Sacrificed (The Ignited Series)

by Dantone, Desni

  It was me and her. The moment I’d been waiting for.

  I felt the familiar tingling in my hand as I prepared a fire ball worthy of Lillian’s face. As I raised my arm to launch it, Micah fell from midair, and Lillian turned the rest of the way around to face me. Both her hands shot out, sending an invisible wave that felt like nothing short of an atomic blast into me.

  It rocketed me into the wall. My head snapped back, striking the concrete with a sickening crack. Stars swarmed my vision as I tried to hold on to consciousness. The fire in my hand extinguished, and the knife slipped from my hands, and distantly, I was aware of someone yelling my name.

  A chair flying across the room…

  Alec taking a fist to the jaw…

  Nathan being dropped to the floor…

  Shouts, from all around me…

  Flashes of activity were interrupted by long stretches of darkness. I hoped the images were nothing more than remnants of a terrible nightmare, but when I finally blinked the black away, I saw that it all had been real.

  Nathan lay on the floor in front of me, hands pulled behind his back as a Skotadi secured them with rope. Only when he was pulled to his knees and placed beside Alec did he see that I had come to. A soft shake of his head warned me not to move.

  Across the room, Micah was blocked off by Lillian and two other Skotadi. The charm was still secured around his neck, and he looked…defeated.

  What in the hell had happened after I blacked out?

  Something bad, for Nathan and Alec to wind up as they were, and the Skotadi to have control of us again. The only advantage we had was that they thought I was still out. If I could take them—take Lillian—by surprise…

  Unfortunately, thanks to my blurry vision and the throbbing in my head, I wasn’t so sure I could conjure another fire ball. I needed to concentrate to pull it off, and that was hard to do with a concussion.

  Regardless, I tried it, and winced at the stabbing pain that shot through my skull.

  Yeah, that wasn’t going to work.

  All I had was the knife.

  Keeping my eyes on Lillian as she spoke to one of the Skotadi, I slowly swept my hand behind me, searching for it. A sharp, burning pain in the tip of my middle finger clued me in to its location. I immediately pulled my hand back, but the damage had been done.

  How could I have been so stupid?

  I managed to keep my face blank as the realization that I’d just been cut with a diamond weapon swept over me. Nathan was watching me, his eyes pleading with me to stay still and quiet…to not do anything stupid.

  Little did he realize it was too late for that. And when Lillian cocked the gun in her hand and took a few steps forward, closing the gap between her and the two guys I cared about more than anything in this world, I knew that stupid was my only option.

  I was already injured with diamond. My fate had been sealed, but if I could save them before I succumbed to the diamond deliria, I would.

  Lillian leveled the gun on Nathan, and I clambered to my feet with the knife in my hand. I had nothing left to bargain with…but myself.

  “Lillian!”

  Though she kept the gun trained on the back of Nathan’s head, her eyes shifted to me. She looked surprised to see me awake.

  “You want me to kill Micah?” I asked her.

  “You’ve proven yourself worthless in that simple task,” she spat.

  “But you still need me. Don’t you?” I lifted the knife in my hand, placed it over my forearm, never removing my eyes from Lillian.

  In my periphery, I saw both Nathan and Alec squirm. One of them muttered my name, but my focus remained on Lillian.

  “I’ll do it, Lillian. I’ll do whatever it takes to save them. I’m not afraid.”

  “You do it,” she taunted, “and your boyfriend will be right behind you. Both of them. And you’ll be around long enough to see them die.”

  “Or maybe you’ll realize how badly you screwed this up when I take myself out of the equation, and you won’t have anything left to fight for.”

  She scoffed. “You’re not that important, girl.”

  “Oh no?” I pressed the knife against me, hard, but not hard enough to break the skin, and grinned when Lillian flinched. “I think maybe I am.”

  In that split second before I made my decision, my eyes found Micah’s from across the room. I hoped, for the first time, that my thoughts were loud enough for him to read.

  And then I slid the knife across the palm of my hand.

