“It’s very real and you’re currently inside it.” I massaged my jaw, stretching my neck to loosen it. She lifted her hand again, forcing me to add, “Hit me with another blast of air, princess, and I’ll retaliate.” I wouldn’t hurt her, but I would pin her. Our first lesson? Control.
Her lower lip trembled, but her teeth audibly clenched. “What the fuck is going on?”
Did this woman have a hearing problem? Because I swore we just went through this. “It all relates back to your mother, Cl—”
Energy quaked around me, causing the bed to collapse to the floor, the headboard disappearing into a pile of ashes as flames erupted around us.
Claire screamed.
I cursed.
And tackled her to the ground.
Claire
This isn’t real.
This isn’t happening.
Everything will be fine when I wake up.
I just need to—
“Claire!” The furious growl came from the man on top of me, his striking blue eyes glowing with fury. “Focus on me, on my voice.”
I’d really rather not.
I just wanted to go home.
To wake up.
To escape.
To be anywhere other than here, with this man who kept talking about my mother, the woman who abandoned me as a child, who shattered my father’s spirit. Grandma always said she killed my dad when she broke his heart. He never recovered.
I hated my mother, couldn’t stand to hear anything about her. Childish, yes, but it was how I survived, how I escaped my reality.
My memories of my parents were nonexistent, having been too young when she left us, too young when my father died.
I shook, tears of the past clouding my eyes. Remembering hurt. Thinking about them hurt. I didn’t want to be here. I didn’t want to hear about her. I just wanted to wake up, to be done with this horrible nightmare.
“Breathe,” the man on top of me demanded. “Come on, princess. Listen to me. I need you to calm down, to breathe, to focus. Search for the tranquility inside you, call on it, pull it into you and use it.”
What the fuck is he even talking about? It could be a different language, for all I knew or cared.
“Claire,” he whispered, his lips dangerously close to mine. “Please, sweetheart, I need your focus, or you’re going to burn the house down. I’m still exhausted from earlier. Just close your eyes and think of a peaceful place. Describe it for me.”
A peaceful place? I thought hysterically, nearly laughing. “Not fucking here!” I shouted, warmth flooding my insides, spilling through my fingertips and raging around me. “Let me go!”
“I can’t do that,” he said, his palms on my face, forcing me to look at him, to see him.
My eyes widened. “You’re on fire!”
“I’m aware,” he gritted out, wincing. “Just… breathe, Claire. Breathe for me. Slowly.”
“You’re on fire,” I repeated, my heart galloping in my chest. How was breathing going to help? If anything, it’d make this worse, right? Smoke inhalation?
Except, nothing but clean air met my nostrils and mouth.