One of my readers I know you just welcomed a new baby girl named Gabriella, and another reader you too a while back, named Faythe so:
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Chapter 50 – On The Road (Samson Conrad POV) Pt.3
"What about me? Didn't you think I'd want to scrapbook?" Imogen asks me as the three of us sit in the back of the Conquest and Luca starts driving out of Moscow. Gazing up at her, almost with a blank expression, I furrow my brows at her, "I bought you a thermo cup," I hold it out to her in consolation.
"Oh... how wonderful... a cup we cannot really use because we don't have hot water to make tea that you bought. Then again that's okay because you only bought tea that Faith likes," she says cheery, voice dripping in sarcasm.
Ignoring her, I steal glances at Fatima. Watching as she puts the camera together before, handing Imogen the laptop I bought.
"Thank you," Fatima finally says after nearly forty minutes when I've unconsciously wormed my way to sit right next to her. The laptop resting on my legs, and our backs against the back row seats.
"I had wished we brought my other one," she uses her chin to point at the camera beside her. "I like taking pictures of the places I go, I can remember it, but there's something about looking at it in that single moment when I capture it," she says leaning her head against my shoulder.
When she sighs, I worry that something is bothering her but she only reaches over and opens the browser, typing in Williamstown, Massachusetts. Taking over when I understand her intentions we scower the Internet opening tab after tab in search of something.
"It's sort of near the mountain ranges," Fatima says, her breath fanning against my face. "Are you guys looking up Sun Valley?" Imogen asks from behind the newer laptop.
"No," Fatima replies not moving her head from its spot, "I wanted to see if maybe Williamstown had a supernatural history of sorts?"
"But so far, the only thing that seems even just a bit relevant is that it shares a border with Vermont," I add.
"Why is that important?" Luca asks up front, looking back at us in the rearview mirror. I stare at him and then Imogen, "Because the weirdness that happened with you two, when you got the two Souls... it happened when you were in Vermont."
"You – you think maybe they sent me because the Six Souls were taking too long?" Fatima asks her nose scrunching cutely, distracting me for a second. When the appropriate amount of time to answer passes, I blink as Fatima's cheeks heat and my ears get hot.
"That actually makes sense," Imogen nods as she stares straight ahead. "I mean Jaxun – what if Wyatt and the others could see we had failed and they sent you..." she points at Fatima, "You to somehow bring us all together?" again we were dealing with too many 'what if's.'
"What went wrong exactly?" Fatima asks, curling her body against mine to face Imogen. She was at ease more than I could remember since she showed up in Bend and moved into the house. Granted there was only four of us in the car, and Luca was behind the wheel.
"From what I was told, you were supposed to get vessels, and go after Jaxun," Imogen nods. "Yes, but the spell must have gone wrong, because I'm not the first one that picked up the piece I found in Vermont."
"We weren't even supposed to be trapped in the pieces either, it was just supposed to be what carried us here, when it broke, we would be sync with the nearest fading human."
"Fading?" I ask wondering if she mean dead.
Imogen nods, "Dying. A human that had no chance of surviving, or had been dead for seconds," my eyes widen and stay that way as I try to process what Imogen was saying.
"However from the minute that I or when I got that second Soul, it felt off," Luca says upfront. "I could hear Rhys' thoughts, my own and they were just... even Rhys when he became aware of my thoughts, they were a bit shocked. When the Six left Zedwood, we were informed," Luca refers to himself as Rhys, which I find all too interesting.
"Of the time period in which we were invading and all my thoughts, slangs, family, even my health took him – Rhys – by surprise."
"It was the same for me as well, but Seraphima, she – I – she hung out in the back ground. It was like she knew I was too young and there was this piece of me where I felt as though I was missing pieces," Imogen says whispering the words sadly, and I glance away looking at the screen but not truly seeing it.
I understood missing a piece of yourself; an emptiness that you'd try anything to fill.
"How were you guys supposed to find one another?" I ask, lifting my hand, absentmindedly for a few minutes twirling a strand of Fatima's hair around my finger. "First, it was supposed to be bodies with no family, and then it would be like relay runners," Luca explains, "You know how, when the baton is being passed they never look behind, and it's almost poetic, a seamless transition."
"You just know that they should be there," I comment, "Exactly. We were supposed to just know who was where. But I woke up and it took a while, before I found-"
"I had a theory," Imogen interrupts Luca, but he only chuckles at her exuberance. "Okay so the planned spell did not work as it was, but uhm, in a way, I understand why," Fatima and I say nothing just waiting for the exposé that Imogen was building up too. "So I came to the conclusion that it's a battle of wills. For example, when Luca came back to Bend with Giselle, I Imogen, had the biggest crush on him. Even before he left. But he came back with her and even though we clicked, I just had the hardest time. I fought my feelings for him at every turn, but Seraphima, she was more aggressive."
My eyes slip up to peek at Luca who avoids the mirrors, but I can still see his turned down lips.
"I eventually did cross that line I drew," she says softly, "And I felt miserable but all I could keep thinking was that I was doing to her what some person did to my mom with my dad. He just up and left with some woman and it didn't matter that my mom was pregnant."
In her voice, her tone is full of disdain at her own actions, or maybe her fathers.
"But that – well I was thinking lately that what if by chance the nearest person that was a second from dying or dead was a serial murderer or something?" I blink. Oh yeah. That's like a leap, jump, and fly from A to B, then Z mentality. "I'm slowly getting gifts," she pauses, "in the wrong hand, I mean can you imagine a psychopath with enhanced abilities?"
A leap but not completely off.
"That led me thinking to Jaxun," Fatima nods, "he has had a head start, what if he was so connected he was somehow able to intercept us all? Gain even more power!"
"Then, I started thinking, Wyatt and the others, what if they somehow added to the spell, make it so that two people that had to meet already, were somehow the ones to find the pieces of our carrier," I nod all while thinking; she thinks like Fatima.
And as a side thought, I realized in relief that Cynthia may just be a one off. If someone like Fatima can come from Zedwood, and Imogen and Luca as well, since they had two Souls inside them, then it was not the whole Realm that were conniving as Cynthia.
