Jane |18+| ✔️

46. The time I ventured into the depths of Hell

Jane

I can't remember the last time I've slept—truly slept. Slept so profoundly that I felt weightless, floating in a bottomless pit of nothingness. This is how I feel right now—until the faintest sound and scent tinkles a deep-seated sensation, slowly awakening you back to reality... only that is not where I am when I wake.

Instantly, I scent him before my vision becomes focused, and the unrelenting heat and ominous atmosphere become hauntingly apparent. My feet crunch along the scorched ground, stinging the underpads of my soles with burning blisters—yet I carry on, knowing I'm lost within Silas's mind.

"Jane!" the bellow is gut-wrenchingly weak as I spin on my heel and begin to sprint across the black-crusted ground riddled with ponds of fire and puddles of bubbling lava while screams of terror taunt my entire being. The sky is bloodred, illuminating the steam-filled pockets and beastly shadows lurking behind crumbled natural volcanic rock formations. Not a dilapidated building or anything living lies within this realm—only death: the eerie, irate ambiance reeks of it.

"Silas?" I scream, but my voice is mute to my ears. I have no voice. My hand grips my throat only to slide with insurmountable beads of perspiration. "Silas!" I try again, but nothing comes forth, only to be overshadowed by mocking laughter. My eyes dart around, panicked and terrified I won't be able to find him in time as my body shakes with despair—despair that is his alone. "Silas," I silently cry before sniffing my emotion back and plunging forward.

"Jane!" the call comes again, sending me in another direction. The blow to the back of my head has me reaching for it before my ankles and wrists are squeezed so tightly that I'm whimpering with a bout of immense agony. Oh, God! The ripping of my flesh has the feeling of a million knives puncturing my body in every conceivable place, hindering my movements as I pull and pinch my limbs, only to find them soaked with sweat and nothing else. Silas.

Urging myself not to give up, I climb a crest of boulders, burning the palms of my hands and pads of my feet as I slip into a bubbling pit of lava. My soundless screams fill the air, only to be dampened with the taste of blood and trails of crimson tears to flood and pour from my eyes.

I won't give up. I won't.

Shoving my body forward, I pull myself out of the globule lava, constantly reminding myself that this isn't real. None of this is real. It's a product of what my mate thinks will come in his afterlife—not on my watch. Never. His kin and mine have always been the beneficiaries due to his selflessness. He's not an oppressor like many others in his shoes—he's a saviour. My saviour... and now I will become his.

With that mental slap of self-encouragement, I grit my now blood-stained teeth, pulling on every ounce of strength I own and crest the top of the rocky perch, spotting the hoard of demonic beings surrounding the Alpha, who is being eaten alive far in the distance.

Closing my eyes, I force my mind to settle, deeply inhaling before I find myself crotching next to him. I'm in control. I came to him—it's how our in-mind meetings work. Silas typically alters our dreams, time, and engaging events—and vice versa if it's his manipulated memory.

I came to him, leaving me in control.

My eyes drip with thick, bloody tears as I see him suffering, feeling everything he's enduring. Looking at bulging veins down to his clenched hand, I feed it with mine, alighting a bazillion sparks to rush through us both. "Jane." The furrow of his brows and the hint of a smile on his bloodied lips reveal not only relief but strength as the black vine retreats and the many horrid faces feasting on his body meet my eyes. Immediately, the pain lessens, and the imaginary grips on my wrists and ankles lift as I miraculously and effortlessly pull Silas to his feet.