Chrysalis: The Emergence of Emery (The Gifted Series Book 1) (13 page)

“Shhh…” Elijah says wrapping his arms around me and I realize the sound is coming from me.

“Take me to him,” I demand, sitting up straight.

“Em—”

“
Now
Elijah,” I bark out, the time for talking is done.

He nods, getting up and pulling me with him. We run, it’s only a short sprint and when we arrive he guides me through a doorway. All the others are crouched down, crowded around a body lying sprawled out on the floor. I move forward and ignore them as I push in-between like they don’t exist. Because they don’t. If he doesn’t, then nobody does.

As I clear them, I see Kade, he’s lying still on the floor, looking perfect, like he’s asleep. At that moment he opens his eyes, and it’s then I see the pain, the power he still holds, even if it’s seeping out of him, and more than that, I can still see the love. Feel the love.

“Princess,” he says, reminding me of our earlier conversation. A tear escapes my eye, dropping onto him.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper.

“Why?” he whispers back.

“Because I got you in this mess, because you did this to save me.”

“Emery, I would always choose to save you. That must be something you understand by now? What did I say?” he asks quietly, and I frown, trying to think of what he’s remembering. “I told you, I’d keep you safe, always, as long as there is breath in my body.” He smiles and then looks over my head. “Can I have a minute with Emery, please?”

I hear everyone shuffle out, I’m not sure they’re happy about it, not if the muttering is anything to go by, but I ignore them, nothing but Kade can penetrate my conscious anymore. I’m living and breathing for him.

“I’ll gladly give my life for you. I know what I bought by saving you. I know, Emery. And still, I’d do it again in a heartbeat.”

“Kade…”

“No, don’t take it away. I’m aware that I’m dying, nobody can do what I’ve done and survive. I’m lucky to still be talking now…”At that moment Kade starts coughing and I can see and feel the pain he’s in.

“Maybe you should stop talking, Kade?” I offer stroking his forehead.

Smiling he reaches across and holds my hand. “It’s always been you, Emery. I knew when I first saw you, and I know with my last moments on this earth, it’s always been you. I only fear for your safety now. What might become of you? Promise me something?”

I nod as tears freefall dropping onto his chest. “Promise you will practice your powers, you’re stronger than them. You need to listen to Elijah, he
will
look after you. I need to know I’m leaving you safe, princess.” The nickname is like a hot knife plunging into my heart.

“I promise,” I whisper. He nods and I can see how much his pain has amped up. He’s struggling to talk and so I glide my finger across his lips, quieting him. “Kade, when we were at the tree, I didn’t get a chance to tell you something. I love you, too.” I watch as his eyes flame gold with the last bit of love he holds and then like his flame is doused, the spirt is gone and his eyes are empty.

“Kade!” I shout and hear thundering steps as everyone tramples back into the room. Everyone is shouting and screaming, my heart slams against my chest.

Thump… thump… thump.

I struggle to catch a breath, my insides are hollow. Empty. Cold.

Thump… thump… thump.

The pace quickens and my limbs start shaking.

Thump… thump… thump.

The white and blue colors start glitching across my body as though it’s electrifying itself.

Thump… thump… thump
.

All of a sudden everything gets blocked out, all the noise, all the feelings, all the thoughts. There is nothing but my heart.

Thump… thump… thump.

Then I’m floating, about four foot off the ground. I look down and my whole body is covered in a cocoon of white and blue, just like earlier, but this time I have a red tinge around me, like a current around my body.

Thump… thump… thump
.

All I can feel is the remnants of Kade. His smell, his touch, his voice. The look in his eyes.

Thump… thump… thump.

Then suddenly his words ‘
I’m in love with you
’ float around my head on repeat and all his love crashes into me. It breaks something, and before I know what’s happening, my body shakes in mid-air. I can see the others shouting, but can’t hear anything from them, they’re on mute. Light propels out of my body shooting and pinging. It whizzes around in three separate color strands, then it comes together, pauses and shoots into Kade’s body. He raises off the ground while my power continues flowing into him. I have no idea what’s happening, but somehow I know it’s healing him.

All I keep thinking is that…

I want him alive.

I
need
him alive.

Now my body is automatically carrying out my orders.

The smile spreads across my face as I watch Kade’s eyes opening, they widen as he takes me in.

“I love you,” I whisper then fall to the ground. Suddenly completely spent.

“Emery!” I hear him roar before I lose my grip on consciousness once again.

“Kade, you need to go get some sleep.”

“No Kat. I need to stay here in case Emery wakes up.”

“She’s fine. They’ve said that she is. It’s up to her now, she’ll wake up when she’s ready. What are you going to do… wait here forever? She could be like this for years.”

