Page 1 of Gift from the Source (Source of Elementra #5)

Willow

My willow tree.

The last time I saw it, the moon was casting a glow on the cascading branches and shiny leaves. The unforgiving winter air added stiffness to my already tense muscles and broken body.

I was escaping my own personal hell.

Now the sun rises with a warmth that’s making sweat bead on my forehead. It adds to the fever of my confusion.

I’m far from the same woman I was when I last sat beneath its protection. Bleeding, battered, and weighing the decision of following a stranger blindly, who claimed I wasn’t meant to be here.

Just the same as then, its presence fills me with a sense of unconditional love, home, and happiness. The tugging in my chest that I now know for certain is my bond with CC ignites like it always has.

For the first time in my life, it doesn’t bring me the comfort it did in my past.

What I once believed to be a random tree planted in a clearing surrounded by old oak trees is anything but random. The purpose it served glares at me as I stare at it in horrified surprise.

It obviously doesn’t belong here .

Neither do I.

This isn’t our home.

One belief—thought—I’ve always had still proves to be true.

Fuck me, I’m so tired of being confused every time I walk into these woods.

My men right my first unsteady step toward the haven I know on a soul level.

My Nexus.

Their hands are calm as mine tremble. They hide their shock internally, while my face screams horrified.

We never passed through a ward but a whole realm.

Déjà vu overwhelms me when I take a green silverish leaf between my fingers and roll the familiar texture around. My ritual, my routine, every time I approach it. It’s always been my way of saying hello.

I can almost swear to you, there are permanent knee impressions in the earth from where I’ve lowered myself here to sit on my heels so many times.

Countless times.

The memories of those occurrences flood me as I take the position now.

My shaky fingers skim the smooth yellowish-brown bark, and like a movie, I play my most treasured moments here across my mind.

The last day I was beneath my tree, I knew good things had happened to me here. I just couldn’t remember them.

I remember now.

I give myself over to the moment and bask in the familiarity. The fun adventures CC created for me, the time I spent reading, learning, and practicing underneath the cover of protection from my tree. The love he showered me with in here.

This spot, created by Elementra, shaped by him for us to enjoy together. Then it became my safe haven once he was no longer here.

I treasure these moments and always will, but one thing is for certain.

We don’t belong here.

“Is everyone okay?” My voice trembles with the question as I push myself back up to stand.

We can’t linger here .

I already laid my eyes on everyone when they appeared, but Oakly and I took quite a beating traveling the realms. Everyone else seemed to have fallen through easier, but that gives me no idea about how they’re feeling. Their magic, gifts, elements…

What does being in the nonmagical realm do to all of us?

I seek Caspian out first. He knew immediately where we were the second his eyes found my tree.

His gaze collides with mine and he reads me like a book.

“We have plenty of time, Primary. We’d need to spend years here for our blessings to deteriorate. I don’t believe for a moment we were sent here with the intention of not returning home. Everyone is okay.”

I believe him wholeheartedly, but my head and heart need to know for sure that everyone’s fine.

My bond stretches out to my men. I assess how they feel as they move closer to me, while my eyes land on my brother.

Lyker has his head tilted back, subtly smelling the surroundings. Lennox, Kyan, and Zane stand stoically, searching the forest with their glares, and Aria’s boxed between them.

“Are you picking up anything?”

His face twist into a sneer. “It smells like shit here.”

The smell is the last thing I’m concerned with at this moment, but now that he’s drawn attention to it, it’s all I notice. I used to be able to detect the unnatural scents when I lived here, but they were never as potent as they are now.

That sense seems to awaken all my others. I don’t have to strain to pick up any surrounding sounds and judging by the silence, the animals of the nonmagical realm know there are fiercer predators around.

My eyes roam the duller, paler colors of the clearing and the forest. The greens here are, well…just that. Green. Nothing like the endless hues in Elementra.

“Oak, how are you feeling?”

“Better now. I’m sorry for every time I’ve picked on you for throwing up. That was brutal.” She grimaces .

Shaking my head at her, I softly smile, then look at Keeper, Trex, and Codi. The three of them appear fine, other than Trex’s intense frowning at the tree line.

“Why was that so rough for us but not everyone else?” I ask the group.

“You and Oakly suffered the worst, I believe, because you were breaking the lock to pass through, so to speak. You opened a portal, and we came through easily seconds after you did.”

San’s matter-of-fact statement startles me. I most certainly didn’t open a portal to another realm. The information on how to do that is in my book, but I haven’t gotten to that lesson.

“I didn’t open a portal. I opened a normal transport, just like we’ve practiced,” I say, nodding to Oakly for backup.

“Yeah, at first. But obviously”—she pauses, looking around—“that transport turned into a portal.”

They’re both right. I know that and I’m not denying it. I just don’t know how to admit that I somehow royally fucked up. I’m not even sure what I did to cause this.

