Flashes of light popped into my vision, even behind my closed eyelids. I parted my lips on a sigh when the thunder rumbled louder. As if the thunderstorm knew what was happening, the soft, wet snowflakes came down faster.
My chest tightened as excitement coursed through me. My heart raced faster, and I tipped my lips into a soft smile. Every nerve ending was on fire and so sensitive because something big was about to happen. I could feel it deep in my bones.
Whatever message meant for me was there; I just had to listen to what they had to say. It had to be urgent because of the pitch of the whispers’ voices.
I tilted my head farther, hoping to make them out. Bunching my eyebrows together, I parted my lips as some words came through the busy frequency.
“Beware of them...”
A chill ran down my spine, and I sucked in a sharp breath.
It wasn’t just one person. It was a group I needed to be aware of.
This wasn’t good.
Was it the people who were after me?
That couldn’t be right because the warning came off more personal somehow. Not a general group of people, but smaller and private. Probably close to me?
I listened harder, hoping to make out anything that would follow the warning.
Thunder roared at the same time as lightning crackled and hit somewhere close. I felt the vibrations of the strike under my feet, rattling through me and the teeth in my skull. The little hairs on my arms and neck stood on end from the static of the lightning.
I still didn’t open my eyes to see what was going on. Instead, I listened with chills sweeping through me.
“Isa!”someone roared. It sounded far away. Like it was nothing but a whisper in the wind.
“Shadows... stay away... shadows...”a whisper said.
Another strike of lightning and roaring thunder shook the ground beneath my feet.
“Open your fucking eyes!”the same person yelled, sounding a little closer.
I couldn’t open my eyes.
And even if I could, I didn’t want to.
I wanted to know who the whispers were talking about.
I needed to listen harder...
“A wolf... disguised... man...”
My breath hitched from the word wolf.
Did they mean the king with the wolf crest from the battle I had dreamed about so many times?
Warmth spread through my body, feeling like someone had lit a fire inside me. My flesh tingled with the sudden heat, but my head was still fuzzy and full of the need to listen. Heat seared my jaw and cheeks with tingles at the sudden onslaught from numb to fire hot.
“Come back to me, Isa! You’re getting lost in the storm!”The person sounded so close and yet so far away.
“He watches... he waits... she... shadows...”
Electricity zapped in the air before thunder boomed following the lightning strike I saw behind my closed eyelids. It reverberated through me, rattling my teeth. It had to have struck close to me. I swear it could’ve been right beside me with how deafening it was.
She? Shadows? Who was she, and was she—
Warm, full lips smashed onto mine, breaking my concentration while listening to the messages. My body came to life like I was free-falling from space to earth in the span of a heartbeat. My fuzzy head cleared, and my stomach dropped like I was barreling down the first hill on a rollercoaster.
