Not so Imaginary // On Hold // GxB Paranormal Romance

Part Fifteen | In Deep

F I F T E E N 

Good news. Sophia and Lucy had the vial that could restore my vision.

Bad news, they weren't about to give it to me. Not without a price.

"Tell you what," said Lucy, "How about I cut you a deal. You activate the Crystal, I let you leave with your life."

To that, Ren made a sound like a strangled cough.

"What, don't like it? Too bad." This was Sophia.

To that, Ren held his scythe at the ready. "Let's try this another way. You hand over the vial, then we take the Crystal and get the heck out of here."

Or, maybe there was another way.

"Why do you need it?" I asked, stepping forward. "The Crystal."

Charlie's voice, to the side slightly behind me, said, "Maybe we should go on a little tour."

And then Sophia was saying, "Hey!" and Charlie pressed the cool shape of the glass vial into my palm.

"Told you," he said in a hushed voice, "I'm here to rescue you. Now drink up."

Ren watched this go down with scythe still poised toward Sophia and Lucy should they make a move. I guess the fact that Charlie was helping was good enough.

As soon as a drop of the liquid had touched my tongue, the world began to fill in from darkness. It was like stepping into a life-sized coloring book.

It also made my head hurt in the way getting stabbed with an ice pick would feel. Going from basically blind to sighted in seconds flat is a bit of a mind-turner. I stumbled backward and lurched toward the floor, but a hand caught my upper arm.

"You okay?" Ren pulled me up and steadied me against him.

Good thing, too. Now that I had my sight back, what I saw below made my heart lurch and breath catch. We stood on a glass panel instead of solid floor, and beneath the world extended down through rows and rows of other glass floors, each occupied by lines of heavy machinery and assemblies of workers turning cranks and manning pulleys and hauling carts up heavy rails from down in the deep.

"This is, it's a mine?"

"Exactly," said Charlie. "The Crystal your ancestor hid was found in these very caves."

Ren wasn't saying anything, just watching Lucy and Sophia, but the look in his eyes was something I didn't know how to place. It wasn't one I was used to seeing. I think it was sadness.

"And now you're going to tell us you need the Crystal because you don't have the energy to sustain yourselves down here," he said.

"You always think you're so smart," said Sophia. "Charlie, take them down."

With that, the tarnished doors to the elevator clanked open.

Ren held his ground and pulled me protectively against him. "Not so fast."

"Actually," I found myself saying, "I'd like to see. I want to see for myself why they need it."

"You're not seriously considering activating the Crystal for them?"

I shook my head. Even if my ancestor indeed was the one who hid it, I had no idea how to make it turn on or whatever it was supposed to do. Whatever power I was supposed to have, I sure didn't have any clue how to access.

"Fine," he said at last, and we were in the shaft of the elevator heading deeper below ground.

"You know," Charlie said to Ren, when it was just the three of us again, "I'm starting to think you don't like my sisters much."