Page 175 of Wicked Bonds

But she couldn’t apply that to the boulder.

However, she could try to make it explode.

Focus, focus, focus, she told herself as her insides begged her to inhale.

Issac’s voice was in her head again, his frantic tone grabbing her mind.

Help the others, she told him.

Aya…

I’ll figure this out,she promised.Just… just help the others.

Fuck, she needed to breathe.

She’d been under too long.

She was going to drown.

To die.

But I’ll come back, she thought deliriously.I’ll come back… and I’ll have another two or three minutes…

She’d done this before. She could do it again.

Only, this time, she knew what was happening, she knew she could escape, knew there was a wayout.

The nightmares threatened her mind again, taking her under, deep into the waves, into the blackness of the sea, to a deteriorated form… her mother dying endlessly… over and over again…

Stas shivered, the coolness of the water drowning her lungs and burning her inside.

She welcomed the pain. It made her feel alive despite the truth of it.

I’ll be right back,she told Issac.Just keep fighting.

His anger lashed at her senses, following her to the depths of death.

And renewing her with a vengeance as she came awake again.

Aya!he shouted.

Her lips parted, her instinct to inhale hitting her hard in the chest. But she swallowed it, whispered to Issac that she was back, and began thinking through the runes Stark had taught her.

Issac threatened to come to her, to pull her out himself.

Don’t, she said.You’re the only one who can help those on the beach.

It’s a fucking slaughter, Aya,he growled, his frustration and fear palpable.

I’m coming,she promised.

But her mouth made her inhale again, taking in more water, and sending her to the darkness once again.

She returned, her mind more focused than ever as she started weaving ethereal energy above the surface, only five or six feet above her head.

Not underground.

I can still see the moon.