Sewn & Scarred (The Fated Creations Trilogy #3)

Chapter Fifty-OneMaddox

Chapter Fifty-One

Maddox

“ I told you,” I murmured down to her as one hand slid over her cheek. “Until the end of my days.”

Her eyes watered, she looked to Charlotte and a load seemed to come off of her chest as she nodded, turning back to me. “And in the Night that follows.”

Time caught up to us, it had moved slowly since the moment I saw her— really —saw her. Alive, and herself, in front of me.

Wyott stood across the table from where the two of us had grabbed a drape each from the ceiling above the balcony and swung down to the throne.

He fell back to my side, pulling the book from the table in the process, and Charlotte shuffled over, too, despite her chains, and we put ourselves between Evaline and Vasier as he gathered his bearings and stood.

I’d sent Sage and Dean to get the woman Evaline wanted to save, to portal in behind her and snatch her before the Vasi knew what was happening.

I felt the castle beneath us shake, and knew they’d be at our sides in a breath.

Lauden cut himself again, spilling more blood into the bowl, and Evaline gasped behind me. He didn’t need the book for the spell, apparently, because he started chanting again.

But before Wyott and I could do anything to stop him, a whip of fire lashed out from behind me and connected with Lauden’s back, throwing him forward into the bowl with a yelp and spilling its contents onto the ground below him, and subsequently, down the drain.

“No!” Vasier roared, running forward, and falling to his knees over the drain.

“What have you done!” he screamed, standing, and making a move for us.

As if they’d been waiting for his lead, as if they’d been confused by the entire scene, all the Vasi around us began to move in.

They came for the stage, and in my peripheral I saw one leap onto the platform, behind Vasier.

The ground shook behind us and Sage screamed over the noise. “Everyone, to me,” she instructed but I didn’t dare turn around.

Vasier’s steps faltered as he heard his daughter’s voice, and his eyes widened as if he’d only just discovered her betrayal.

“Sage?” he asked, but we didn’t have time to respond as the Vasi closed in on us then. Wyott, Charlotte, Dean, and I all tensed—Dean coming to stand on my other side. But the Vasi only crashed against some boundary in front of us. A clear, invisible, boundary. Not a ward.

Air.

I looked back at Evaline and saw her wide eyes, her hands tensed in front of her.

I swore as I reached to free her from the barbed wire, I’d forgotten it was there, when I heard Wyott make a choked sound behind me.

I whipped around to him, afraid a Vasi had snuck through and had hurt him, and then I saw it, too.

My heart stopped, my breath stalled, as I understood why Wyott couldn’t speak.

I grabbed him at the same time that he fell back.

The Vasi scraped against the wall of air, trying to get to us.

“Everyone hurry!” Sage yelled behind us. “I can only keep it open so long!”

“Wait, where’s Maeve?” I heard Evaline say behind us, but I was focused on the wall in front of us.

The faces of the Vasi were clear and unobstructed. Furious, and gnashing toward us.

Dean and Charlotte fell back behind us while Sage instructed them to hold onto her as we entered the portal.

There was one face, one Vasi, at the front of the wall. His eyes were on Wyott, red and angry and desperate to get through, but for a single moment, I thought I saw the brows furrow. Thought I saw a flicker of something—anything—but hatred.

But maybe that was only what I hoped I saw.

Evaline was standing near the wall as if tempting the Vasi to break it.

She was on her tiptoes, searching frantically, tears falling down her face.

I reached for her, pulled her into one arm so I could drag her back to the portal, when she started screaming.

“No!” she screamed. “I can’t leave her! I have to find her. Please!” she screamed, but I had to pull her back, she’d lost a lot of blood and Gods knew how long she could hold the wall for.

I grabbed Wyott, too. Wrenched him from where he stood, frozen. Eyes pinned on the Vasi who stood in front of him.

I wrapped them both in my arms and dragged them.

I felt Sage’s hand on my back and turned to face her so that she could put her hand on my chest, and touch all three of us at once.

The portal shifted below us, started to close.

Sage’s face contorted into one of pain, of concentration.

“You have to fight it, Sage,” I ground out against my hold on Wyott and Evaline who fought me. “Think of Evaline, think of how you want to help her after everything you’ve done.”

Sage’s eyes bulged, veins popped from her forehead, but she tightened her hand around us, around Evaline, and screamed against the effort.

Slowly, the portal opened back up.

Wyott jolted, and I turned to see him still looking out into the crowd, at the Vasi his eyes had been pinned on from the moment he saw him.

And just before Sage roared to step in, just before I hauled my brother and my mate into the portal, I heard Wyott call out.

“Father?”