Muted colours bloomed into vibrancy, affording me a pulsing head-ache as I adjusted back into my present reality. Ryder was still only inches away: his face torn into confusion. We were sitting as we had been just before I'd been yanked into the future - as if everything was the same.
It could never be the same.
"We have to go," I said tautly, refusing to let myself break down. I was a tightly wound ticking time bomb and I could not afford to explode. In the darkest recesses of my futures, I allowed myself the freedom of expression: the acidic tang of vomit, the garbled cries - I let myself feel it, because no one would ever see.
Reality was different. I launched myself to my feet, darting around my room like a hurricane. My body completed the task that my mind was too frantic to do. Through this, I watched Ryder just observe me from the bed, as if I were a curiosity, or perhaps better worded - a puzzle.
"Kat," he muttered, one hand reaching out for me. I didn't know why - an outstretched hand would not dispel my dreams, would not stop the whirlwind that had been set in motion. But he didn't know.
No one knew what it was like. To be taken from your world and shoved into another. To watch monstrosities play out before you and know you had no real role in ever stopping them. To understand that there were simply too many dark things in the world - and there was nothing you could ever do to change that.
Everyone was so simple and so blind.
I'd wished for blindness every day of my life.
"Don't call me that," I dismissed him curtly. His slowness of mind and his weakness of spirit wouldn't aid me now. Maybe the moment we'd shared would have helped us bond, helped us become better partners. But I needed to find Tatianya, and Stellaire couldn't do a damn thing to help, especially not in his condition.
"Why are you like this?" he questioned me, the words ever so slightly slurred in their delivery.
I paused for one solitary second, only affording Stellaire that small window of time. "Because I have to be."
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Tatianya lived only a couple of blocks away, and I could only hope I was catching her before the future took hold. My breath was harsh and ragged as I ran the way, the mirage of blue and gold whipping past me and creating an endless stream of colour in my peripheral vision.
When I finally rounded the corner to her street, I was a heaving mess - I'd pushed myself too fast and too hard. I didn't care. I strode up to her door, marching past the perfectly manicured garden of red cressiya flowers and not sparing a glance for a couple of neighbours that appeared threatened at my intrusion to their perfect, little lives.
A cheerful sun-carved glass door greeted me and I cursed in disgust as the door did not yield before me. Another barrier. I raised my fist and thumped on the door, relishing each heavy sound that brought me closer to finding her - to ensuring that the horrific had not happened.
It couldn't have happened.
Footsteps greeted my ear: light, hopeful and painfully slow. I thumped on the door for good measure, hoping that would hasten their pace - and then again, just in case -
"Katarina." The word was icy-cold and painfully precise. A red-haired tall, elegant woman greeted me, her lips pursed in distaste at my unexpected entry into her day. I nodded sharply at her, then shouldered past her, ignoring her unnecessary and wholly unexpected complaint. Though she stalked after me, her high heels clicking against the marble, I simply upped my pace and took the stairs three a time.
YOU ARE READING
Legacy
Romance"There's a war going on, Katarina," he hissed into my ear. "Remember which side you're on. And know that neither is the right one." This world was built on power, lies and corruption. Our hands were always stained with blood. Our eyes were windows t...
