Burnt Devotion (Imdalind, #5)(23)

She doesn’t want you anymore.

With her rejection, the barrier slipped away from my mind, the voice erupting in a violent shift that rippled through my body and brought physical pain. My muscles tensed, my heart beat amplified, and even the wood beneath my fingers seemed to be moving.

I tried to control it. I tried to fight it, to find the barrier and shift it back into place, but the voice was too loud, the anger all-encompassing.

She probably didn’t even want you in the first place.

Don’t say that.

She kept it close only to give it back when it would hurt you the most.

She wants you to fail.

Ilyan wants her to fail.

No, Ilyan is my family.

He only told you that to get what he wants.

Her. He wants her.

They are both liars.

No!

The word spouted in my head as I flinched, my hands pressing into the wood of the door so roughly I was sure it was going to move through the thick slab. I almost wanted it to. I wanted to hurt her.

“Did Ilyan tell you to say that?” The words ground their way out of me on their own, the voice deep with a hatred that was filling me.

Before I had even stopped speaking, Sain’s hand was pressed against my back, his magic a dead weight against my soul as it began to fill me.

“Focus, Ryland,” Sain whispered, his voice a soft anchor that I tried to cling to. If only it was enough.

“I will not focus,” I knew I was speaking too loud, but I didn’t care. “She’s giving back something that means so much! You have no idea what I went through.”

I know what you went through.

Make her pay.

I lifted my hand in an attempt to pound my fist against the door, the tense ball shaking with anger that only kept growing as the voice did. I was one quick motion away from shattering the door into a million splinters, my magic surging with the powerful energy that would be needed for such a feat.

Make her pay!

Yes.

My fist fell toward the door, only to be stopped by Sain’s soft hands. His touch gentle even though it was strong enough to stop me in my tracks. I froze in place as he moved to stand before me, my breathing a torrential heave as his soft eyes dug into me.

Don’t let him stop you.

Now is your chance!

I know.

She promised she wouldn’t give it back.

And now she is breaking that promise.

Now. Do it now.

“I was in that dungeon, too, Ryland.”

Simple words that meant so much more than I was sure even he understood. The words weren’t enough to slip the bind back in place, but I could feel it shift. I could feel the muscles in my arms and back relax, my breathing becoming mellow.

If only the voice would fade away again and give me back my mind.

“I saw what they did to you, Ry,” Sain continued, his voice a hushed whisper so as not to carry through the door. “They did the same to me so many times before.”

He’s lying.

No, he’s not.

Even though the voice was growl, I knew at once it was wrong. I had sat with this man only a day before and spoke of the terrors that we both had faced. I had seen the shadow of torture in his eyes, and I saw it now.

“She wants to give it back, Sain,” I said, disappointed that the growl still ran through it in a heavy vein. “After all I went through for her in order to give it to her, she wants to give it back.”

The tension in my back increased with every word, the painful pressure of heartbreak growing until I was certain I was about to be ripped apart.

“No, Ryland, she wants to help you.”

“How do you know?” I roared, my shout ricocheting off the stone walls of the alcove we stood in, the sound loud in my own ears. “You don’t even like her.”

Sain’s face blanched for the slightest moment, his eyes darkening before they shifted. I had expected the black of sight, but instead, they faded to a green, a darkness in them I hadn’t seen before chilling me.

“She is the Siln?.” I expected more, but that was all he said. Although, the odd statement somehow only confused me more, the voice within me calmed as if it somehow understood exactly what he meant, even if I didn’t.

“Ry.” Joclyn’s voice pulled me from the confusion. If only it could have pulled me from the madness.

“And she is a Drak,” I hissed in a whisper as Sain’s magic pulsed strongly through me. “A worthless Drak who cannot keep a promise.”

“Listen to what she has to say, son,” Sain whispered as he took another step toward me. “Don’t listen to the voice in your head. Not now. Not yet.”

I stared at him, waiting for him to say more, waiting for the voice to rampage through me, but they seemed to have slunk back into the shadowed corners of my mind. The murmurs were louder than before, but at least they weren’t destroying me. At least I could still be here with her.

Focusing on the clarity of my mind once more, I leaned against the door as I breathed and tried to think of something to say, some way to answer that wouldn’t leave me battling the same demons.

“I want you to have your heart back.” I tensed as her voice came through the door again, my heart beating in a panic at what was coming. “Not because I don’t love you, but because I do, just not in that way.”

Her words froze as my eyes snapped open, and the words that I had tried so hard to say to her came back to me in a whisper that rang with so much truth that, in that moment, I was sure the voice, the monsters, the torture, and everything were nothing more than a memory.