“You didn’t fuck—”

Tillman’s words are silenced as he and the other three of my men whirl around, surrounding me protectively. It takes me a moment to catch up, but then I hear it.

The slightest sound of a transport opening.

We each hold our breaths as the timing for this one to open is taking much longer than it would in Elementra. The seconds seem to take minutes as the faint buzz grows louder and my skin pulls tight with anticipation as everyone gets themselves into a fighting position.

Whatever threat is getting ready to pop out in front of us won’t be receiving a warm welcome.

“No,” I breathe, dropping my hands and barreling through the wall my men created as soon as the newcomer’s signature crawls across my skin. “What are you doing here?”

“Oh, child. You’re okay…” Gaster pants when I throw myself into his arms. “I felt your signature leave the realm. I couldn’t sense you anywhere, so I knew yo u were here.”

“Why did you come? We have no clue how I did this, Gaster. It’s too dangerous,” I say softly, pulling back and gripping his biceps.

I frantically check him over from head to toe to make sure he’s okay. Just because he’s capable of doing this doesn’t mean it isn’t hard or draining to do so. When my gaze lands back on his face, the petrified, shattered look in his baby blues causes my breathing to hitch.

“My last Guardria traveled here and never returned to me. I’ll be damned before that happens again. Where you go, child, so do I.”

My lower lip trembles at his words and my heart clenches so painfully I’m not sure it’s beating.

CC made one last trip here to me and never came back home to him.

“We’ll all be going home today, Gaster. Together. I promise.”

“I believe that, Willow,” he murmurs, tugging me back against his chest for another moment.

He glances around at everyone else to make sure they’re okay, then his eyes land on my tree. This is the second time he’s ever seen it, but something about his look now is more calculating. I watch him keenly as his small grin morphs into an amused smile.

“What is it?”

“I did a very good job replicating it exactly. I did perfect, as a matter of fact.”

Multiple snorts sound behind me and mingle with my own. “That you did.”

Corentin’s stern glare is locked on Gaster’s face as we stand in front of him. I’m waiting for the tension that was just broken to build back up. The unknown of why we’re here has his fear pulsing through my chest and adding Gaster to the mix now intensifies it.

Just when I think the two of them are getting ready to butt heads, Corentin’s mask drops along with his crossed arms, and he pulls Gaster away from me into a hug.

“This will be the last time you come to this realm without anyone’s permission. No one warned me I’d have to take care of my elder as well.”

“Elder?” Gaster gasps, placing his hand to his heart. “I am in my prime and I do not need to be taken care of. ”

“Obviously you do. This is the second time you’ve run to this realm with no backup or clue of what’s going on,” Corentin says, arching a brow that makes me snicker.

In his defense, Gaster is the type that would get himself into trouble if he didn’t have the rest of us to worry about.

“And I’ll do it a third if need be.” Gaster flicks his beard hard enough it grazes Corentin’s sneering face as he makes his way to hug the others.

Tillman’s prepared for Corentin to try to lecture Gaster some more, so he cuts in with a hand to his chest and a shake of his head.

“We can talk with him later. He’s already here, so there’s no point in arguing. Keeper, Draken, Cas, and Ry go scout the tree line. Don’t venture into the woods. Gaster, do you think you’d be able to transport us back home?”

“Not all of you at once. I’ll need a couple trips.”

Tillman nods. I can imagine the toll it took for Gaster just to transport me to Elementra based on how it felt bringing myself and Oakly here. Even if he took two at a time, that’s more than eight trips and leaves us all separated.

I’m not willing to do that.

My thought causes Tillman to smile at me briefly before he begins barking orders at everyone. Including me. “Take a minute with the girls or for yourself, little warrior, then get your mom’s book out. You’ll be opening a portal for us to go home.”

Shit. Right.

No better time to learn than on the fly and under pressure.

Blowing out my breath, I nod, then pull my shoulders back as Oakly and Aria each take a side of mine. I soak up their silent support.

My muscles relax as Draken, Cas, Keeper, and Ry all return together and surround Tillman. None of them look worried, so I assume we’re alone for now.

The girls gaze around, and I sense their curiosity of this place as if it’s my own. For once, it’s not me who’s completely lost in a strange new place, and I’m smugly pleased about that .

“I don’t understand how the point of this mission was to track your blood, but we ended up in another realm,” Aria says quietly.

“I think because she was bleeding when she opened the transport, it shifted into a portal. Why the hell we ended up in this place, I don’t know.” Oakly chuffs.

“I had a single-minded focus on my blood and followed the line of the trace. It was faint, yes, but I felt it and latched onto it.”

They both hum, but Oakly also nods her agreement. She felt it too. We followed the steps, did exactly what we’d been training for, and should’ve popped out at or at least close to my blood supply.

I have no clue how it went so wrong.

