace, wanting to get to her faster to pull her out of the flames.