“If you won’t fly Kalgren Tech then you’ll just have to fly ‘Thorn Airlines’ first-class instead.”
She couldn’t resist any longer and she fully relaxed into him, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Does that mean I get the seats with the leg room?”
“No, you get the seat with your legs pressed up against the hunky captain.”
“I guess that will have to do. Did you just call yourself... never mind,” she murmured. She knew that he sometimes read magazine articles about himself and liked to quote the more favorable things said about him in the media. Pax looked over his shoulder as the rising sun disappeared below the horizon as they flew toward the west. It was as though Thorn was reversing time for her, and they were flying backwards into the night so that they could spend it together.
In a way, he really was reversing time as they quickly swallowed up time zone after time zone. When the sun had fully disappeared, and the night became dark, Pax rested her head on his shoulder.
“Falling asleep already, hot stuff?” he teased softly.
“No,” she denied, snapping her eyes open abruptly. She smiled at the old nickname through her sleepiness and said the first intelligible thing which came to mind. “How was your day at work yesterday?”
“I fired three incompetent engineers. Two out of three cried, one begged on his knees.”
“Yikes.”
“Yeah—they seemed to think that once they got to the top, they no longer had to work as hard as they did when they were at the bottom. Not true. I also promoted half a dozen guys who really deserved it, so it balanced out.”
Pax smiled against Thornton’s collarbone. She nuzzled her face into his neck. “I will have to call Grandma and tell her that I won’t be coming over for brunch. She’s probably cooking.”
“I already told your whole family that I was going to kidnap you today. Well, I left out the sexy parts where I wrestle you to the ground and potentially use rope—but basically, they know you’re with me.”
“My sweet Thorn. Always the perfect gentleman,” she whispered against his neck. Before another minute could pass she’d fallen asleep again.
Thornton smiled as he felt the drop in her energy, and the limpness in her body. She must really trust me, he thought to himself, if she can allow herself to fall asleep while I’m holding her so far off the ground like this. Of course she does. We’ve been through so much together. But Pax never trusts anyone, so this still means something special. Even if I dropped her she’d probably wake up before she hit the ground, and even if she did hit the ground she probably would be barely scratched... but it’s still special to have her trust like this. He stared at the horizon ahead and saw a little glow of light.
“Paxie, you’re going to miss the moonrise,” he whispered.
She stirred awake again and looked in the direction he was flying. “It’s not a moonrise if it’s caused by flying toward the moon, silly. Technically for all the people who live around here, it’s a moonset.”
“Things are different for us,” he said simply. “They always have been. You and I have seen the earthrise and earthset!”
She stared at the soft amber glow of the moon as it rose steadily into the sky with Thornton’s flying. The small reflective ball was somehow inspiring and majestic. It gave her little tingles of excitement in her chest. It is kind of like he turned back time and gave me the moon for my birthday, she thought whimsically to herself.
They had such power in their bodies, to be able to change whether they stood in night or day within a few seconds of flight. Thornton could be flying a lot faster, but he was using a leisurely pace to enjoy the scenery of the electrically illuminated cities and the naturally luminous night sky.
Thornton stared at the brightly lit towns below, looking for the one he had chosen. After several more comfortable minutes of flight, he began to descend, declaring, “We’re here!”
Pax had been distracted and mesmerized by the celestial geographies, but now she turned her eyes to the land below. “I see... the Alps?” she mused. “Could we be in Switzerland?”
“Darn! How’d you guess?” he asked.
“We were in France last month,” she explained. “I flew around a lot when you were in meetings and I kind of remember the layout of the land. Although, it looks a lot different at night.”
“I booked us a room at the Gstaad Palace, right in the mountains. I know you’ll love it!”
“You never settle for second best,” Pax said with a laugh. Thornton had flown to the doorstep of the hotel in seconds, and they moved to check in to their suite. When they arrived at the room, Pax immediately ran to the balcony and placed her arms on the railing. She leaned forward and gazed at the moon hovering just over the dark outline of the Alps. It was breathtaking.
