Series: Lords of Rathe Series by Meagan Brandy
Total pages in book: 104
Estimated words: 98580 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 493(@200wpm)___ 394(@250wpm)___ 329(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98580 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 493(@200wpm)___ 394(@250wpm)___ 329(@300wpm)
I crumble, pain and sorrow threatening to swallow me whole as everything comes back at once.
Knight’s acceptance turned vengeance.
Me broken in a cell my so-called people put me in.
The King’s visit.
The sanctuary.
Knight's soft hands and broken whispers. His accidental, unmistakable love and complete and total acceptance.
His claiming.
His letting me go...
I wail into the darkness, the images cutting off with one last picture across the walls, only this one isn’t from my own memories, but his.
It’s Knight on his knees, alone in his room, wishing for a way to be mine.
I hurl more vomit toward the ground.
Hatred and confusion created a toxic cocktail that has me wishing I could turn back and throw myself off the cliff I was dropped on that lead me to this moment, but the spirits won’t allow it. I've entered their cave, and they want me out.
Once again, I drive forward, falling several times as my knees and pulse crunch and scrape against the hard ground. The skin on my knees splits open, but I don’t care. I need out.
Just when I’m sure the pain is too much, that I can’t take it and it alone will kill me where I crawl, a light appears at the end, the figure of a female shadowing the front.
“We’ve got a new girl!” she shouts, her voice raspy and thick.
My body falls, my muscles giving way as she reaches into the cave. Her hands grip me around my upper arms as she yanks me from the depths of whatever hell this cave is made of.
The girl stands above me, head tipped to the side with the sun that I haven’t seen in days bright behind her.
“Welcome to Exile Island.”
I was right.
This is Exile Island, where the unwanted and unwelcome Gifted are thrown.
But I shouldn't know that.
That wasn't a real memory, me reading that book.
It was a fake one Knight gave me when he stole the truth from me.
I want to be angry, but I dig deep down, searching for that rage, begging it to build, but I can’t find it, and that makes me want to spew all over again.
Who cares if he did it to steal my pain and fix what he broke.
It's wrong. He killed my best friend because he thought I killed his sister.
I should hate him, but I don’t know how.
Not anymore.
Not after everything.
And for that … I hate myself.
Wait.
Wait!
Thought I killed his sister?!
I close my eyes, searching for the memory once more. A memory that once again isn’t mine.
It's his and it’s clear as day.
I didn’t kill Temperance Deveraux... so who the fuck did?
My mind is a fucking mess, a million thoughts I can’t make out swarming me all at once, to the point I feel dizzy. My vision keeps blurring, but I blink through it, trying to focus on the warmth of the sun as it beams against my back. I’ll admit, I’ve missed it while in Rathe. Growing up in the human world might sound like a nightmare to most Gifted, but there were a lot of parts I can appreciate now that my mind is mine again.
Like the sun and the ocean. I look toward the edge of the island, the sharp rocky cliffs that look like they lead into nothing but clouds. My senses are on fire, a hundred times what they were. I hear the crash of waves below. I smell the salt in the air.
Exhale Island isn’t in Rathe.
It’s hidden on Earth.
I try to focus on the fact that I’m on familiar ground again, seeking a sense of peace but there is none. Now more than ever I feel like I don’t belong, but as I look to the gorgeous girl leading me down the black stone path, a small pain forms in my chest for her.
Because really, she must feel it too. Everyone here must, and I imagine that’s the point, forcing them out of their homes and into a world they don’t even belong to.
It's a punishment crueler than death.
The girl adjusts the dagger at her hip, tossing her long, wavy black hair over her shoulder as she looks up toward the sky. I follow her line of sight, my eyes widening as not one, but three dragons shoot up from behind the cliff, wings stuck to their side as they race high into the sky and the sound of their bodies shooting overhead. As fast as they appear, they’re gone, nothing but a trail of smoke in their wake.
“Holy shit.”
The girl chuckles. “Yeah. They’re more competitive than the lycans,” she says, facing forward and I take her in better.
Her leather boots are a deep brown and heelless, reaching just above her knee. Her pants look like leggings, but the material isn’t one I recognize, and a black tank top tucked into the waste. She wears some sort of holster over her shoulders. It’s the same color as her boots, the thick bands curving around her shoulders and meeting at her spine where the straps become one. It lies flat against her back, looping around her ribs and clips like overalls without flaps. She has a dagger slipped in the sheaths on both the right and left side and a holster belt clipped loosely around her waist, two small pouches on each side, but I couldn’t guess as to what’s inside them. She even has a small headpiece—again, a perfect match for the gear and boots—that lies across her forehead, the straps hidden beneath her thick black hair.