“She won’t. She’s a fighter.
My fighter
. She’ll be back with me soon.”

“You’re going to get yourself hurt if you don’t pull away from her now, Kade. You need to leave her behind. We can go somewhere and start anew. She’s strong, you’ve seen that nothing will happen to her. Plus, she has Elijah and the rest of them.”

“I think you should leave Kat.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Absolutely, I do. I’ve denied the feelings I have for Emery for years. You of all people know that. When I finally admitted them to myself it was still with chains holding me down, chains I gave myself, not willing to trust in her, in us. I was so focused on the past that I tried to block out the possibility of this future. I can’t do it anymore. I love her. Whether she’s lying here silently, or fighting at my side. Loving me back or running away from me… she’s the one.
The only one
. I want to breathe the same air as her for all eternity. She’s my Pith, my soul, my essence, she is the core of me. More than that, Emery is essential, without her I can’t be me.”

“There’s nothing I can say to change your mind is there?”

“No.”

“Okay, then I’ll go, but when she’s better I promise to make an effort to get to know her, for you. Kade, you know the only reason I have been completely standoffish, is because I’m afraid she’s going to be the end of you, my brother. But if you’re destined, more than that if you’re
determined
to be with her, then I will stop showing her this side of me, and try to let her in.”

“That would be appreciated, Kat.”

I can hear the beeping of machines. Although they are drowned out slightly by what seems to be wind chimes.

Odd.

A sharp sound jolts my body and I try to pry my eyelids apart but fail. The heaviness too much.

“Kade, let me sit with her a while. You’ve been here for four days. Dude… you smell.”

“Shut up, Elijah. I’m not gonna leave and risk her waking without me here.”

“Okay, I’ll just park my butt in this chair a while.”

The room goes back to just beeping and wind chimes. I remember everything that happened. Although, I’m not quite sure why I passed out. I can only imagine it’s because I revived Kade, and it’s depleted my energy. The one thing that is clear inside me is the longing for him. The love I feel for him, and the happiness, knowing he feels the same. It’s all consuming. I hear him sigh and feel his fingers fold around my hand.

“I just wish she’d wake up.” His voice is raw and raspy.

“I know, man. I know,” Elijah replies.

Trying again to move my eyes I fail once more.

Kade.
I speak in my mind, but he doesn’t reply. My heart rate accelerates slightly as fear starts ramping up, the inability to do anything is strangling me.

“I can feel her fear,” Kade states to Elijah, the concern evident in his voice.

“What? I can’t feel anything.”

“Well, we’re connected, remember.”

“Shall I get someone?”

“Yeah.”

I hear Elijah’s chair scrape, and the door clicks open and closed. I try to relax my mind and listen to the wind chimes.

Kade…

Emery?

Oh thank God, you can hear me.
I tell him.

Emery. You’re okay?

Yes. I just can’t open my eyes, Kade. It’s scaring me.

Hold on.

I feel some tugging and movement on my face then suddenly everything is brighter.

“Try now,” he tells me aloud.

Slowly I pull my eyelids apart and try to focus on something, but the world is blurry.

“It’s okay, princess. You had these pads covering your eyes,” he explains, and that still doesn’t make any sense to me, but right now I only care that I’m awake and looking into the face of the man I thought I’d lost.

Opening my mouth nothing comes out. “You had a tube in until this morning, it was helping you breathe. They said you might feel scratchy in your throat, and have trouble talking when you finally wake. Just have some water, baby. Take it easy and give it a couple of hours. Hopefully, then you’ll have your voice back, okay?”

I nod my reply, before telling him with my mind.
Kade. I love you.
I watch as his eyes close and his whole body relaxes.

“Whatever we do now, we do it together,” he tells me squeezing my hand, and I nod and smile.

Elijah bursts back into the room with a doctor trailing him. “Em, you’re awake,” he shouts.

“Shh… man. She can’t talk, not yet,” Kade snaps at him.

The doctor looks between Kade and Elijah. Appraising them I think, although that could just be my overactive imagination. “Gentleman, please, let me speak to Ms. Laird.”

I’m surprised, I mean, it hadn’t occurred to me up to that moment that my surname was really Laird. I’ve been called Emma Breitsprecher for so many years, but I’ve never really been her.

“So you can’t speak?”

I shake my head no.

“Hmm, that’s rare, a sore throat and a scratchy voice is very common. Maybe a little water will help.” I nod again and she turns to Elijah, looking him up and down. Now I definitely didn’t misread that. Wow!