Movement in my peripheral catches my eye and my gaze follows Trex as he paces back and forth. Why he’s separated himself from the others, I’m not sure, but his weird behavior has the hair on the back of my neck standing on end.

“Give me a sec,” I whisper to Oakly and Aria as their murmurs about me starting my ‘opening a portal’ lesson become a solidified plan.

Before they can stop me or ask what I’m doing, I take a couple heavy steps in the direction of Trex so he hears me coming.

“What’s wrong?”

“Something feels off. This is where you grew up?” he asks as he rubs his chest mindlessly.

“Yes. Why?” I cock my head, observing his behavior.

“I don’t know, Willow. This place feels like it’s trying to get rid of me, shove me out…I can’t even describe it. It’s fucking with me so bad. It’s like my heart’s trying to fall out.”

His heart…

My eyes widen as they bounce between him and the tree line he keeps staring at. I know the destination behind that wall of woods better than any other.

Shit. This wasn’t a mistake at all.

“Oakly,” I holler as I slice my palm open .

In seconds, I’m surrounded by more than just my sister as our entire group comes at my call, and I completely ignore their questions for the time being as I watch the red of my blood pool once again in my hands.

“What do you need me to do?” she asks firmly, cutting off all the other voices.

“We need to track my blood again. Now.”

“You think—”

“Oh shit,” Draken says, eyeing Trex and me.

“Exactly, dragon,” I acknowledge him mentally, not wanting to speak out loud what I believe to be true just yet as the clearing falls into an eerie silence.

“That’ll be enough for now. Ready?” I ask Oakly.

“Ready.”

“Track,” we command together.

Unlike last time, when we barely felt a whisper of a pull, this time the trace grips us with such force we grunt, stumbling forward as it yanks us. The tug is relentless. It’s so tight that our feet move without thought, dragging us with it.

There’s no resisting it.

Our steps pound against the earth, each stride swallowing the ground beneath us until the tree line looms just ahead, all in a matter of heartbeats. I try to force my feet to stop, but it’s useless.

We burst through the trees that circle my clearing protectively and enter the wooded path that I’ve traveled so many times before.

Dead of night or broad daylight, I’d know exactly where we’re heading.

Stop, stop, stop.

I mentally command my body repeatedly, to no avail.

The faster my feet move through the forest, the quicker my heart rate spikes and my anxiety takes hold.

I shove it down as far as I can, reminding myself one of my tormentors is dead, fallen by my own hand. The other is back in the realm where I belong, awaiting his death for when I find him.

Nothing here can hurt me anymore .

My heart screams for a second to come to terms with what’s about to happen as the end of the forest quickly approaches.

“Sever the connection, Oakly. How do we sever it?”

“Why do you—shit.” Her eyes grow round when she looks at my panic-stricken face. “Imagine yourself cutting the string. Just like you do when you pull us from your mind. Cut it.”

I picture the realm’s largest pair of scissors, then I mentally slice the line pulling me back to that hellhole. The instant snap sends us both crashing into the foliage, landing hard on our hands and knees.

My breaths come out in ragged, tearing gasps, each one more painful than the last. I squeeze my eyes shut and my fingers claw into the earth beneath me. They grip so tight, my bones might snap. The grittiness of the soil bites into my skin, grounding me as the panic surges, wild and overwhelming.

Another harsh breath falls from my lips as gentle hands brush against my trembling body. It’s the soft touch of my men trying to calm me, but I barely process it. The tremor running through me is stronger. It claws at my chest and threatens to swallow me whole.

I hear my name through the roaring in my ears—both the cherished pet names and my real one. It filters through the chaos, a whisper amongst the storm brewing inside of me.

Come on, Willow, you can do it. Pull yourself out.

“Filia mea. You can do this.”

My heart thuds wildly at the sound of CC’s voice, but the soft undertone of his words has the panicked beat regulating and the swaying in my mind settling. I raise my hand, stopping my men from lifting me and wrapping me in their comfort when their grips grow tighter around my body.

I can’t let them do it for me.

The panic flooding my veins is an old companion. One I’ve shared moments with far too many times. I don’t know anymore if it’s a friend or foe—whether it’s trying to warn me or destroy me.

All I know is that it’s here again, in full force, and I’m on the edge of letting it consume me.

My entire life, I’ve avoided this fear. It’s a sickening dread that’s haunted me since I was a child. But there’s no escaping it today. It looms ahead, waiting, and I have no choice but to face it.

I’ve been sent back to where it all started for a reason.

I have to face the place that tried to break me…and make sure it never has that power over me again. I’ve survived it countless times before.

I can do it one last time.

I’ll do more than survive this.

My arms and legs want to give out on me as I push myself to stand, but I shake my head out and breathe out through my mouth. My eyes attempt to refuse my command to open, but I force my will through the last remaining line of panic.