  Someone yelled no, and suddenly there was a flurry of activity. Micah, already knowing my intentions, was the first to react while everyone else stared at me in shock. He broke free of the two Skotadi and wrestled a very stunned Lillian to the ground.

  Their eyes had lingered on me a few seconds longer, but then Nathan and Alec were on their feet. Though their hands were still tied behind their backs, they were able to keep the Skotadi preoccupied while Micah fought with Lillian for control of the gun.

  No one was paying any attention to me. Seeing an opening, I jumped on Lillian, pulling her off balance. She barely avoided the knife in my hand, but in the process, lost the gun. As I crawled across the floor after it, she lunged for me.

  The moment my hands circled around the cold metal, I flipped around and pulled the trigger. My aim was off, and the shot hit Lillian in the stomach. Though it wasn’t a kill-shot, she dropped hard.

  I scampered to my feet, holding the gun out in front of me as I ordered the other two Skotadi to freeze. Nathan and Alec were both on the ground, beaten and worn, but okay. The Skotadi stepped away from them, hands held up in the air as they eyed me warily, stealing glances at their leader bleeding on the floor.

  Yeah, I did that, thank you very much.

  Micah was advancing on me. “Kris…”

  I knew what he wanted to do, but I wasn’t going to let him yet. “Cut them loose first,” I told Micah, nodding to Nathan and Alec. Someone would need to keep the Skotadi in line while Micah worked his magic on me.

  If he could still work his magic on me.

  I was feeling…off. The room was starting to spin, I was seeing double of everything, and my legs had turned to rubber. Someone needed to take the gun from my hands before I accidentally shot someone else.

  The moment Nathan and Alec were cut loose, they were at my side. Alec took the gun, apparently recognizing the fact that I could barely hold it up anymore. And my legs…

  They finally went out from under me and I dropped to my knees. Nathan went with me, cushioning my fall. “Kris…” He shook his head, face aghast. I could have been mistaken, but his eyes were glistening, almost as if he were on the verge of crying.

  It was the deliria. It had to be the deliria.

  “Out of the way,” I heard Micah say. I looked over Nathan’s shoulder as Micah approached, ripping the blocking charm from his neck. As he withdrew the vial he kept hidden under his shirt, his eyes leveled on mine. “Stay with us for five more minutes, Kris. Okay?”

  Five minutes? I doubted I had five seconds, I thought, but slurred, “Yeah, sure.”

  “What are you doing?” Nathan asked Micah, his voice thick, shaky.

  “Healing her,” Micah answered quietly as he withdrew what he needed from the vial and held it in his hand. “I hope.”

  “You can do that?” Alec asked.

  “Shh.” This came from Micah as he closed his eyes, entering the state of meditation he was always harassing me about practicing.

  My eyes fluttered shut, and I lost sight of them, but I was still there. I was distantly aware of being laid down, and my head resting on something hard, but soft. Legs, I thought. Nathan’s legs. I felt his arm behind my shoulders, supporting me, as Micah held my diamond-cut hand in his.

  As a warm tingle pulsated in my palm, then traveled up my arm, I wondered if it was Micah’s doing or the diamond. If it was the diamond…

  There was so much I’d never said that I needed to say, that I may never have anothe
r chance to say.

  “Nathan…”

  “Shh,” came his response from above me, and his voice, whispering soft words that I couldn’t understand was the last thing I would hear.

  CHAPTER 24

  I dreamt of the river, but unlike the other times I’d found myself on its banks, it was a peaceful experience. Lauren and Megan were there with me, as beautiful angels, and I didn’t want to leave. It wasn’t like our usual times together—they were dead now after all—but I was sent away with a message I swore to never forget.

  Where there is free will, anything is possible…

  I couldn’t go where they were going, they had said. I had a destiny to fulfill. And it might not be as bad as I thought. That was all they told me, all they would give me.

  Once I realized I wasn’t joining them in the afterlife, we went our separate ways, and for the first time since their deaths, I wasn’t sad. It was a bittersweet awakening, having to leave them, but when my eyes opened and fell on Nathan sleeping quietly beside me, the pain of saying my final goodbye waned.

