A Thousand Year Obsession ✔

49. Don't Try To Control; Become

49. Don't Try To Control; Become

I couldn't let myself think.

If I started thinking, I'd start remembering, and if I started remembering, I'd start reliving, and if I started reliving I'd lose the tiniest inch of sanity I had left.

So I didn't think.

Three doors. Eight windows. Table. Chairs. Sofa. Armchair. Counter tops. Cupboards. Bookshelves.

The first door was locked. So was the second. And the third. So I went round the room to each window, but they were all locked too.

Palms out. Deep breaths.

Nothing.

I exhaled sharply, my arms snapping back to my sides. I stepped back, refocused my eyes on the doors and tried again.

Nothing.

'Don't just feel it, become it.'

My teeth clamped down on my lip and my eyes shut tightly. I shoved that thought away, that stupid, warm, comforting, reasonable voice that wouldn't leave me alone. I relaxed my body again and focused my thoughts, waiting for the magic to come boiling up through my blood.

It never came.

"You look tense. How about a shoulder massage?"

My gaze didn't stray at the taunting question, my mind blocked off from anything and everything, even my own thoughts . . . even my own magic.

"You're never getting out. You seem to have forgotten everything you once knew about magic."

"Shut up."

But he only laughed, the chair creaking beneath his weight as he shifted positions, his head lowering to rest on his clenched fist. I could see him from the corner of my eyes, the startlingly bright blue eyes, always sparking just so with that spectacular light, and the honey brown hair, overgrown now, the ends touching his brows and shadowing his ears. His lips were turned up at one corner and his eyes followed every tiny movement I made, not in suspicion or caution, but with that terrifying warmth of someone who simply loved gazing upon another. I hated it.

I inhaled again and closed my eyes, my fingers instinctively reaching up to the crevice just above my breasts, but they touched only skin and my eyes snapped back open, my breath catching.

I didn't have my pendant anymore.

I threw it in a river

I swallowed harshly.

I needed the pendant. I needed my book. I couldn't use magic without it. I couldn't access any of my so called potential. I'd always used my pendant. Without it my magic was unpredictable, uncontrollable, inaccessible. I was ordinary, normal, helpless.

'Stop pretending to be someone else.'

My jaw clenched and my fingers curled tightly into my palms at my sides. I shoved the thought away, shoved every thought away, ignoring what I knew to be true. I couldn't face recognizing it. If I faced that then I'd have to face everything else. And I couldn't do that. Not now. Not yet. Maybe not ever. I couldn't.

'You said you trusted me, Morgana. Do you still stand by that?'

Something cold fell onto my chest and I glanced down startled, my fingers raising to the slippery wetness coating my cheeks. I was crying. I was crying and I hadn't even realized. I was crying and I wouldn't even let myself think about why. But I was crying. I was already crying and nothing mattered anymore. I couldn't change anything. I couldn't do anything. I couldn't be anything.