"Like what?" He asked, smiling broadly at me.
And just like that I was lost. I filled him in on everything he had missed while he was gone, including the escalation my gifts had taken. I told him how I had faced my fear of bugs and saved our friends in the process. I gave him all the gory details of John's attack by the bear and how I had been able to redirect her. I talked non-stop, telling him every last detail.
"Wow, you're like Wonder Woman," He said, awestruck.
"No, I'm not. Everyone keeps saying I am, but I'm still myself. I just have new clarity. It's like how they say if we could tap into more parts of our brain, we could accomplish so much more. I guess as an Ascended, I'm able to use all my brain, no matter how small it is," I said making a joke of the situation. “Besides, my new powers aren’t doing me a whole lot of good at the moment, are they?”
He chuckled at my words. "You've been hanging out with Shawn too much, that's something he would say."
I smiled and was about to respond when the door opened at the far end of the room. Startled, I surged to my feet as Sam and Shawn were dragged into the room by four huge Daemons. I rushed to their sides as the Daemons unceremoniously deposited them on the floor and slammed the door behind them.
"Shawn what happened?" I asked my brother, shocked by the dazed look on his face.
"I don't know. They dragged us off from that hallway and when I woke up, the other Links were gone, and Sam was still unconscious. I think those bastards hit her too hard. She was bleeding from her nose and mouth. I tried to clean her up," he said, rolling Sam over onto her back.
I gasped when I saw Sam's blood-soaked face.
"I tried mopping it up, but I only had my hoodie to work with," he said, indicating his saturated jacket that was riddled with holes.
"What happened to your jacket?" I asked as I hurried to the sink on the opposite side of the room from where Mark was being held.
"Those Daemon-Asses have fiery touches is what happened," he reminded me as I mopped up Sam's face with a wet cloth.
"They do," Mark said from obvious personal experience.
Shawn whipped around, startled at Mark's voice.
I watched as conflicting emotions passed over my brother’s face. He went from looking hurt to confusion and finally anger.
"What are you doing here?" he barked, looking at me to gauge my reaction to Mark's close proximity.
"He can explain," I said to my irate brother as I continued to mop up Sam's face. "But you're going to have to wait for that explanation because I think Sam is hurt worse than we thought."
Shawn pivoted back around to face me in one fluid movement, completely forgetting about Mark. "Why? What's wrong with her?" He all but yelled in my face.
"Hey watch it," Mark said, stepping as close to the barricade as feasible.
I glanced over and saw that he was fuming at the tone of voice Shawn was using with me. My pulse fluttered as I looked into his eyes and saw his emotions clearly reflecting in them. I was instantly flooded with the countless memories we shared.
"Krista," Shawn pleaded, jerking me away from my walk down memory lane.
"Because, she's bleeding from her nose and ears," I said, tilting Sam's head to the side so he could see the small trickle of blood that had pooled on the elaborate Oriental rug. "Plus, her pulse feels really weak. I'm not sure what they hit her with but they did a lot of damage."
"It wasn't the Daemons, it was Harmony," Mark said quietly.
"What do you mean? Who the Hell is Harmony?"
"My sister," Mark said heavily, as he sat on the only chair in his makeshift jail. "She's a Descended, which means she has all the power Krista does, but she also has The Dark One in her corner. She can control the emotions of multiple subjects around her, just like you can Krista," he continued bitterly. "Of course she uses her gifts to get in your head, to control your mind. I'm guessing that while you were knocked unconscious, she was tearing into Sam's brain."
"How do you know that?" Shawn demanded, still not ready to believe anything Mark uttered.
"Because, I've seen her do it too many times to count over the last few months. My father convinced her to break her link, that’s how she became a Descended. Now she controls Mason’s mind to be her lackey. She uses just enough mind control to keep him docile. I don’t even know if he even realizes they’re no longer linked."
"Okay, so how do we help Sam," Shawn asked.
"I don't know if you can. I'm guessing by the fact that she’s bleeding from her ears that her brain is swelling. If she doesn't get medical attention soon, her brain will most likely bleed out. I'm sorry man," he said once again, bowing his head in defeat.
"That's not true Krista, you can save her. You have like superhero healing abilities," he said, pleading with me.