The Opelux and Other Monsters || Book One

CHAPTER 68 - TRITTEON

I stumbled out of the portal door, pressing my fist as hard against my chest as I could to counteract the pressure. A tremor jolted through me, and I had to grip the wall and wait for it to pass.

What had I done? How could I not know? How had the information never come out during any of my lessons? Whatever it was, I had been horribly wrong. The infatuation had not been brief. I still felt it. And infatuation was anything but the right word for it.

I had felt it to a lesser degree when I had first seen her after our swim in the lake, after she had bound herself to me unintentionally. The desire to sample another taste of her blood had overwhelmed it though. It had been even stronger the second time, when I'd woken after Cort had killed me. Now, being with her was all I wanted. Being with her was the only thing that would ease the painful tension in my chest. I didn't know why—or even how I knew it. It was fact—instinct.

But I couldn't. The memory of her horrified face was burned into my mind. She would never forgive me for my ignorance.

The thought of what Pharro might do to me held little weight.

I stepped over a large chunk of white stone in the jagged, holding cell doorway, the ghostly burn of Orion's skin against mine tormenting my mind. I made it down the steps into the trench without tripping over myself through the duration of another drawn out body tremor, and didn't have to hold onto the wall for support until I stood in front of the cell I had left Angquin inside.

There had been so much heat. I had felt an ocean of Poeir—Poeir that wasn't mine. The more I had given in to my desire and the harder she had held onto me, the more powerful I had felt.

Had she felt it? She had to have. Could it have been one-sided?

"Stop!" I yelled to the huge, empty room. I had to rein myself in. I couldn't think about it. Perhaps if I got her off my mind, the tension in my chest would go away.

What had Daniel done? Was Angquin alright? Would it put Orion at risk?

"Enough," I growled. I didn't feel an ounce of concern for Rilyin's life, and that alone should have alarmed me. But it didn't.

I pressed my hand to the cell and brought up the control pad and one-way-window. Angquin crouched at the opposite end from the door, rocking back and forth, drops of blood scattered around her, her forehead pressed against her knees. Something was very wrong.

I hit the speaker. "Angquin? Can you hear me?"

She didn't respond. She didn't even stop rocking.

I wouldn't go in until the situation was fully assessed, so I hit the two-way button and turned off the electric current and neutralizer for the inside. The entire sphere turned transparent.

"Quin?"

She froze.

"Are you alright?"

She looked up slowly. Her eyes met mine and, for a moment, I thought she might burst into tears. But a deep growl rumbled up her throat and her eyes turned black. She was on her feet before I had time to blink and slammed into the wall in front of me, slicing the claws of her good hand across its surface. The cell shook and cracks erupted across the wall.

And then I saw it. The subtle ripple of air around her head and the black X burned into her skin below her left ear. Daniel had fastened a Vek Veehm to her—the lesser version of a Directive Crossek brand—compelling her nature to change. The thing would be linked to Daniel's own life force. She would be like this until he was dead.

I swiped my hand across the screen and the neutralizer and electric current powered back up.

She raised her hand to strike the wall again and I flinched in anticipation. But she stopped. She blinked, the black disappearing from her eyes, and her hand fell to her side and she dropped into a crumpled heap, the Compellation Veehm cut off by the cell itself.