Worldly? Is that another cryptic message?
I took the paper she held in her outstretched hand. It held three simple words.
Daniel. Vendor 109.
Chapter 21
My lips parted just as a rush of air fluttered over my cheeks. I looked up to see one of the rugs swaying.
The psychic was gone. I pulled the rug back, searching frantically for where she’d disappeared to, but behind the rug was a narrow alleyway. Doors lined the alleyway every few feet.
She was nowhere to be seen, obviously having gone into one of the doors. I sighed in frustration. Once again, she’d entered my life and left it as mysteriously as she’d come.
Despite being disappointed that I couldn’t ask more questions, excitement still rose within me. Giddy, I burst from the small room behind the carpets and ran back to the street.
“Logan! Logan, where are you?” I frantically searched for my boyfriend and spotted his head above a sea of people a few vendors down. A grin still lit my face as I ran toward him.
“Logan! I found—”
I stopped short when the crowd parted.
Draped around my boyfriend stood a tall, beautiful girl. Long, wavy brown hair flowed down her back, and her lithe body pressed against Logan’s side. She had one arm entwined around his neck, the other trailing familiarly up and down his stomach. Her fingers moved along his abs confidently, as if they’d traveled that path before.
My lungs seized, and my heart felt as if it had stopped.
Beside the beauty, Logan wore an uncomfortable expression. He reached behind him to grasp the young woman’s wrists before gently trying to push her away. She pouted prettily and kept her hold on him, murmuring something in his ear.
As if sensing me, Logan’s head snapped in my direction. Guilt flooded his gaze as confusion and hurt welled up inside me, prickling my gift.
Surely I’m seeing things.
“Logan?” I asked, my voice wavering. I staggered toward him, not knowing if I should approach.
The beauty raked her gaze up and down my frame.
“So this is her.” She propped a hand on her hip. Her long red nails flashed in the sunshine. “I’ve heard about you, how you’ve been trying to sink your little claws into something that doesn’t belong to you.”
Pain entered Logan’s eyes. “Daria, I need to talk to you.”
“What’s going on?” I asked, my feet rooting to the ground.
The girl laughed, the sound brittle yet amused. Goose bumps erupted along my skin. I wrapped my arms around myself as the dark power flared coldly.
“He really didn’t tell you?”
Despite Logan trying to push her away, the woman remained at his side, her arm snaking around his waist. Hot jealousy coursed through me.
“I’m Crystal. Logan’s fiancée. Did he forget to mention that little detail?”
My jaw dropped, my fingers curling around the paper in my hand. Only two minutes before, I’d been filled with joy and hope at finding answers just around the corner…
My eyes found Logan’s again. I didn’t want to believe Crystal. I’d trusted Logan. He’d told me he didn’t have a girlfriend. He’d told me that he was available.
But did he?
With lightning speed, I recounted the numerous discussions we’d had. He’d only ever told me that he didn’t have a girlfriend. He’d never actually told me who Crystal was other than a girl back home.
So was this one of his responsibilities he was avoiding at home?
Hysterical laughter bubbled up inside me. “So is that how it works? You tell me you don’t have a girlfriend because she’s really your fiancée? Is that what honesty means to you, Logan? Semantics?”
Logan’s face fell. He pushed Crystal off him and stepped closer to me, his arm reaching out. “Daria, please. I can explain.”
The hysterical laughter finally escaped my lips, the sound shrill and sharp. “So it’s true? She’s your fiancée?”
Crystal stepped forward, tossing her long dark hair over her shoulder. She stared at me with accusing green eyes. “Do you really think you’re the first woman who’s tried to steal him away from me? Logan’s quite the catch, as I’m sure you know. Women are always trying to get him, but we’ve been promised to each other since we were kids. He’s meant to be with me, not you.”
“Crystal,” Logan said through gritted teeth. “Back off.”
She barely gave him a glance before turning her attention back to me. “You didn’t think that you were really going to end up with him, did you?”
Logan’s hands clenched into fists, and he shot her an angry glare. He took another step closer to me. “Daria, let’s talk, please. Let’s go somewhere alone where I can explain.” He held his hand out, his large palm open, just waiting for me to grasp it.
But I couldn’t. Even if I wanted to touch him, I couldn’t.
I’ll never want to touch him now.
I spun away, my breath trapped in my throat. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t move. Pain coursed through me in such intense intervals that action was impossible.
Move, Dar! Just get out of here! Get away from them!
Crystal laughed, the sound as hauntingly beautiful as she was.
That laugh jolted my limbs into action. I took off through the crowd, her laughter following me. That laugh conveyed that I’d been played for a fool, and everyone was in on the joke except for me.
I sprinted down the street, clutching the paper to me as if my life depended on it, which it very well could have.
“Daria!” Logan shouted, but I darted around the corner onto another street before blindly running to the end.
I zigzagged through the marketplace, not watching where I was going, running into people as I ran in a blinding fury. The dark power swirled and filled my body, creating a tremendous sense of power along my limbs.
I have to get out of here. I have to find the portal!
But as that singular thought entered my mind, the paper clutched in my hand caught my attention. Daniel. Vendor 109.
