Raine felt a hand touch her shoulder and she jumped. When she spun around, she found Eryk’s deep black eyes full of remorse as he looked longingly at the spot Kaden disappeared. Camille was behind Eryk, watching her carefully.
“What happened to him?” Raine asked. It took several moments before anyone spoke. Finally, Eryk pulled his eyes away from the woods and looked deep into Raine’s subtle blue gaze.
“His mother wanted to make sure he understood where his loyalties lay, and I wasn’t there to protect him like I promised.” Eryk turned and walked into the house.
Camille stepped to Raine’s side and finished the explanation.
“When Kaden was born, his father had the Celtic markings put on his shoulders and back. They were a symbol of his heritage. We all have them.” Camille turned and lifted her shirt to reveal an intricate set of flowers, leaves, and vines that snaked over the right side of her body and over her right shoulder. In her tank top, the markings were not visible and Raine had never seen them before. The ink wasn’t black which made it appear less like a tattoo and more like a drawing that covered her skin. It was beautiful and feminine.
“The markings on his chest appeared when he was chosen as your Guardian; they are the markings of the elements.” Raine didn’t remember any tattoos on his chest. She was too astonished at the pain the markings on his back represented.
“I’ve never seen them before.”
“The markings on his chest are only visible to those who are aware of Elementals, so most humans never see them. You could say we have a glamour around us that keeps the humans from discovering who we are. Kaden has never been proud of his markings. He has never shown them to anyone. Now you know why he always wore shirts, even while swimming. To be honest, I never realized how bad everything really was.”
“Those are whip marks, aren’t they?” Raine whispered, almost as if she didn’t want anyone to overhear.
“After Kaden’s father died, his mother lost all sense of self. Kaden was caught in the crossfire.”
“It looks like she tortured him.”
Camille gave Raine an apologetic smile before she lowered her head and followed Eryk into the house.
Raine, alone in the grassy space in front of the house, looked into the trees where Kaden disappeared. A tear ran down her cheeks.
The scars on Kaden’s back and shoulders looked to be from a whip made of thorns. They were very old and jagged. Raine realized Kaden had to have been very young when that happened. Her heart ached for the loss of his innocence at the hand of his mother.
Raine bent down to pick up Kaden’s shirt. An object dropped on her foot in the process. It was Kaden’s cell phone. As she bent to retrieve it, the phone vibrated in her hand as a new text flashed on the screen. She glanced down and couldn’t help but read it before the screen faded to black. Her body started shaking. She looked up to see Kaden watching her from the edge of the woods.
He held Tech limp in his arms, his torso smeared with a mixture of mud and blood.
Raine let his shirt and phone drop to the ground, the text forgotten with the shock of seeing Tech so badly injured. Instintively, she took a step forward before the words of the text flashed in her mind and she abruptly stopped. She had to get away from Kaden. With a pang of regret for Tech, she turned toward the dirt drive. Her legs moved of their own accord for the main road. Rocks kicked up behind her as she chose that moment to frantically flee.
>*< >*< >*<
“Raine, wait,” Kaden yelled as he tried to run after her. He cradled Tech in his arms until he was far enough out of the woods to lay him on the ground. Tech’s shallow, labored breathing told him Tech was on the brink of death. He laid his head on his furry friend as he gave one last whimper before his life faded. Kaden screamed in rage and grief, then stood and gave chase.
“Stop!” Kaden’s pleaded again, but Raine kept running.
She reached the end of the drive and turned on the asphalt road in the direction of the nearest town. Cars whizzed by her on the road, but she never slowed. Kaden reached the asphalt far enough behind her that he couldn’t catch her right away, but he was closing in. He prayed her strength would waver and he could close the gap.
She turned to look over her shoulder and was almost hit by a rundown white van that sped past her on the road. It cut sharply in front of her, veering onto the shoulder of the road, before it screeched to a halt.
Raine pulled up fast, slid on the small rocks near the side of the road, and fell backward as she slid into the side of the van, leaving a dent in the door before it slid open.
