Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 112398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 562(@200wpm)___ 450(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 562(@200wpm)___ 450(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
She blinked through the moisture that blurred her eyes. “And what if I fail? What if I fail our family? What if I fail the rest?”
She glanced at her phone, which sat face up on the bed. The screen was still open to a picture of what was clearly a Laven woman. Dead after a stabbing at a railway station in Italy.
“What if I’m not enough? And what happens if Laven no longer walk in Faydor? What happens when we’re obliterated?”
I grabbed her by both sides of her face, palms holding her tight as I drew her toward me. I brushed the pads of both thumbs under the hollows of her eyes as I urged, “You can’t lose faith.”
Aria let go of a tremorous sound. “It’s so much more than I ever imagined. For so long, our world was small. Our Laven family. And now . . .”
“And now we know how important Laven truly are,” I stressed. “Now we know what is riding on stopping this monster.”
Uncertainty passed through her expression. Desperation and despondency. “I want to. I want to believe that I hold that kind of power—but God, Pax . . .” She sucked in a shaky breath. “We know what it means if there are fewer Laven to stop the Kruen. More humans will die, too. It feels like too much.”
She hesitated, then whispered, “And I’m just . . . me.”
Tightening my hold on her face, I pulled her closer. Breathing her in. The goodness and the light. “That’s right, Aria. You’re just you. Amazing and wonderful you. You are so fuckin’ powerful. I’ve seen it. Have felt it. And I think you know there is so much more inside you that remains untapped. We just have to figure out how to tap into it.”
Chapter Eighteen
Aria
It was unsettling, waiting for something to happen. For the tsunami I could feel building in the distance to finally hit land. A surging force that would eradicate everything in its path.
It was as if I could feel it lingering at the edges of this world. Trembling and vibrating as it gathered strength. And when it combusted, it would fracture everything this world knew.
That worry over my family had come back in full force, and I’d probably checked in with my mother too many times to make sure they were all safe.
They were.
Safe and still staying at my grandmother’s.
I’d warned them to be extra vigilant.
I glanced around the grocery store, where Pax and I roamed up and down the aisles, grabbing a few things to stock our room with.
I couldn’t help but peer at those surrounding us who went about their days without a clue. Some in torment, the voices so strong that it felt nearly impossible not to reach out and touch them as I passed by.
Others where their voices were only a slight drone.
None were without hopes and fears.
An elderly woman, her back hunched with a hump and her head permanently angled to one side.
A mother with three young children who was frazzled but still patient as she smiled.
A man who rushed in to grab a twelve-pack of beer.
The workers.
The patrons.
My spirit ached with what might happen if all Laven were erased. I couldn’t imagine that society would stand. It would mean complete and utter destruction.
It would be impossible for life to go on the way it was meant to.
The precarious balance we tiptoed tossed from its axis.
“Ah, here we go. Doughnuts.” Pax sent me a wry grin as he grabbed a plastic container from a display in the bakery.
A sad smile ridged my mouth. There was no stopping the melancholy. Finding proof of all the dead Laven earlier today had wrecked something inside me.
But I had to put one foot in front of the other and hope I could tap into whatever was trapped inside me, the way Pax had said. It just made it really difficult when I didn’t understand any of it.
The hardest part was that this was no longer about my survival only.
It was about survival for all of us.
For Laven.
And I knew, without question, that extended into humanity.
Pax felt my unease, and he reached out and tugged me toward him. “Come here, Princess.”
He tucked me between himself and the cart, and he started pushing it around the end of one aisle and up another, his mouth at the side of my neck as he murmured near my sensitive skin, “Remember when you told me we had to cherish every moment that we had? Make use of every minute of time that we’re given? I’m gonna hold you to that right now. We’ve got too much to be living for . . . to be fighting for . . . for you to give up on me now.”
I leaned against him, letting myself sink into the warmth he exuded. “I’d never give up on you, Pax.”