  The memory of my last actions rushed back to me, and I scanned the room for clues as to where I was. Wherever it was, it appeared safe. Perhaps a hotel room—and not a cheap slummy one either.

  I couldn’t be certain, but everything seemed…okay.

  I lifted my arm from underneath the covers and traced a finger over the new scar in the palm of my hand. It had faded and was barely visible now.

  A smile spread across my face. Micah had done it. They all had done it. We had gotten out.

  And Nathan lay beside me. Only a slight discoloration of the skin under one of his eyes remained as a reminder of the brutality he had endured.

  Partially convinced I must be in another dream, I reached out to touch him, to trace a finger across his temple and down his cheekbone. The feel of his skin and the day old scruff on his jaw at my fingertips reassured me that he was really there with me.

  His eyes fluttered and snapped open, and suddenly I was gazing into a sea of blue. He stared at me a beat as I smiled at him and then, as if suddenly realizing that he wasn’t dreaming, he sprang up in the bed.

  He hovered over me as I lay on my back, looking up into his eyes that were both terrified and relieved at once. As the seconds passed, they softened, as if he finally believed that I wasn’t an illusion.

  “How do you feel?” His voice sounded strained and wary, perhaps an indication of the hell I had put him through.

  “I think I’m okay,” I murmured.

  With a heavy sigh, he dropped his head to my shoulder. He remained there as he gained control over his ragged breathing, his body shuddering above me.

  “Nathan?” I ran my hand through his hair gently. I was halfway through my second pass when his head snapped up unexpectedly.

  “What were you thinking?” he demanded, his voice full of emotion, but not anger.

  “I had to distract them,” I offered meekly.

  “By killing yourself?” he croaked, and I realized that, to him, that may have appeared to have been my intention.

  “Nathan, I—”

  “Didn’t I tell you we would get through this?”

  I nodded and he lowered his head to rest his forehead against mine. His body still shook in tiny tremors, palpable under my hands when I put them on his shoulders.

  “Don’t do anything like that again,” he ordered, then lifted his head to look into my eyes, and waited for me to agree with another nod.

  I hadn’t considered how my actions would affect him. Then again, I hadn’t had much time to think about anything. It had been more of a whim, a desperate attempt, with a desperate hope that I could be saved, and only now did I fully understand how foolish I had been. And how my actions must have looked to him.

  “I wasn’t trying to kill myself.” I felt the need to make him understand that. “I—I’d already nicked myself with the knife. I’d already been injured.”

  It was a little embarrassing admitting that, but he needed to know I hadn’t done it on purpose. I didn’t think telling him that I would have sacrificed myself anyway, to save him and Alec, would help my cause, so I kept that tidbit to myself.

  “I knew Micah could heal diamond injury, and—”

  “That was your plan?” His face dropped. “That was your hope? That Micah could save you?”

  “I guess so.”

  He shook his head in disbelief and shifted so that he was now propped up on his elbow beside me, facing me, but no longer hovering over me. He was still so close, but I’d preferred it when he’d been closer.

  “And what if it hadn’t worked?” he asked, his eyes raising to meet mine reluctantly.

  I shrugged, feeling ashamed. The world would have been safer, but I hadn’t stopped to consider the impact my possible loss would have had on others—on Nathan. From the haunted look on his face, I knew he would have been left devastated, and for that, I felt horrible.

  “But it did,” I offered. “Don’t be mad.”

  “I’m not mad.” He softened, looked down into the small space between us like all the world’s answers could be found there. “I was just scared.”

  That I could understand, but I could also tell that he had more to add, and I waited patiently for him to organize his thoughts.

  “I was afraid I’d never have the chance…” he started before trailing off. Unease clouded his eyes as he contemplated what he wanted, but struggled, to say. Finally, his eyes lifted to mine with determination. “I thought I’d never get to say to you all the things I should have said to you a long time ago.”

  My throat constricted as I waited. When those words didn’t come fast enough for me, I forced a strained, “What?”