Kaden felt his stomach drop to his feet as a familiar figure jumped from the van and grabbed Raine in a vice-like hold. Donovan sneered at Kaden as he pulled Raine’s struggling form into the van and silenced her screams with his dirt-smeared hand. Kaden pushed his feet to move faster but knew he was too far away to reach her.
Raine’s eyes pleaded with him and Kaden could feel the panic building inside her head.
As he got closer to the van, a blonde-haired woman appeared from the front passenger seat and knelt down next to Raine. She fisted her hand in Raine’s hair and pulled hard. Raine whimpered against Donovan’s hand and her eyes welled up with tears.
Kaden slid to a stop.
“Mother?” His breath was coming hard. “What . . .”
“Thank you, son. You’ve done me proud again.” Lizzy’s lips curved into a sneer as she leaned closer to Raine’s ear and whispered words only meant for Raine, but Kaden heard them as if she spoke directly to him. “I had my doubts. You almost had him, but his loyalty to me is unwavering.”
Raine’s eyes went wide with shock at the understanding of Lizzy’s words and the hurt Kaden saw in her blue depths cut him to the core. He started to shake his head in denial when Donovan smashed her over the head and Raine went limp in his arms. Their connection severed at her sudden unconsciousness.
Kaden’s feet moved beneath him before he even realized he was running at the van full speed, his anger near the surface. An enraged scream flew past his lips.
“Don’t mock me again, son,” Lizzy screamed as the door slammed closed. Gravel sprayed Kaden as the van sped away.
Kaden’s lungs burned with intensity as he ran until the taillights dimmed in the distance. He finally slowed to a stop and bent over to catch his breath. He closed his eyes and concentrated on Raine, hoping to connect with her thoughts, but nothing came. The marking on his hand began to burn and itch and Kaden knew she was distressed, even in her unconscious state. Another scream of agony and frustration left his mouth.
Running back to the house, he found Eryk and Camille kneeling next to his best friend’s unmoving body on the ground. Kaden knelt beside him and laid his forehead on Tech’s bloody fur as the sting of tears burned his eyes. Big gaping wounds on Tech’s side showed the horror of his attack, and a wave of hatred washed over him.
Betrayal hit him in the gut and he felt like he was reliving the nightmare he suffered yesterday. He prayed Raine would come wake him like she did last time, but reality set in as Kaden’s world shattered.
“What happened?” Eryk asked.
“She’s got her,” Kaden explained in his shock. “This can’t be happening, not now.” He stood, picked up his drenched shirt and phone from the ground, and swiped his finger across it to access the main screen. The last two texts flashed on the screen and Kaden threw it across the yard.
“Kaden, what happened?” Camille gingerly stroked Tech’s fur as she knelt next to him in the grass.
“Apparently I’ve been working for my mother this whole time.” Kaden shoved his fingers through his hair, grabbed a fistful, and pulled.
“Your mother has Raine?”
“My mother . . . and Elzar.”
Kaden felt a sudden jab in his stomach moments before a weightless sensation made his stomach lurch. He couldn’t move. His hands and feet remained restricted in a vice-like grip by the gnarly vine that snaked around his body and hel
d him immobile several feet above the ground. Another vine slowly made its way to his neck.
Camille stood next to Tech’s body with murder in her eyes as she advanced on him. Eryk ran forward, pulling her back against this chest, immobilizing her arms as he spoke silently in her ear. Kaden fought the constriction on his chest as he struggled to get free, but the vines only tightened.
Blackness crowded in on him as he tried to choke out his apology, but nothing came out. He felt weightless again before he hit the ground, knocking the last ounce of breath from his body. The vines holding him hovered above in a menacing knot before they slammed back into the ground with such violence it shook the ground.
Camille stalked forward. The anger in her eyes matched the words that spilled from her lips. “If anything happens to her, I’ll finish what I started.” Camille stormed off, leaving Kaden panting for life on the ground.