“Could you go and get Ms. Laird some water, please?” Taking no notice of the looks she gives him, he turns and is gone. She doesn’t say anything else, just reaches forward and something flashes in her eyes. It’s enough to spark fear in me. Her hand descends toward my throat and once again I find myself watching in slow motion as Kade’s hand reaches out, striking like a snake, capturing its prey. He has her wrist in his grip before she even knows what’s going on. Whatever was showing in her eyes before, she’s now hidden it well as she averts her gaze to Kade, putting on the pretense of being scared. “What are you doing?” she whispers. “You’re hurting me.”

“Do you think I’m
that
stupid? Do you think that I’m a level ten for no reason?” He spits and she screws her eyes up at him.

“You’re not that good,
Kade.
Otherwise, you’d have known the minute I stepped in the room,” she hisses, and I watch as a pain passes over his face.

She’s wrong. Stop it. You’ve been all about me. Plus, you haven’t slept in days.
I tell him in my head.

Just then Elijah walks back in the room unaware and she turns to him, hitting him in the chest with a red light and he flies back through the air smashing into the wood and glass that makes up the wall of the room we’re in.

No!
I internally scream.

Kade jumps up. Blasts her with a white light, then he hits her again, this time with a gold flash the same gold that shines in his eyes. He brings her up in the air and holds her there. She’s trapped, immobile and unable to speak. “Call Katarina,” he tells Elijah and my body jolts. Elijah pulls himself up from the floor and walks out of the door.

Now what?
I ask him.

“Now we wait. Katarina will be here soon.”

You had to call for your sister. You couldn’t have called Sicily or Tess… or I don’t know, Zeit? Even he wants to hurt me less than your sister.

He chuckles at me.

This isn’t funny!
I snap.

His lips twitch, but he says nothing.

A few minutes later Katarina appears. “Good to see you awake,” she tells me. Her voice holds no malice or sarcasm, and I frown as Kade’s lip twitches again.

Douche.

“She can’t speak,” he tells Katarina as he moves his eyes from me to her.

“Oh, is she okay?” she asks, and it feels like genuine concern.

I wonder whether I’ve woken up in an alternate reality, nothing would surprise me these days.

“She’ll be fine,” he answers glancing over to me. I see his eyes flash momentarily from hazel to gold then back again. Then his head snaps toward the woman being held in the air. “If she had been alone, though.” He stops and I watch a muscle jump in his cheek. “Take her, deliver her. I’m off the grid for a while. I’m with Emery,” he says.

“Of course. So glad you’re okay, Emery. And when you’re back home, I’d like to take some time to explain why I was a bitch before… and apologize,” she whispers.

Shit, maybe I am still in a coma.

Kade doesn’t respond to my thoughts, but Elijah snorts, a smirk spreads across his face.

“Kat now isn’t the time. Take this one…” Kade’s voice is firm and she nods, offers me a small smile, then turns her gaze to the fake doctor and that’s when I see the bitch return.

“Elijah,” she says quietly. He walks over and holds his fingers to the doctor’s head, and much like when he did it to me, she passes out. Kat catches her like she weighs nothing and walks away.

“Emery,” Elijah says walking to my bedside and grabbing my hand. “I was so scared,” he whispers leaning over me and pulling my head into his chest.

Can you hear me?
I ask him.

Yeah, baby sister.
He responds without speaking.

Only you?
I query, my eyes quickly darting to Kade.

Yeah. Your mind automatically finds who you want to speak to, but if you’re just thinking something out loud then any of us that are able to read minds will know what you’ve said.

I nod in answer and watch as Kade rolls his eyes, obviously aware that I’m talking to Elijah.

Don’t worry I’m not talking about you.
I tell Kade with a wink and he just shakes his head and sits down.

I might just start talking like this all the time.
I say smiling at Elijah.

You wouldn’t be able to. It doesn’t use much power, but I would estimate that if we only communicated this way for more than six months, we would be in danger of doing ourselves some real damage.

Wow, really?
I ask amazed and he nods.
I can’t believe Katarina was actually nice to me. Then she carried that doctor out like she weighed nothing.
I say looking back to the door.

She was being nice because she knows, ultimately, Kade will always choose you. So she has no choice but to fall in line. And she isn’t that strong. She’s a level six. You’re about a five at the moment, although you have some gifts that I’ve only ever seen on level seven or higher. Your powers are still developing, you won’t reach your full potential for a while—

How long?
I cut him off.

He smirks at me.
Even when we’re talking via our minds, you can’t let me finish without asking another question.

I bite my lip.

I don’t know how long. And I don’t know what level you’ll end up being, but I would take a guess at a level eight like me, at the very least.

I can feel my eyes widen, the thought of being so strong, both excites and scares me.