Author: Shannon Messenger

“I removed the barrier locking them away. I’m not exactly sure when and how they’ll return, but they’ll all resurface.”

“Any in particular I should worry about?”

She hesitates before she answers. “You . . . have a lot of pain in your past.”

“I can handle pain.”

“I hope so.” Her hands tug at the buttons of her coat and she swallows a few times. “There’s something you should know. About the day your parents died. About what happened to them.”

My stomach tightens and my mind flashes to the gnarled tree I dreamed about a few nights ago. Coated in blood.

Does Audra have something to do with my parents’ death?

Will it matter if she did?

My heart launches into overtime as her lips part, ready to spill the secret she’s been hiding so long.

What if it’s something I can’t forgive?

She closes her eyes and I hold my breath.

Everything hangs on her next words—and I’m not sure I’m ready to hear them.

CHAPTER 40

AUDRA

This is it. Time to strip away the layers and lies I’ve piled on top of my secret shame and show Vane the dark, ugly truth.

If only I can find the words.

I feel like my voice has dropped away, fallen into the pit of my stomach and tangled with the sourness filling me. If I try to drag it back up, it will reduce me to a crumbled, heaving mess.

I focus on the morning sun on my skin. The breezes in the air.

Calm. I need to stay calm.

All I have to do is say it: It was my fault.

Four simple words that have been the sum total of my existence for the last ten years. They flash before my eyes, making the world blur. Or maybe that’s my tears.

Just say it.

Maybe he’ll hate me.

I deserve it. But I don’t know if I’ll survive it.

I may be brave in training or in battle—but I’m a coward. I can’t tell the truth to Vane Weston. Especially to Vane Weston.

Which is absurd. I already made my confession when I was seven.

Back then he just held me tighter and soaked my shoulder with his tears.

Will he react the same way today?

Or will he do what I deserve? Shove me away for betraying him? Destroying him?

Does it even matter?

Vane didn’t have the fourth breakthrough—and I refuse to try again. His mind is too fragile, too overwhelmed by all I’ve put it through. The winds could push him too deep again. Or pull him away. Either way, I can’t chance it. Won’t chance it. Vane is too important.

To the Gales.

To our world.

To me—though I shouldn’t let him be.

So if I only have a few days before I sacrifice myself, is it too much to hope that his memory of my confession doesn’t resurface until after I’m gone? That I leave this world knowing Vane Weston cares?

It’s the most abhorrent, selfish desire I’ve ever indulged. But staring down my death makes me allow it.

I force myself to meet his eyes. “You . . . need to know that you watched your mother die.”

His mouth forms several different words before he speaks. “Why are you telling me that?”

“Because I don’t want you to stumble blindly into the dream.”

“It was a tree, wasn’t it?” he whispers.

I shudder, remembering the way the tree shifted in the sky, aiming right for her heart. The crack of bone and branch mixed with the screams and the wailing wind. “Did you—?”

“Not yet. But I dreamed about a bloody tree floating through a storm. I figured . . .”

The silence that follows feels like a vacuum, expanding, closing off the world as Vane stares at the horizon, watching the white lines of waves streak toward the shore. An unstoppable force. Like the storm heading our way. Bearing down. Ready to crash any day.

“Was that really what you were going to tell me?” he asks.

My heart plummets, but I straighten up to sell the lie. “Of course. Why?”

“No reason.” He turns on his phone. “We should probably get on the road. It’s ten a.m. I’m sure my mom is freaking out.” His phone beeps. “Yep. Three voice mails.”

“Wow, she’s really worried about you.”

“I’m sure she’s planning different ways to murder me. As soon as she finds out I’m okay, of course.”

“That’s because she loves you.” I don’t mean to sound bitter, but I do.

Vane scoots closer, resting a hand on my knee. “Your mother loves you.”

She used to—I think. But not anymore.

I shrug my sadness away.

It doesn’t matter.

Nothing matters anymore.

So I don’t hesitate to take his hand when he offers it this time—and I don’t try to pull away as we walk to his car.

Maybe it’s everything I’ve been through. Maybe it’s knowing my days are numbered. Or maybe I’m finally giving in.

Whatever it is, I’m just along for the ride. For as long as I have left.

CHAPTER 41

VANE

Winds sing through the open windows as we streak down the freeway and I watch Audra from the corner of my eye. The motion lulled her to sleep, and it’s strange to see her so peaceful. The hard line of her jaw softened, turning her lips into a perfect heart.

Fantasies of kissing her flash through my mind, but I shove them away. Because I see something deeper, too. Something that forms a lump in my throat.

She’s giving up.

We didn’t talk about the whole me not having the fourth breakthrough thing—but we both know what it means. I won’t be strong enough.

I’m not sure what I’ll do with my power if I find it—if I can fight. Destroy. Kill.

But I’d kinda hoped that if I just found a way to understand the Westerlies, they’d have the answer.

I lean my head toward the open window and concentrate on the gusts I still can’t translate.