CHAPTER 21
RAINE
Pain shot through her head as she came to. Raine blinked into the darkness and winced. She tried to remember what happened and where she was, but the fog in her brain refused to lift.
She tried to raise her hand to rub the back of her aching head, but her arms wouldn’t move. A sense of panic welled up in her chest as she tried to focus in the inky blackness of the room. It was stifling hot and her throat felt like it was full of cotton, her tongue heavy. She tried to swallow, but couldn’t muster enough saliva to moisten her throat.
The cobwebs slowly cleared as memories fought to come to the surface, but lay just outside her reach. Confusion and fear made her limbs begin to shake, and Raine desperately tried to latch onto something.
She inhaled deeply and the smell of musty old wood accosted her. She shook her head against the smell and paid for it with another stab of pain in her head that brought tears instantly to her eyes. She blinked them swiftly away and waited for her eyes focus in the dark room.
The marking on her wrist began to glow, softly at first, until it grew in intensity. She knew her fear made her marking come to life and she could feel the instant Kaden probed her thoughts. A wave of relief washed over her and she instantly relaxed. Kaden, she knew, would be close.
As her marking increased in intensity, the room, no longer shrouded in darkness, produced more confusion than answers. She had never seen this place before.
There were curtainless windows in the far corner and she could see the moon low and orange in the sky, which meant night had just fallen. She could just make out shadows and shapes of trees. Faint moonbeams filtered through window and she could feel the subtle pull of the moon, but it was just beyond her grasp.
A large wooden bed sat in the corner under the windows covered in an old quilt that had to be responsible for part of the musty smell. A mirrored dresser stood in the corner and held a large machine-type device that gave off the incredible heat she felt in spurts.
Raine sat in a chair next to the dresser, her hands tied to the old wooden armrests tight enough to make her hands feel numb, her feet tied to the bottom legs. Her bracelet was gone and her entire body, held captive by the ropes and incredible heat in the room, was weak and fragile.
Raine felt another probe to her mind and knew Kaden was frantic to reach her. Thoughts crept through her foggy brain as memories finally surfaced. A stab of pain speared her when she remembered the text on Kaden’s phone.
Elzar will be proud
Kaden had been working with Elzar from the beginning. Raine felt foolish for putting her trust in him. She remembered Aria’s words of caution about putting her trust in the wrong place and she mentally smacked herself for doing just that. To make matters worse, Kaden was now connected to her innermost thoughts.
She tried to throw a mental block up to keep him from probing her mind when a blast of heat hit her like a ton a bricks and instantly made her sleepy. The marking on her wrist slowly faded as weakness enveloped her. Raine blinked furiously to keep her eyes open, but she knew she was going to lose the battle.
A faint light suddenly appeared under the door and creaks sounded just beyond the barrier that held her prisoner. Someone was coming. She fought against her heavy lids as the door opened and light flooded into the small room.
A shadow, tall and lean, sauntered into the room as Raine strained to see his face, positive it was Kaden. She wanted to look him in the eyes and find the answers to her questions. She needed to know why he led her on. She needed to stop the hurt in her heart.
The shadow stepped deeper into the room and Raine let out a weak gasp.
“You?” Confusion warred with reason inside her mind as she felt her neck give way and her head slumped forward, eyes closed. She fell into darkness, Ryker’s face burned in her memory as his laughter followed her.
CHAPTER 22
KADEN
Kaden flipped the shower on and stepped into the cold water. He shivered in the stream of water until the heater kicked on and delivered scorching water that instantly filled the small room with a dense fog of steam.
It had been almost eight hours since Raine disappeared in the white van, and Kaden could hardly keep his anxiety at bay. His arms ached and his chest, still smeared with Tech’s blood and dried mud, had a few fresh marks from the vines Camille had used to nearly crush him. He used the soap to wash the grit from his body as he watched the blood of his most faithful friend disappear down the drain.
