{"id":3655,"date":"2018-07-09T00:00:04","date_gmt":"2018-07-09T04:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/?p=3655"},"modified":"2018-07-08T18:46:06","modified_gmt":"2018-07-08T22:46:06","slug":"forty-one-06","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/?p=3655","title":{"rendered":"Forty-one – 06"},"content":{"rendered":"

[This post is from Hecate’s point of view.]<\/em><\/p>\n

Matt\u2019s gaze darted upward, toward the invisible curve of his sister\u2019s wards, eyes moving as he sought their shadows against the stormclouds.\u00a0 When his breath hitched for a second, she knew he\u2019d seen what she had.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not possible,\u201d he breathed.<\/p>\n

\u201cExcept it is,\u201d she said, her voice thick.\u00a0 \u201cExcept it\u2019s happening.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCan you\u2014?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI haven\u2019t tried.\u201d<\/p>\n

His gaze snapped to her.\u00a0 \u201cWhy not?\u201d<\/p>\n

Hecate stared at him askance for a few seconds and then shook her head, swallowing bile.\u00a0 \u201cBecause I had to warn<\/em> all of you before I took that risk.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matt took her hand, fingers lacing through hers and squeezing.\u00a0 A jolt of energy shook her, then the feed mellowed into a current flowing through both of them.\u00a0 She swallowed again, staring at him.<\/p>\n

\u201cTry,\u201d he whispered.\u00a0 \u201cWe need all the help we can get.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re not spent.\u201d\u00a0 She stared at him, her heart in her throat.\u00a0 She wasn\u2019t sure what he\u2019d called, but she\u2019d felt his working and known it was powerful.\u00a0 How is that possible?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI know,\u201d he said, squeezing her fingers again.\u00a0 \u201cBut I\u2019m not sure what to think of it.\u00a0 Makes me nervous.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hecate\u2019s lips thinned and she squeezed back, her gaze flicking skyward again.\u00a0 \u201cHopefully we won\u2019t have to figure out what it means, not yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

She caught his response dimly as she reached out with her own magic to touch the dark nymphs above them.\u00a0 \u201cHopefully.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then, she stopped hearing anything around her, sucked in and under as she came into contact with the nymphs.\u00a0 Song filled her thoughts, a dirge sung sweetly, a song of mourning and loss raised by a thousand voices.\u00a0 Cold swept through her, setting her teeth chattering and her toes curling.<\/p>\n

Focus.\u00a0 Damn you, focus.\u00a0 You\u2019re the one who used to command them.\u00a0 You can do it again.<\/em><\/p>\n

The cold only pressed down harder and it became harder to breathe.\u00a0 Her vision dimmed until she didn\u2019t see Matt\u2019s face or the sky or anything else, only darkness.\u00a0 Her throat felt like it was constricting, as if ice-cold fingers had wrapped around her neck, talons digging into her veins.<\/p>\n

Fight this.\u00a0 You have to fight this.<\/em><\/p>\n

It was just so hard<\/em>.\u00a0 A chill like ice crept through her, spreading from her neck through the rest of her body, as if she was being slowly encased in ice.\u00a0 Perhaps she was, despite it being the height of summer.\u00a0 She couldn\u2019t feel Matt\u2019s hand around hers anymore\u2014couldn\u2019t feel him at all.<\/p>\n

It was only another heartbeat before the shadows that had encroached on her mind swallowed her whole.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[This post is from Hecate’s point of view.] Matt\u2019s gaze darted upward, toward the invisible curve of his sister\u2019s wards, eyes moving as he sought their shadows against the stormclouds.\u00a0 When his breath hitched for a second, she knew he\u2019d … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[240,293,14],"tags":[150,171,170,194,181,149,148,168,147,165,146],"class_list":["post-3655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book-6","category-chapter-41-book-6","category-story","tag-awakenings","tag-fantasy","tag-fiction","tag-hecate","tag-matthew-astoris","tag-original-fiction","tag-post-apocalyptic","tag-serial","tag-serial-fiction","tag-story","tag-web-fiction"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1EBlN-WX","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3655"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3655\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3656,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3655\/revisions\/3656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}