Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 130619 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 653(@200wpm)___ 522(@250wpm)___ 435(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130619 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 653(@200wpm)___ 522(@250wpm)___ 435(@300wpm)
“It feels the same.”
“It’s not. I assure you that what feels like days here are only moments on Earth.” He shoves a bite of his cake in his mouth. “Very good. Where’s it from?”
“My favorite bakery in downtown Austin,” I answer absently, focused on the oddity of what he’s just shared. “How is that possible?”
A book appears on the table next to me. “Read that one. It’ll explain the time differences, but bottom line, we have breathing room to train, or I couldn’t be here without neglecting my duties as an Overseer. And the good news is that we have Elysium on our side. The magic here will be your guide. You’ll even find you wake up knowing more than you went to sleep knowing each day. I always do. It’s one of the reasons I come here.”
I scoop up a bite. “And you don’t invite others to experience the same?”
“As I said, on a select basis.”
“Yet you invited me?”
“I did,” he confirms, sipping his coffee and offering nothing more.
“Aren’t you worried about unleashing my ‘assets’ while the serpent still has control of me?”
“It doesn’t control you unless you allow it to control you, and you haven’t gone that direction. To me, that says a lot about you. You’re stronger than it, but more importantly, you want to defeat it. And so, you will.”
I draw a sharp-edged breath, feeling as if there are shards of glass cutting my lungs. “And if I don’t?” I ask, daring to voice my greatest fear.
He leans forward and captures my hand where it rests on the table, the jolt of the touch shocking me, the collision of our stares stealing my breath. His fingers curl around mine, warm and somehow cold to the bone, and when he speaks, his voice is rough with demand. “You don’t have the luxury of allowing that ‘if’ to exist, Ember. Do you understand?”
The Sacred Book of Nephilim
Magic is either light or dark, and in the darkness, you find hell.
Chapter thirty
The way he says those words, “You don’t have the luxury of allowing that ‘if’ to exist, Ember,” sears me with dread and foreboding and kills our sweet dessert mood with a big fat spear. I yank my hands from his and shove aside my cake, which disappears, and I don’t even think about the magical moment, for the clawing defensiveness ravishing me. “Or what? What aren’t you telling me, Micah?”
“Read the book.”
“Give me the highlights from your point of view.”
“I told you—if that happens, you can never read the text without my thoughts intruding on your own.”
I push to my feet. He doesn’t do the same. “I don’t like the secrets you’re keeping,” I grind out.
“There are no secrets. I’ve handed you the truth in that book. Come on now, Ember. Ease up and sit down and eat carrot cake with me.”
“It’s gone,” I say. “The cake is gone.”
“Bring it back.”
“No. What time is it?”
He points at my wrist, and a watch appears. “It’ll read the accurate time.”
I don’t ask how that’s possible, and I’m done gaping at acts of magic. I glance at my wrist and find the nine p.m. hour, comforted by the idea that time is different here, which translates to no one looking for me. I’m not sure anyone but Oliver would care anyway. Certainly not the people who I believed to be my parents, and I’m not sure it would be for the right reasons if they did.
“Penny for your thoughts,” Micah says, and it’s only then that I realize that he’s standing in front of me. Close. So very close. And for reasons I can’t explain, it feels different this time—a warm, sunny day splaying across the ocean of possibilities. One corner of his far from angelic mouth quirks. “Or, in this case, a fresh piece of carrot cake?” There’s a gentle tease in the suggestion, pillowy silk in his words.
I swallow hard, the scent of him is earthy and wholly male, and I really like it. I really like him, too, and that’s pretty twisted considering he may have to kill me. “I don’t want the cake,” I say bitterly. “I don’t want a lot of things right now.”
“Fair enough,” he says. “I’m more interested in what you want. What do you want, Ember?” His voice lifts slightly, as if he’s invested in the question and my answer.
Him, I think, and part of me believes that’s what he wants me to say. Another believes it’s a shallow answer to offer a man who’s fighting to save the world—perhaps from me. “Everything I could say to that question feels wrong right now.”
“We might be Nephilim, Ember, but we have a human side and human wants and needs. Using that part of us actually makes us stronger, more connected to those we protect, closer to each other.”