I stopped midstride, panting, as other supernaturals looked at me curiously from where they stood and shopped. I could only imagine the spectacle I was making of myself, but my brain felt like it was going to explode.
Daniel. Vendor 109.
I twirled around in a circle, searching for numbers. There! Tiny numbers lay etched into the stone at the foot of each vendor’s table. The booths were numbered, just like a city street in the human world.
Nearly tripping, I stumbled to the nearest shop. “Where’s one-oh-nine?”
The fairy behind the table raised his blue eyebrows. “Excuse me?”
I held up the paper, showing him what the psychic had written. “Where’s vendor one hundred nine?”
He nodded down the street just as Logan shouted my name in the distance, but I couldn’t talk to him. I couldn’t face him. He’d lied to me. He’d lied through his teeth about who Crystal was.
What did he think? That telling me she wasn’t his girlfriend would somehow annul him of any responsibility to her? That word play would mean he hadn’t lied?
I took off in the direction the fairy had nodded at, trying to pay attention to the tiny numbers as I whizzed past each shop.
When I rounded another corner, my gaze darted to the ground. 106. 107. 108.
I careened to a stop, nearly pitching over, in front of the vendor with the tiny cobblestone reading 109.
The simple booth held a display of various knickknacks that rivaled a touristy shop in the human world. Little children’s toys, cheap-looking baubles, and tacky jewelry lined the table. The man behind it eyed me curiously. “Can I interest you in anything?”
I took a step forward, adrenaline making my hand shake. “Daniel. Vendor one hundred nine.”
Part of me expected him to look at me like I was crazy. That was how I felt. Inside, I was falling apart and unraveling at the seams.
But instead of waving me
off, his curious smile disappeared, and a new reverence lit his eyes. “Right this way.”
He stood and pulled back a curtain draped behind him, revealing another dimly lit room behind the outdoor shop, similar to the psychic’s booth.
Logan again shouted my name. Except it was louder and closer.
“Hurry. I don’t have much time.” I dodged around the vendor’s table. I couldn’t let Logan find me. I didn’t want to talk to him or even face him. Pain shot through me in such intense intervals. He’d betrayed me.
The man dipped his head. “As you wish.”
I entered the space behind the curtain, and he gestured toward the corner. “It’s there.”
I peered into the dim corner. “What’s there?”
“Daniel.”
“He is?”
“Why, yes. He’s right in there.”
I squinted. Something wavered in the air. Subtle purple colors shimmered in the shape of a…
My forehead scrunched. A door?
An undercurrent of powerful energy prickled my skin. I took a step closer. Something lay in that corner, something powerful and magical.
My feet tapped lightly on the stone floor, each step bringing me closer to whatever powerful magic filled the man’s shop.
The hairs on my arms stood on end as the dark power buzzed to life inside me, rushing up and wanting out, excitement making it strong.
“What is that?” I asked warily.
“Daniel.”
It didn’t seem that the shopkeeper would be giving me any answers.
“Daria? Daria!” Logan’s frantic yells grew louder, more anxious with every call. His werewolf senses meant he could easily track me. I probably only had seconds before he found me.
Before I could think better of it, I lunged forward, right toward the shimmery purple energy.
The curtain behind me ripped open, and Logan leaped into the room.
But the purple energy had already encompassed me, syphoning me into its embrace as the dark power and my healing light sang with glee.
Logan’s eyes grew wide, his mouth opening with horror, but the world around me disappeared, as if fading to black.
Logan’s fear-filled eyes were the last things I saw before everything went dark.
Chapter 22
The feeling of being ripped apart and torn to pieces from the inside out made me scream. If I had thought traveling through the headquarters and marketplace portals were bad, they didn’t hold a candle to the purple portal.
The sensations grew and grew, until it felt as if my heart was going to burst. I screamed again, but it carried no sound. Wherever I was, senses from the human world held no meaning.
I’m going to die. I’m certainly going to die.
But just when I felt for certain that my life would end, the sensations stopped. I landed hard on something solid, my legs buckling beneath me as harsh pants emitted from my mouth. I fell forward, grabbing for something to hold onto, anything tangible that I could grasp.
My fingers sank into something spongy. Whatever I’d landed on was solid, but also … not.
Airy, white fog drifted around me, the whiteness stretching farther than I could see. I tentatively peered around while my heart slammed against my ribs.
Panting, I called, “Hello?” My voice sounded small, fear threatening to suffocate me. I squeezed my eyes tightly shut. What have I done?
I could feel that I was no longer on earth. I was somewhere else, somewhere unknown. My dark and light powers buzzed inside me, as if rejoicing.
But then the hot, searing pain of Logan’s betrayal came back. How could he do that to me?
“What have we here?”
I snapped my head up, searching for the bearer of that voice. Off to the side stood a man. No, he wasn’t a man. He was something else, something other.
“Daniel?”
He drifted to my side, his movements graceful and languid. His skin held a subtle glow, and his features were so beautiful that they rivaled anything Michelangelo had painted. But when my eyes met his, I hissed in a breath.
Irises an identical shade of turquoise to mine stared back at me.