Thornton came up behind her, combing his fingers through her hair gently before placing his hands on her shoulders. She leaned back against him, savoring the perfect moment. The beautiful moon, the beautiful mountains, her beautiful man.
“Do you like it?” he asked. She closed her eyes at the sound of his rich masculine voice. It blended in perfectly with the howl of the wind, and the flapping of the silk curtains. Even so, there was something she didn’t recognize in his voice. His voice was the one which was most familiar to her, next to her own. Yet she was still sometimes surprised by a lilt or a tone. What was it that she heard which she didn’t understand?
Turning around in his arms, she looked up at him with a deep delight. She almost felt like crying. “You win. It’s the most gorgeous sight I have ever seen.”
He laughed at her enthusiasm. “That’s a pretty large claim coming from a girl who’s seen a nice little chunk of the universe.”
“And you took me there too,” she whispered. Pax stood on her tippy-toes to place a kiss at the side of his mouth. “Really, Thorn. The room, the view... it’s all beyond spectacular. Knowing you, I bet you planned it so we’d be here at exactly this moment. But you don’t have to take me to a palace in Switzerland to make me happy; I would be happy anywhere as long as you’re with me.”
“Really? Anywhere?” he asked gruffly. He slid his hands over her back, slipping them into the waistband of her jeans.
“Yeah,” she whispered. She placed her hands on his chest, observing the reflection of the bright moon in his pale blue eyes. It was the reflection of a reflection—but the man to whom those eyes belonged meant more to her than the moon, sun, and stars combined. “Everywhere. Let’s go everywhere.”
“Well, fire maiden,” he said in a playful tone, taking both of her hands in his and pulling them gently as he walked backwards, “right now the only logical destination is bed.”
Amara jerked her mind away from the dream with a blush. She knew she should stop watching out of respect for her friend. She had a healthy amount of curiousity and yearned to keep peeking (and probably would have kept spying if the leading man had been anyone other than her brother) but she knew she would never be able to look at Thornton the same way again. It would be far too traumatic to witness such a thing.
Turning away from Pax, Amara smiled sadly at the memory. Her brother could be a really sweet guy when he wasn’t being a jackass. He had been an amazing boyfriend to Pax, and she doubted that anyone could compare. In addition to his huge financial resources and company jets, he had the power of a deva at his fingertips. A girl like Pax needed a powerful man to keep up with her—and Amara did not believe there was anyone else she could connect with in the same way. She felt a bit sick to her stomach, thinking bitterly and fondly about what they had both lost. The memories were so unbearably wonderful—she never would have known how much turmoil was simmering just under her friend’s stoic countenance without her telepathy.
Amara ached for her friend, knowing that Pax had recently waged a small war with herself. She had tried to kill the feminine, soft parts of herself that enjoyed letting her boyfriend surprise her on her birthday. She had tried to sacrifice everything to achi
eve a power that she could never lose—but this did not seem wise to Amara. The more she peered into her friend’s mind, the more she realized that Pax was just a broken human girl. The blonde woman prayed silently that they would both find their way back to happiness—whatever that ended up being.
Chapter 14: She Conquered Impossibility
Pseudosphere, Month Twenty-Eight
Para was finally at the brink. She was finally at the threshold of the goal which had fuelled her every thought, her every movement since she had first stepped into smoky emptiness of the fifth room. Dark, navy blue smoke swirled around her body like threatening storm clouds. Her building energy created small tornados in the debris around her—she only had half an hour, and she wanted this to be the half hour that changed everything.
In the center of Room Five was a giant translucent sphere, the size of a small moon. The girls had immediately recognized the material upon entry; it was the fjuyen substance that had been used to hold Amara captive in the past. Pax had caused all the bones in her arm to splinter when she had tried to break the substance, mistaking it for glass. She could not look at the mineral without remembering that excruciating pain, and feeling the need to learn how to master this new element. It had beaten her before with its mere existence; she would not allow this to happen again.
