{"id":4437,"date":"2020-10-05T19:18:02","date_gmt":"2020-10-05T23:18:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/?p=4437"},"modified":"2020-10-05T19:18:02","modified_gmt":"2020-10-05T23:18:02","slug":"twelve-04-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/?p=4437","title":{"rendered":"Twelve – 04"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

She stared at the village for what felt like a long time, trying to wrestle her stomach back into behaving, trying to breathe, trying not to cry.\u00a0 It was as if something large and heavy had come crashing down on her all at once, something she had no hope of shoving away or stopping.<\/p>\n

Swallowing the bile that crept higher, she turned away again, staring off into the ravine and at the bridge, at the play of afternoon sun and shadows on the old pavement.\u00a0 This place was her whole world\u2014she\u2019d never been anywhere else, never further from it than maybe ten miles.\u00a0 While her friends might have dreamed of leaving someday, that just wasn\u2019t her.<\/p>\n

This was home, and no matter how exciting what she read about it books might have been, this was where she belonged.\u00a0 She was sure of it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m sorry.\u201d<\/p>\n

She flinched at the sound of her cousin\u2019s voice, squeezing her eyes shut against the tears that threatened anew.\u00a0 Kailey shook her head hard, not daring to meet Lin\u2019s gaze\u2014not yet.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s fine,\u201d she bit out.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not nothing,\u201d Lin said as he stopped to stand alongside her.\u00a0 \u201cWe both know that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s fine,\u201d she repeated.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut it\u2019s not.\u201d<\/p>\n

She wanted to be angry, wanted to yell at him, to scream at him, to lie again and say that everything was fine, that he didn\u2019t need to worry.\u00a0 The words died like ashes on her tongue.<\/p>\n

Kailey bowed her head.\u00a0 \u201cWhen did you figure it out?\u00a0 How?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI had a dream,\u201d he murmured.\u00a0 \u201cThat\u2019s all.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s never just a dream with you,\u201d she whispered.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo,\u201d he agreed softly.\u00a0 \u201cI guess not.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[This post is from Kailey Astoris’s point of view.] She stared at the village for what felt like a long time, trying to wrestle her stomach back into behaving, trying to breathe, trying not to cry.\u00a0 It was as if … 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":[336,337,356,14],"tags":[150,171,170,345,149,148,168,147,165,200,146],"class_list":["post-4437","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ambrose-cycle","category-book-8","category-chapter-12-book-8","category-story","tag-awakenings","tag-fantasy","tag-fiction","tag-kailey-astoris","tag-original-fiction","tag-post-apocalyptic","tag-serial","tag-serial-fiction","tag-story","tag-thomas-merlin-ambrose","tag-web-fiction"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1EBlN-19z","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4437","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=4437"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4437\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4438,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4437\/revisions\/4438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}