Chapter 168
RYKER’S PO.V
The guards made to grab her but I stopped them. I didn’t know why I did that, it just seemed right as I took off after her. I didn’t know how she knew where to go but she was expertly weaving through the intricate halls as if she had lived here all her life. I followed
Susu her, not wanting to interrupt whatever was
happening but also wanting to keep a close eye on things.
She finally stopped in front of the door to our room and ran her hands down the wood. “This is it, this is the one I saw,” she turned to me. “I need you to brace yourself.”
“What the f uck is going on?” I asked but she said nothing as she pushed the door open.
Everything looked normal, at least until I realized that Camilla wasn’t in bed. I’ muttered a curse immediately thinking of the worst. Did someone grab her? Did she leave somewhere without telling me? Was she hurt? I was so lost in my thoughts that I didn’t realize her scent was still in the room. It wasn’t until Lyla walked over to the other side of the bed and cursed that it dawned on me. I rushed
over to see what she had found and my entire world came to a screeching halt as I took in Camilla.
She was lying on the ground with crusted blood coming out of her nose. She was still in her clothes from yesterday meaning this happened at night. I felt like a failure for not realizing something was wrong earlier. I pushed past Lyla and picked her up slowly. She was breathing but barely and she was cold to touch. I lay her on the bed unsure of what to do next.
“Camilla, can you hear me?” I asked but I got no response and I cursed.
I didn’t know what happened so I didn’t know what to do. The first thing I did was clean up the crusted blood from her nose and check for any signs of a head injury or something that could have made her bleed but there was none. She was fine, her breathing had evened out now that she was in bed but she wouldn’t wake. Her skin was still a bit cold to touch but that was the extent of it.
I became aware of Lyla’s presence again when she moved to stand next to me and in a second, I had her pinned to the wall by her throat. “How did you know she was lying here like that?”
“I’m a seer remember,” she didn’t look panicked despite the fact that I held her life in my hands and could snap her neck at any second. “I know you’re panicking but let me help her, please. I saw it for a reason, I am here to help, I won’t cause you any trouble.”
“How do I know that I can trust you?”
before,” she reminded me. “If I wanted to hurt you both, I would have done It my roof and helpless. Why would I wait to do it now?”
“Because I helped your do then when you were under
She had a point whether I wanted to admit it or not. I released her and her hands. immediately flew to her throat. She didn’t look upset with me, merely annoyed and uncomfortable. She straightened up and dusted invisible lint off her clothes. I turned to Juan who was still standing by the door. He had followed me earlier but he made no move to walk into the room. He raised a brow in my direction silently asking if I was okay and I shrugged. I wouldn’t be okay until Camilla was fine.
She had been lying here helpless for the entire night and I didn’t even notice. She could have been hurt more, she could have died, she could have been taken and I would have never known. I was so busy with my own thoughts that I didn’t realize what was happening to my own mate. It was so confusing that the mate bond didn’t recognize or alert me to the fact that she was hurt. It was normal for me to feel her every emotion and whenever she was in pain so it didn’t make sense that I couldn’t even figure out that she was lying unconscious.
“It isn’t physical,” Lyla said suddenly making me turn to her. “I can’t read your mind, it is just obvious what you were thinking and the answer is because what happened to her wasn’t physical. It is more like a tear on the inside.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I tried to warn you before. I said there were numerous paths to the future and I couldn’t say anything then so as not to solidify them and make them happen but this was one of them. Her powers are fragile at best and explosive at worst, you think she has the powers to heal but she doesn’t, what she holds is far greater than that and with great responsibility comes great sacrifice. It is all about the balance of the world. She cannot hold such power and not pay the consequences for it.”
“You’re speaking in riddles,” I cut her off. “if you have something to say then say it directly. I have no time for all this rubbish. Tell me what is wrong with her and how to fix it?”
“There is nothing you can do to fix this, she needs time to heal and special attention. I will prepare a poultice. I am not the best at potions but I know how to do this. She will be fine before tomorrow. She will wake but you need to be very careful. The person you are fighting against isn’t one to be trifled with. I haven’t seen them yet but I can sense their power. You are walking into something you don’t even understand.”
“Then help me understand, walked over to her and grabbed her shoulders. “Tell me what it is that I need to know in order to keep my mate safe.”
“Camilla doesn’t hold the power to heal, she holds the power of life. The very essence of it seeps into her soul and her spirit. That is why it manifested in her blood all those months ago,” my jaw went slack. Of all the things I thought she would say, this wasn’t one of them. “When the vampires came to be, it was as a result of trifling with death. The first turned became the embodiment of death because he had lost his soul. To combat that, the goddess gave her the gift of life, now that the vampires are gone, she needs to balance it out.”
“Life is a powerful thing and if she controls it, that makes her equally powerful. To balance it out, she made the powers come with a price. For each person she heals, she takes something out of herself, a chunk of her own life force you could say. I cannot see how many she has healed in the past but those were experiments. In those cases, she wasn’t giving the life, it was being taken from her. She healed someone yesterday, did she not?”
I nodded slowly at her words unsure of where she was going with it. “That was my sister.”
“Well, when she deliberately healed your sister, she was willingly giving life and it came with a price. It is the same way when the vampire willingly gave life back to his lover, it took something out of him. If she continues to heal people, she will reach a point where she exerts herself and she loses her entire soul.”
After her cryptic and almost terrifying words, she went with Christine to get some herbs from the forest. I made sure they had some guards with them and I sat in the room with Camilla. She was still sleeping peacefully, from just looking at her there was no way you would have realized that she was trying to recuperate from the missing part of her soul. The entire thing was bizarre and insane. I couldn’t understand why the goddess would do something like this. Wouldn’t it have been more worth it to just take the powers away?
“Ryker?” Riley’s voice pulled me out of my thoughts and I turned to her. She was leaning against the wall for support and I cursed when I realized she was one wrong move away from falling over. I immediately grabbed her and led her to the chair. She sank against it with relief and I frowned at her.
Rile
“What are you doing here? You should be resting. Don’t you realize that?” I asked but she said nothing. for f ucks sake, I love you
but you need to go back. If you don’t want to be in the physician’s quarters anymore then I can have you moved to another room but you need to rest.”
“Is this my fault?” she asked quietly and I stilled. “I overheard Juan and Christine while I was still in the physician quarters. They said something about Camilla being hurt because she healed me. I thought it was a joke because you had said she was fine. I knew I needed to come here and find out. Is it true?”
I stayed silent not knowing how to respond to her. I always prided myself in being able to tell the truth no matte the situation but this was one of those times where it seemed like a lie would be a better option. It wasn’t her fault, but there was no denying that it happened because she healed Riley. If anything, it was my fault, I allowed Riley leave putting her within firing range of whoever was behind these attacks and I asked Camilla to heal her.
“It is the fault of whatever which was behind this,” I said finally but she didn’t look too convinced. “I don’t want you to worry about this. We have it covered. All you need to focus on is getting better. Camilla will be fine and when she is, she will come to see you.”
“I’m sorry,” she whispered but I shook my head. There was nothing to apologize for. “Maybe I should just go back home after this, I seem to be causing a lot of trouble here.”
“You’re not,” I assured her, “and you’re not leaving until we figure out who is behind this for real. For now, go back and rest, I’ll have a guard take you.”
Just as I was about to leave, Lyla walked back into the room. She looked at Riley first and there was something about her expression that I hated. Before I could ask, she turned back to me. “I got the herbs.”