She knew that the test of the room was to crack open the fjuyen globe—and the only way she believed she could do so was with sheer power. Since Pax had accessed Silver Form, she had been completely focused on going further. She felt the time pressure of their stay in the Pseudosphere coming to an end, and she wanted to make the best of it while she still could. After carefully planning out the various methods they could use to solve the puzzle, the girls had accepted that only Para would be able to handle a task of this magnitude.
And now, after focusing on nothing else for months, Para was prepared to go past Silver Form. If she could only access more power, she knew she would be able to destroy the orb that mocked her so relentlessly. Any moment now, I will manage it. I know that I can do this—I will be the first woman to pass all the tests of the vector zone.
She heard a sound like a laugh echoing from inside her mind. A melodious female voice entered her skull, mockingly. What are you playing at, Para? You’re just a little insect.
“I am not an insect!” she hissed, clenching her fists until her nails dug into her palms. She recognized Suja’s ridicule, realizing that the memories were haunting her. Blood ran down her fingers, dripping onto the smoky floor. Every muscle in her body strained until it was taut. Tears of blood streamed down her face from the pressure of building energy in the tender skin of her eye sockets.
You should have joined with me when you had a chance. I could have given you real power. Oh, sweetheart. On your own, you are just a pathetic female deva. It’s laughable.
“You’re right. I was pathetic. But I won’t be anymore—I won’t be pathetic for a millisecond longer!” Para screamed at the top of her lungs, feeling the cyclones of energy rip her indigo hair around wildly. “You were far stronger the last time we met, Suja—but I have changed. I am still changing. I am no longer an ordinary, worthless little girl!”
The navy blue smoke curled around Para’s legs like a cat, rubbing against her silvery body languidly. As she increased her concentration, sucking energy from the world around her, gales and blizzards began to twist forth from the emptiness, feeding her power. Para felt like she was at the center of a hurricane, sweeping all the elements into her command, twisting them with the power of her mind so she could hold them in her hand, and use them to break her fjuyen adversary.
Lightning crackled in the whirlwind around her as she used her mind to magnetically draw forth all the energy from Room Five. When the tempest began to calm, she knew that she had tapped everything available, and needed to focus on the energy inside of her. Her whole body hummed and shook as she stepped forward, placing both hands against the globe. “I’m going to destroy you,” she whispered to the dense, hard element. It must be breakable—and if it was breakable, she would find a way to destroy it. Even if it was impossible, she would find a way. “Do you hear me?” she shouted at the inanimate, but indestructible substance. “I’m going to destroy you!”
Para’s intense level of concentration caused severe pain in her head. It felt like an avalanche of ice spikes in the brain—she doubled over, clutching her head as she continued to push past the pain. “None of you ever thought that I had any value. You pushed the boys—you taught everything to the boys, but you left me useless. You tried to keep me dormant—you tried to repress me. I won’t be considered laughable by our enemies. I won’t be the weakest link!” Para’s mind was in such chaos that although she was yelling at the unconquerable fjuyen sphere, she was also yelling at her family. “I am capable! I am valuable! I will be indispensible.”
She fell to her knees, shaking with the intensity of the rapidly mushrooming power. As she thought of the powerful men in her family, she knew that every single person had been through the agony that she was now experiencing, and far greater. Every one of those men had pushed himself to his own limits—no one had been given anything. When it came to personal strength, everyone was on his own. Alone. To make an unstoppable team, each man must first do his best by his lonesome—not working together. Sometimes they needed to work against each other, against their own selves. They had all been in the Pseudosphere—they had all suffered here, together but alone.