“Who are you?” I searched for answers on his inhumanly beautiful face. An ethereal quality surrounded him, making my powers sing. I slowly rose on the spongy ground.
With every second that passed, my dark and light powers billowed, feeling calm and serene as if they were … at home.
The turquoise-eyed man smiled. “I’m Daniel. And you are?”
“Daria Gresham.”
Never had my powers felt as they were. Normally, my light sat just below my navel, where I always tried to bury it—control it—but in the strange world I’d come to it swelled to my skin, pulsing and pushing, until a billowy light filled the air around me.
“Strange,” Daniel muttered. “You glow like us, and I can sense something in you that is like me, but it’s different.” He cocked his head, his perfectly sculpted eyebrows drawing together. “What are you?”
I scoffed. “What am I? What are you?”
“I told you. I am Daniel.”
“Right, but what are you?” He had to be at least six-three, and he had broad shoulders, wavy dark hair, and turquoise eyes that bore a startling resemblance to mine.
My heart continued to pound. I took another step closer to him and tried to calm my breathing. The air felt different, thicker but lighter at the same time. It was too bizarre for me to comprehend.
“What do you mean, Daria Gresham?” An amused smile lit his face. “I’m what you are.”
Ignoring my frustration at getting sucked in a conversation of riddles, I stepped even closer to him. “Daniel, can you help me? Can you help me figure out what’s going on inside me?”
His beautiful face stretched into a grin that was so breathtaking that for a moment, everything inside me stopped.
I stood in the presence of pure beauty that was unrivaled in the human world.
My mouth grew dry as I soaked up the energy of his presence. Looking down, I muffled a yelp when I saw my arms. Similar to Daniel’s, my skin glowed.
“What help do you need?” he asked, his tone still slightly amused.
I let my arms fall, and my breath started to come faster. I’m glowing. I’m freakin’ glowing!
I didn’t even want to consider where I was or how I would get back home. Just the thought of how impulsively I’d stepped into whatever portal lived in vendor 109’s tent made me want to cry with worry.
Get it together, Dar! Remember why you did this!
I cleared my throat then said, “I have this power that was born inside me. It’s too strong. I can’t control it. I need help getting rid of it.”
“Power inside you?” He cocked his head again. “Of course you have power inside you. That’s what we’re made of.”
“We?” I took another step closer to him. The glows around our skin touched and mingled. For some strangely alluring reason, I wanted to be even closer to him. “What do you mean, ‘we’?”
That curious and amused expression filled his face again. “Why, I do believe you’re the most curious angel I’ve ever met.”
“Angel?” My mouth went dry, and my feet planted.
He laughed. “Isn’t that what you are? It’s what I am, and I can see that you’re one of us.” He tapped a beautiful, elegant finger on his chin. “Different, yes, but still one of us. Now, shall we talk about why you’re here? I haven’t had a visitor as curious as you in over a millennium.”
I cradled my head in my hands, my long blond hair running through my fingers as I tried to understand what he was telling me. “But how do you know that I’m an angel? I thought I was a witch.”
“As I said previously, you’re different from other angels, but I can sense your power, and the glow of your skin signifies your divine status, but…” He tapped his chiseled chin again. “Something inside you isn’t quite right.”
“What do you mean?”
“Your powers. They feel … off.”
“Is that because I’m really a witch? Maybe you’re wrong about me being an angel.”
“Oh no. I’m not wrong, although you may be part witch, but you are most definitely an angel.”
For a moment, I just stood there while Daniel, who was apparently a pure-blooded angel, towered above me. Being beside him made my inner dark and light powers feel calm and at home. Both flowed languidly and free through my body.
They’d never felt that way before.
I bit my lip, frowning. On earth, my light always stayed stored in the chest below my navel that I’d created as a little girl, but not free. Never free. When my light ran through my body, it was too painful. So I only called it forth for a healing session … or it escaped if someone touched me. But at least I knew what my light was—it was to heal others. As for the dark power, I still didn’t understand what it was or why it had been born inside me.
Extending my arm, I studied the satiny glow. Just beneath my skin’s surface, energy prickled and flowed serenely yet powerfully, my dark and light powers both coursing through my body.
So what the heck does that mean?
I shook my head, glancing up at Daniel again. He wore a curious expression as he stared down at me.
“But how is it possible that I’m an angel? I live on earth.”
Daniel elegantly lowered himself to the ground, his muscled thighs pressing through his bright-white pants as he crisscrossed his legs. “Would you like to sit with me?”
I fell to the ground in a heap. Unlike me, he’d somehow made the movement appear fluid and graceful.
He cocked his head. “So you live on earth? My, that is peculiar.”
“So you really don’t know anything about me? You don’t know who I am or how I’m an angel?”
“No, I don’t, but perhaps I could help you learn the answers to your questions.”
“Could you? Oh, please. Yes! Whatever you’re able to tell me would be fantastic.”
The white fog descended more around us, caressing my skin like air on a humid summer night. Strangely enough, the temperature felt warm and comfortable, even though clouds on earth only lived high in the atmosphere, where the temperature plummeted.
Power in Darkness Page 18