“No.” She finally forced the word from her dry mouth.
Xander’s full attention was aimed at the man. “You just keep praying to your Lord, keep asking for his protection. You’re going to need it. I intend to kill you with my bare fucking hands.” His tone was a feral growl.
“Xander. No. Go back. This is my dream.” The words sped from her lips.
His concentration on the man wavered and slid to her. Confusion, surprise, and rabid determination flashed in his eyes.
Kkkrrr. A gunshot.
She startled. So did Xander. Only he didn’t really startle; it was the impact of the bullet slamming into his head. His face went slack, his legs crumpled, and she saw the neat hole in his forehead. He fell facedown with a solid thunk that jarred the ground underneath her.
She squeezed her eyes shut. This was a dream—a bad, terrible, horrifying dream—and she was going to wake up. She had to wake up. Pain would wake her up. She balled her hand into a fist and punched her broken arm. White-hot agony rolled through her. She almost vomited. She cried out and opened her eyes.
Xander lay where he had fallen. She punched her arm again. Pain blinded her for a blessed moment, then ebbed, and reality swallowed her.
“Nononono…” It was the only word that existed. Somehow she ended up next to him. He lay facedown. She didn’t want to turn him over, didn’t want to see confirmation of what she already knew, but something stronger than herself reached out to him, tugging his shoulder with her good hand until she finally flipped him over.
The neat, round hole on the side of his forehead was an abomination on her soul. Death stared out from his unseeing eyes. Her insides felt like they were being ripped from her body. Her mind tore from its skull. She heard herself crying and screaming and bawling, even as she laid her hand over his wound, willing herself to heal him, heal him, heal him.
He’d told her that taking away her pain felt cool and satisfying. But all she felt was the scalding heat of his blood trickling from the wound and, underneath her palm, a shard of skull poking her. “You can’t be dead. You can’t be. You have to live. You have to. I can’t do this without you. I need you.” Her voice vibrated with grief and terror.
“He heard me. Heard my thoughts. He was possessed of evil too. I had to… I had no choice. Forgive me. Oh Lord, forgive me.”
Isleen heard the man talking, but didn’t pay attention to his words. The only thing that mattered was… “Xander. Xander. Xander.” She chanted his name over and over.
Sirens sounded in the distance, ringing out over the low hills and through the shallow ravines.
“You must come with me now. We need to leave this place.” The man grabbed her arm.
“No!” She turned on him, baring her teeth at him like a cornered raccoon. Her reaction startled him back a step. She wasn’t leaving Xander. She was going to heal him.
Chapter 20
Emergency sirens screamed through the dark, mixing and blending with the Dragon’s anguish until King slapped his hands over his ears just to be able to think beyond the grief and guilt.
He’d been watching and waiting for an opportunity to steal her away. He’d spread the road spikes when it appeared she was finally leaving. Of course, he hadn’t anticipated that the truck would end up in the ravine. Number one priority: Get her away from here so the proper ritual could be performed.
When he pulled his hands from his ears, they were damp, the gun slick and slippery in his grip. He tightened his hold on it. Weapon shaking, he aimed it at the man who’d been in the truck with her. The last thing he wanted was to kill an innocent, but she didn’t know that.
The Dragon wailed and howled her grief, the sound a vise of guilt tightening down on King’s chest. He’d killed. Again. It was the decades of indoctrination that had raised his hand and squeezed the trigger. It was fear. And it was his duty. As one of the Faithful, it was his responsibility to eradicate evil from the world. The man had been inside King’s head listening to his thoughts.
Logic dictated that King end the man. But murder… Eliminating a corrupt soul was supposed to be right, so why did it constantly feel so wrong? In his mind, King could hear Chosen One saying, “It is not for you to question the laws of the Lord. It is for you to prove your faith in the Lord.”
But still, the Dragon’s sorrow paralleled the horror in King’s heart.
“Leave with me now, and he won’t be harmed.” His voice cracked.