Completely forgetting that she was comprised of two women, Para felt the loneliness of being in an ocean of midnight darkness that stretched to eternity. She had to prove herself to herself first and foremost. She could be an asset to her friends and family at home—she would leave that room being an asset if it was the last thing she did. She closed her eyes, seeing their faces and thinking of how much she loved them all. The petty issues with Thornton and Asher disappeared as she saw them only through the eyes of pure love. It was simply overwhelming how much she loved them; the love of two kindred spirits combined and amplified.
“Mom, Grandpa, I can't bring you back. But I won’t lose anyone else. And I will destroy this fucking ball.” She struggled to stand, and let out a defiant yell: “Eat me, Suja!” With that final thought she felt herself flooded, completely taken over by the power. She lost consciousness of herself as the ancestral deva potential became realized in every atom of every throbbing, yearning cell of her body. She felt the change as though it had happened a thousand times before in dreams, she felt the bulge in her muscles as her heart rate increased to what must be at least six hundred beats per minute. She clutched her chest, feeling the power and pain in her heart as it struggled to keep up with the demands of this transformation. She then threw her arms back, thrusting her chest outward and gasped for air as her mind swam with the dizzying power.
After the lightning and billows of terrible black energy quit gushing around her, there was an incredible calm. She felt the golden energy surrounding her, tranquil and sure. Para’s body trembled with the humming prana, and her already extremely long indigo hair, now lay pooled up on the ground, spiraling several times around like a snake coils up before striking. She had achieved it—the change was sure. She had achieved Golden Form.
“I did it,” she whispered, staring at the clear fjuyen substance before her. “I did it! Now you’re going down! I feel it!” She screamed excitedly, releasing a huge laugh and levitating up into the atmosphere. She fisted the air exuberantly and threw her head back in ecstasy. “I feel it! I am hot! I am untouchable! I am powerf—”
Her arrogant rant was interrupted as her body split in two.
“—ful, ” finished Pax and Amara in unison as they both fell out of the sky and hit the ground with thuds. Amara was still in Ruby Form, with a hue of red surrounding her body, while Pax was surrounded by the silver glow. Pax lay limply for a moment, as her whole body burned. She hyperventilated, concentrating on making the air rush around her skin to cool her down. She
felt as though she’d been electrocuted with voltage far more intense than lightning.
“Ow,” she muttered, trying to discard the pain as nothing. She said the word to soothe herself and downplay her shame. If Para had tried to crack the sphere instead of wasting her few seconds of ultimate power boasting, they could have completed the trial by now. For a moment, Pax hated Para for her foolishness.
Distracted from her thoughts by a strange sound, she looked over to see Amara curled up into a ball, wailing, sobbing, and scratching her skin everywhere, leaving red welts in the wake of her nails. The girl screamed as she convulsed on the floor. Pax’s eyes widened; she was in much better shape than Amara. Although her head ached and her body ached, it seemed she could handle the pain and the energy output much more than her friend.
“Pax!” bellowed Amara as her body shook in violent spasms, completely out of control. Tears streamed down her face as she trembled and Pax rushed over to her, pinning her down to the ground firmly. The girl was convulsing so violently that Pax had to use both of her arms and even her knees to put her friend in a full body lock. “Calm down, Amara. Calm down!” Pax spoke evenly, even though her own breathing and heart rate were anything but even. “Let the power go. Release the power. Send it back where it came from.”
“It came from you!” Amara cried.
“We took it from the atmosphere. Just let it drain away. Come on, you can get rid of it—just breathe it out and sweat it out.”
“This much energy isn’t meant to be in my body. Sakra, Pax, what have you done to me? I’m going to explode! I can’t handle this!”
Pax felt a wave of guilt but she shook her head. “I couldn't have done that without you. You're stronger than you think, Mara.”
“The anger! The rage! The memories!” Amara shrieked as she shuddered. “It’s all you! I saw and felt it all… I saw your grandpa get killed—I saw your mom’s body. How can you revisit the worst experiences of your life so easily and just use them as fuel…”
Thirty Minutes to Heartbreak Box Set (Books 1-3) Page 41