Kaden’s throat tightened as he thought about Tech, now buried just beyond the trees of his house. Tech had been in abundant pain when he found him, the lower half of his body crushed by a giant earth clod that held him pinned to the muddy ground. Kaden knew instantly that Donovan was in the area and he had to get back to Raine and get her out of there. It took him forever to dig Tech free and when he returned with Tech in his arms, Raine was reading the text on his phone.
Instantly he felt her disappointment, her feeling of betrayal and helplessness. The panic she felt as she ran down the road almost overwhelmed him, but Kaden knew he had to get to her and make her understand.
Donovan, and his mother, got there first.
Kaden placed both hands on the shower wall, closed his eyes, and soaked his head in the stream of water. It poured over him and he let the heat burn the open wounds on his neck, chest, and back. As the water washed over him, he tried to relax and concentrate on Raine. Each time he tried to connect with her before, he felt only blackness and his anxiety grew.
“I’m sorry, Raine,” he whispered to the wall as the memory of Raine falling unconscious onto the floor of the van ran through his mind. Her last thoughts of his treachery weighed heavily on him and he tried to block out the guilt.
We never should have stayed to practice. Kaden chastised himself before he smacked the wall with his hand.
White hot pain seared his hand and the marking by his thumb burned with intense heat. He felt a jolt of confusion as his mind finally connected with Raine and Kaden let out a sigh of relief.
Raine was groggy and hot, but otherwise unharmed. The images in his mind were shadows at first, but as his marking grew hotter, the shadows became clear.
I’m sorry, I should have protected you. Kaden willed his thoughts to her in the hopes that Raine would understand. He felt her relax for a moment before thoughts of his text filtered through her mind and she began to panic. Kaden tried to send reassurance to her, but felt her close off from him as a blast of heat hit her hard in the face. Then she faded to blackness once more.
Kaden’s eyes flew open and he turned the shower off. With quick movements, he grabbed the nearest towel and wrapped it around his waist before he swung the door open with a resounding thwack against the wall.
“I know where she is.” Kaden walked down the hallway leaving a trail of wet footprints in his wake. Camille and Eryk sat on the couch with an open map in front of them. “She’s at our family cabin along the waterfall scenic byway, deep in the woods, far from prying eyes. The images were foggy and unclear, but I would recognize that room anywhere.”
<
br /> “How do I know I can trust you, Kaden?” The venom in Camille’s words hit him hard, and if looks could kill, he would be dead ten times over.
“You don’t, but you don’t really have a choice. I don’t have time to argue with you, it takes almost three hours to get there. We can fight along the way,” Kaden said as he turned and walked back the way he came, slamming his bedroom door closed behind him.
Five minutes later, Kaden emerged from his room with dripping hair and a water-spotted shirt. In a hasty run down the hall, he pulled up short when Camille met Kaden at the front door. She stepped into his path before he left the house, arms crossed, hate burning in her eyes. Her pixie cut hair, spiked in every direction, still adorned with pink tips, almost poked him in the chin as she stood a breath away from him.
“I swear, if anything happens to Raine, anything at all, Eryk will not be able to talk me down again.”
Kaden would have smiled at her fiery threat if circumstances had been different, but all he could muster was a brief nod as he pushed past her and made his way to the car.
Eryk leaned against Kaden’s black car with his head tilted back to watch the stars overhead. He was deep in thought and Kaden felt as if he were intruding on something private, but he had no time to waste on reflection. As he approached the car with quick, determined steps, Eryk let out a sigh.
“I cannot go with you this time.”
Kaden was surprised at the change and opened his mouth to ask why when Eryk cut him off and continued.
“I must go assemble the other Fay Warriors if we are to succeed in our quest. This will be a dangerous rescue and I fear the help of my brothers will be necessary.”
Eryk pushed from the side of the car and faced Kaden full on. They were matched in height and Kaden was able to look deep into Eryk’s eyes as Eryk placed his hands on Kaden’s shoulders.
Raine (Elemental Series Book 2) Page 16