  “How much you mean to me, how much I care about you, how much…” His eyes flicked away as his throat jumped. They leveled on mine again as the next words made their way to my ears. “How much I love you.”

  I stared, unable to do anything else. It was just too much…so unexpected…so…

  He loved me?

  “I’ve been an idiot,” Nathan continued. “I’ve loved you all along, Kris. It just took me this long to accept it, and to realize that it’s what I want. You’re what I want. And then, there was Alec… And I thought that if I pretended to not care, that it would make it easier if you chose him. I realize now how stupid that was, that I was practically pushing you to him, but I’m done being stupid now.”

  For a man of few words, there were times, like this, that he managed to blow me away. I managed a smile, but words were lost to me. Fortunately, Nathan wasn’t done yet, which gave me time to collect my own thoughts.

  “And I don’t care what happened with Alec. It was all my fault, because I didn’t fight for you like I should have. From now on, I’m going to fight,” he continued. “I’ll fight for you—and not just for your life or your future, but for your love.”

  For the first time in a very long time, happy tears welled up in my eyes. I placed a hand on his stubbly cheek, forcing him to stop and listen to me. “You already have it.” His brow pulled together like he didn’t understand, or couldn’t believe, what I was trying to say. Just to make sure he understood, I added, “Nathan, I’m in love with you.”

  His eyes squeezed tight as if he were in pain, and he shook his head in disbelief. “I don’t deserve you,” he muttered.

  I would have voiced an argument, if not for Nathan angling close enough to stunt all brain function. A ghost of a smile graced his lips just before they found mine.

  That kiss sealed our words with a tender promise. His mouth moved delicately over mine as if he were taking special care in savoring the moment. My heart swelled with the emotion I had grown used to restraining. Now, in letting it flow freely, my body responded ten-fold. My hands trailed up his arms, which were taut from holding his weight as he shifted over me. His upper body blanketed me, but when I cupped the back of his neck, I tugged him even closer.

  That move sparked a change in the wa
y Nathan kissed me. Tenderness and purpose gave way to raw desire. My hands moved over his back and shoulders as if wanting to touch him everywhere at once. None of it seemed enough. Finding the hem of his shirt, I slipped my hands underneath the fabric until they were flush with his skin. The muscles that, until then, I had only seen in my imagination, were at my fingertips, and felt even more magnificent in real life.

  Fueled by love, and a previously restrained desire, this kiss quickly transcended all other kisses we have shared—both physically and emotionally. I knew it, and I’m pretty sure he knew it, too. As expected, he was the first to recognize the heady direction we were heading.

  “Okay…okay…” Nathan murmured as he pulled away, albeit reluctantly. His chest heaved against mine as he caught his breath. Though it took visible effort, he pushed off of me. Scooting back a few inches for good measure, he propped up on one elbow to look down at me.

  “We get to do more of that now, right?” I asked wistfully.

  His lips curled into a smile, wide enough to produce both the sexiest and most adorable dimples I had ever seen. “I sure hope so. But, for now, you stay over there.”

  That was fine. I rolled my head so that I had a perfect view of him, and that was enough for the time being. I was curious, but I didn’t ask why he insisted on maintaining the six inch gap separating us. To me, it was a form of torture. I considered that being close to me might be a form of torture for him, so I decided not to press the issue if that was what he wanted.

  We were together, and that was what mattered. Now that we had that established, and we apparently weren’t going to make out again anytime soon, I figured we’d talk.

  And I had a lot of questions. Starting with how I ended up here—wherever here was?

  “What happened? After I blacked out?”

  Nathan grinned. “You’re two favorite people rescued us.”

  My two favorite people? His sarcasm had been apparent, so that could only mean…

  “Gabby and Richie?”

  He nodded.

  “How?”

  His grin grew. “Apparently, the Kala had a tracking device placed on Micah, in the event that they ever lost him. When we left to come find you, Gabby and Richie notified the Kala. They tracked him, sent practically their entire army. The Skotadi didn’t have a chance.”