All at once.Stars.
I hitch my breath, struggling to regain control of anything.
Heat thunders from the centre of my chest, and that calm well of water now rages like a torrent and the control I had grasped spirals.
Explodes.
“Ten,”I shout in my mind.
That’s all I can think. All I can focus on. He’s everywhere in my mind like he’s invaded, and I can’t escape.
The vision we’d shared dissolves in my mind, and a waterfall takes its place, lush with green foliage, trickles of water pouring down multiple paths through a gloomy rock, all shrouded in mist.
It’s beautiful in the ruggedness of it. How wild it looks.
And I’m breathless.
The waterfall explodes, replaced with a night sky dancing with stars. Pretty and vast. So vast, I feel lost. Alone. Singular in the world. But I can feel Ten. He stands next to me.
No, not standing. I’m lying down. Staring up at the sky.
“Ten?” I ask.
“Right here.”I hear it in my mind. In the vision.
It turns cold. The ground is chilling beneath me. The stars fade as I keep looking up. More snow above me, and great craggy rock faces lean over me. Then pain.
My pain.
In my body—my head, my chest. Ripping through me, tearing me apart. Raw and visceral. Aching, throbbing pain.
“No. No. No.”
Ten’s shouts echo inside my mind, ringing, distant.
I clutch my chest, the centre of where the pain emanates from.
Ten let’s go, dropping both his hands from me and our connection, and the vision vanishes.
I’m left gasping… reaching for… He’s already putting space between us as I open my eyes, and there’s a stricken look on his face enough to dredge all my fear to the surface.
“What happened? Ten?” Kamari asks as I keep my eyes on his, studying for any clue or explanation.
Ten steadies himself, leaning down on his knees for a few beats. He shakes his head before answering. “I think the visions I’ve seen and what we just experienced are the past and the future. Or at least possible futures.” His words trigger what the Maker told me. She said I would see possibilities.
“I was hurt,” I say, convinced that was what happened. And I know he saw everything that I felt. He was there with me.
We were in a place in time in the future where I was gravely injured, staring up at the sky, Ten by my side.
“Okay. Have you two had a third join?” Kamari asks, her eyes lingering on me, studying me.
“Ravi. He tried to break our connection, I think.” Ten’s voice is hollow.
“And what happened?”
“Darkness,” I answer, remembering that wave of blackness blocking everything out. Like I’d been plunged into something so cold and vast I couldn’t escape.
“Aten, we’re going to go over everything you’ve seen since you and Ever have connected. I want every image, every colour, every detail. But I agree with your conclusion. He’s right, isn’t he?” she asks.
