[This post is from Marin’s point of view.]
My heart stopped, freezing in my throat as I met Phelan’s wide-eyed but seemingly sightless gaze. His eyes were unfocused, pupils shrunk to almost nothing. My fingers tightened again, squeezing hard enough to leave marks, to bruise.
Energy crackled and the hairs on my arms and the back of my neck stood straight up on end. I could see him now, see him as clear as if we sat outside under the blazing sun, bathed in the bright light of day.
I said his name again. He didn’t blink, but his mouth opened. A whisper emerged, faint and nearly lost amid the thundering in my ears.
“Help,” he breathed.
Just the single word. I didn’t know what to do—didn’t know how to do what he’d just asked of me. I didn’t even know what was wrong.
“How?” I blurted. “Phelan, how do I help you? What do you need?”
“Break—”
“Break what?”
“Break it.”
I almost shook him. “Break what, Phelan? I don’t know what you’re—”
The connection. Whatever started this is still there, still has claws—
Claws.
Claws in him.
I breathed a curse and squeezed my eyes shut. I wasn’t sure if I could do it, but I had to try—there was no other choice.
I sucked in a deep breath, reaching down into the deep, dark well of power I’d only tapped into a few times—maybe twice, three times, and I didn’t have a single clear memory of any of those times, truth be known.
Just as long as it doesn’t hurt my son.
I felt a warm sense of reassurance, as if my little boy was already trying to tell me it was going to be okay. Maybe it was my imagination.
I sort of hoped it wasn’t as I started wrapping Phelan and I in a shield of my own making, cutting us off from the outside world.
The last thing I heard before I blacked out was Phelan’s voice breathing, “Leannán.”
