Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 132138 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 661(@200wpm)___ 529(@250wpm)___ 440(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 132138 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 661(@200wpm)___ 529(@250wpm)___ 440(@300wpm)
He’s going to marry his Bron. I’m real and his heart is so full.
And then it hurts.
Shim hits his knees. His whole body aches, and he would swear there is a hole in his gut. What’s happening to him? Fear takes over, but then he hears the hum. He hears it each night in his dreams, and when he concentrates very hard, he can sometimes hear it during the day. It’s a soft noise, usually, but now it’s a roar in his head that drowns out everything else.
Except his brother. He can feel his brother’s panic. How can he hear his brother? Lach is on the other side of the palace, but Shim knows he’s running.
And he knows something else, too. I’m in trouble.
Bonded. Somehow, I reached across the planes and made that connection that ties us to each other outside of our dreams. I grasped some invisible thread and I’m pulling him to me.
And it hurts. The agony. As though his being is yanked somewhere it shouldn’t go.
He feels the fire building in his belly. He hears my panic. Despite the horrible pain, he forces himself to listen—to himself and his body. The fire is his power, given to him by the bond, pulled from him by an intensely strong bondmate.
I am in danger, and he has the power to save me.
Get me close, love. Get me close. Can you feel me? I am with you always. Always, love.
He needs me to listen. He can do this. He can control it. It’s right there on the surface. Fire will save me, save us all.
And then his power dies.
Too weak. I’m too weak. Gods. Shim screams. He can feel me fading, dying. Not now. Not when we haven’t kissed, haven’t loved, haven’t melded into one another’s souls.
Rage threatens to take over. He was promised. He and Lachlan. I was promised to them. More than any crown or kingdom, I am their birthright and he won’t be denied.
He hears his brother shout as he does the only thing he can. He reaches across the cord that connects us and sends his life to me.
As he feels my breath, he takes his final gasp, and the world becomes fire.
Feet pounding. Panic floods his system and I am Lach again. Shim. Something is wrong with Shim. Something changed, in his head, in his soul, in the whole fucking world. He was standing there talking to Duffy and suddenly he knew where Shim was, been able to feel what he felt, sense what he was thinking. He was always able to feel his other half, but not like this. This is overpowering, overwhelming.
And then it’s over. Lach feels the connection cut and silence reigns. Nothingness. He can’t feel Shim at all, as though he doesn’t exist.
Lach runs. He knows where his brother is. The stables. And now he sees something that terrifies him.
Fire blazes, engulfing every wall of the small stables where the best horses are kept. The family’s private stock. And it looks like nothing can be saved.
But Shim is in there and if he can’t be saved, then Lach has nothing left at all.
Shim is the smart one. Shim is the one who can love. Shim is the beautiful part of his soul. Without Shim, there is only Lach, and Lach is violence and dominance and cold power.
Lach doesn’t wish to live without the best part of his soul.
He hears Duffy screaming at him to stop, but he can’t. If Shim is gone, then the fire can take him, too.
Heat assails him so strong that for a moment he can’t move, can’t breathe. The smoke is so thick he almost can’t focus. His eyes water and his lungs burn. Something large knocks him down, and he watches in horror as Shim’s horse flees, its entire body on fire.
But there he is. Shim lay on the floor, his body still as the flames leap around. Some seem to shoot from his body, but he doesn’t seem to be burned. His clothes are a mess, but his skin is pristine.
“Shim!” Lach screams over the cracking of the fire. He looks overhead. The beams will come down any minute. He doesn’t have a second to lose. He has to get his brother out of here. He leaps across the flames, his skin scorching, and picks up his brother.
And drops him. His flesh is on fire. Horrible burns erupt on his flesh where he touched his brother. The skin bubbles and boils.
And he can’t give up.
Lach grits his teeth against the agony and lifts his brother again.
He screams, the pain filling his every sense, but somehow his feet move toward the door. Somehow he makes it outside where the grass is cool.
He falls to his knees and knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that his brother is dead.