“If I’m really part of you,” I whisper, “tell me how to save her. How to save us.”

No answer.

I’m officially losing it. What do I expect? Some magical voice to whisper the perfect solution?

I need a plan.

The white lines on the freeway blur into streaks as I think harder than I’ve ever thought before. The brain’s a muscle, right? Maybe I just need to push it.

Fifteen minutes later all I have is a wicked headache.

I’m insanely grateful Audra slept through that little experiment. I probably looked constipated.

But there has to be a solution.

Has. To. Be.

I could always knock her out.

There’s no way I could ever bring myself to hurt her—but it’s too bad there’s no other way to make that happen. She can’t sacrifice herself if she’s unconscious.

“You look like you’re going to burst a vein in your forehead,” Audra says, making me jump. “What are you thinking about?”

It’s a strange question coming from her. She’s rarely curious about me. So I decide to be honest. “I don’t want you to sacrifice yourself for me.”

She sighs. “We’ve been over this.”

“Yeah, and I keep waiting for you to stop acting crazy. Face the facts, Audra. I may never have the fourth breakthrough. So everyone needs to stop hanging their hopes on me like I’m the miracle they’ve all been praying for.”

“You’re the last Westerly, Vane. Breakthrough or no breakthrough doesn’t change that.”

“Pretty sure it does.”

“No, it doesn’t. Right now you’re an unknown variable. Raiden doesn’t know how powerful you truly are. And as long as he doesn’t, we can use that. Keep him worried and distracted, waiting to see what you can do.”

“Great, so you’ll give up your life to save a pawn.”

“Not a pawn. A weapon.”

Ice slices through my veins at the word. “I don’t want to be a weapon.”

“I know.” I can barely hear her soft whisper over the wind. Not that I have any idea what to do with it.

We drive in silence as my car crests the mountains, and the San Gorgonio Pass Wind Farm comes into view. The gleaming windmills line the hills, stark white against the bright blue sky, their blades pumping from the force of the swirling winds.

In a few miles we’ll be home.

I’m not ready to go back to reality. Not with so few days left until the Stormers arrive. Not with parents who will demand answers I don’t have. Not without figuring out how to save Audra.

Golden arches appear on the horizon at the same moment her stomach rumbles.

Inspiration strikes.

I change lanes, heading toward the off-ramp.

If I can get her to live her life for herself in small ways and see how awesome it is, maybe that will convince her not to sacrifice herself.

“Where are we going?” Audra asks.

“We’re stopping for lunch.”

CHAPTER 42

AUDRA

The heavy scent of grease and salt clings to the inside of Vane’s car, practically suffocating me. The late-morning sun hammers through the glass, but Vane keeps the windows closed tight, trapping me with the smell.

Sharp pains sear my stomach but I ignore them. Much like I ignore the soggy bag of untouched food he set on the dashboard in front of me. Or the seething Vane next to me, taking his frustration out on his poor, shredded hamburger.

“You won’t even try a bite?” he asks again. He holds out a French fry to tempt me.

My mouth fills with saliva, but I shake my head and swallow, hating the sloshy thud I feel in my gut as I do.

Honestly, I don’t know why he seems so surprised. This isn’t exactly a new development.

“You want to eat,” he says when my stomach growls. “You’re just too stubborn to admit it.”

I can’t disagree with that. So I take a page from the Vane book of arguing and simply shrug.

He doesn’t seem to like that, tossing the fry back into the bag with extra force. “You’re starving yourself so you can be strong a few months from now—when you probably won’t even need to be. Do you see the insanity there?”

My stomach growls again and I clamp my arms around my waist, trying to wring out the sound. The hollowness in my gut feels like it’s swallowing me whole.

Vane snorts. “So what’d you do?”

“What?”

“You live in a piece of crap burned-down house in the middle of the freaking desert. You barely sleep. You aren’t allowed to eat or drink. It’s like someone’s trying to punish you.”

“No one is punishing me. I chose this life for myself because it’s what I wanted.”

It is, I remind myself. And it’s what my father asked me to do.

“Then why do you want to punish yourself?”

Silence sits between us. An ugly, awkward thing I can practically feel staring at me. But I have no way to break it.

Vane grabs my hand again. His touch is soft, gentle—but firm, too. He isn’t going to let me pull away.

“Why do you live like your life doesn’t matter? You do matter. You matter to me—and not because you’re this fierce warrior thing who’s going to sacrifice yourself to save me. You matter because you’re you.”

He mumbles the last words, like he’s embarrassed to say them.

I’ve been trying not to look at him, trying to keep this moment under control. But my head seems to turn on its own, and my eyes pull to his.

“You’re the one constant thing I’ve had in my life. I lost my entire past—except you. You stayed with me. And kept coming back, every time I closed my eyes.” His cheeks look flushed and he shifts in his seat. “I looked forward to seeing that girl with the long, dark hair whipping around her face. I looked forward to you. The real you. Not this buttoned-up soldier girl you pretend to be.”