But then she stopped, because she could only gape at the magnificence spread out in front of her. The ocean. Her mind struggled to comprehend something so vast when her world had been whittled down to darkness since birth. The great body of water roiled and pitched, bubbling foam riding on its edges, the whole of it stretching toward the horizon.
“This color must be blue,” she breathed, because she’d read descriptions of the ocean and knew. Knew the creatures that hovered over its beauty were birds. The wealth of the sight sprung tears to her eyes and she lay down sideways, curling her knees to her chest, struggling to breath.
Hadrian laughed and snapped his fingers again.
Chapter 20
Tucker voiced cracked under the strain of shouting Mary’s name.
How long had she been out?
Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ.
He shook her still form where he’d laid her in the grass, his hands planted on either side of her head ripping out fistfuls of earth, the blood vessels straining behind his eyes and on the verge of rupturing. She’s so limp. Why is she so limp?
“Mary! Wake up!”
Oh God, had he taken too much of her blood earlier? Is that what was wrong?
If he’d done something to cause this, he would never forgive himself.
What if her fae blood was driving him mad? Didn’t Jonas warn him about this? When there were no ill effects after drinking from her twice, he thought the king had exaggerated. He could have been wrong, though. Maybe he was hallucinating and Mary was fine?
Please let that be the case. Please let her be fine.
For now, he had to trust what he could see. What was right in front of him.
His vision reminded him of a video game. Bursts of speed and sound, followed by nothing but the intense rapping of his heartbeat. The world didn’t look natural. Just fits of color and undiluted terror.
“What can I do, son?”
That was his father’s anxious voice, but he didn’t have the wherewithal to respond. Couldn’t think of or see anything but his mate’s lifeless body in front of him. Could only replay the moment she’d slumped forward onto the wheel over and over until he was physically ill.
“Honey,” he said through his stiff lips, his hands roving over her body to find the invisible injury. “Come on. Come on. What’s wrong?”
There was only one person he could think of that had an encyclopedic brain when it came to underworld lore. Jonas. As soon as the thought occurred to him, he ripped the phone out of his pocket and tossed it at his father’s feet.
“Call Jonas. Tell him what’s going on.”
Having his father call the vampire king would get him into trouble. By showing up in Buckhannon, he’d exposed their kind to his father. A human. None of that mattered right now, though. If something serious was wrong with Mary, he wouldn’t live long enough to see the consequences anyway. Maybe he should have made the phone call himself, but he physically couldn’t remove focus from his mate for as long as it took to dial.
His father knelt down beside him and engaged the call—
Mary’s eyes opened.
They were full of tears.
But Tucker was so fucking relieved to have her conscious, he draped himself over her body and whispered fervent prayers, one tripping over the next.
“Oh my God, it’s so beautiful,” she whispered, her voice sounding odd.
Tucker lifted his head to find Mary’s eyes fixed on the sky above. It wasn’t unusual to not have her look at him directly, but there was something different about her expression, though, the gravity in her eyes.
She was seeing something.
Seeing.
“Mary…”
“It’s even better than the ocean, I…” Her breath caught, so much happiness and wonder on her face, he couldn’t look away. “This is only one city? It’s so large. And there are so many people. Are those children?”
The last word turned into a sob, her hand lifting to cover her mouth.
Wherever Mary was seeing these things, it wasn’t here in the pitch-black field. She was as far away as her voice sounded and there was only one person who could show her these things. The ocean, cities. A sorcerer, rather. The one who’d promised her sight. Hadrian.
Was he delivering on his promise to her early?
Was she with him inside of her head?
Was he showing her what she had to look forward to?
Tucker fell back in the grass, his heart missing several beats in his chest. His head shrank around his skull, throbbing, sending pain shooting to his eye sockets, his teeth.
Never had a greater conflict been waged in a being, human or vampire.
His greatest wish was to see Mary happy and the sight of it gave him a sense of completion. Yet knowing it came from someone else was his life’s greatest agony.
Walk away.
Look how happy she is. Look how happy he can make her.