It will hold my hand

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I sent out my sensate skills to see if Edward was spelled and actually sat down in shock.  Edward was a demon, I could feel it was undeniably as I felt Alex to be a Changer. Edward’s power saturated the air around him, and yet he was no Demon Lord. I didn’t know the Granite Realm’s hierarchy well enough to determine exactly what he was though. Besides that, I could feel the hold Marcus had on his mind. Edward was most definitely spelled and I had no idea how to break him free of it. The devilkin still alive pulled me painfully to my feet. When Marcus had arrived, I’d felt a second ward snap into place, this one felt like Sebastian and it was to keep people out. What it meant was that I had no where left to run, but at least the bastard wouldn’t get Cassie. I wondered briefly when Edward had been taken over, and if the Counsel knew.

“I see we managed to surprise you. My Master is a little disappointed, he honestly thought you’d have put up more of a fight. But then I knew how to stop you dead in your tracks. See, that little enforced vacation you made me take inside your mind clued me in on it. Your guardian evokes so many conflicting emotions in you that you become overwhelmed; trust and betrayal, love and disgust, oh it’s a wonderful mix. The only thing better would have been if I’d gotten your tiger. Your love for him is all wrapped up in your fear of being dominated by him. But it doesn’t matter. Without ever touching you, I’ve made you helpless. So come along, there’s no fight left in you.” Lucien poured acid on my emotional wounds. He also made a huge tactical mistake; he’d come within reach.

“What part of my nature makes you think that I’ll just give up?” I asked then jerked the knife out of my shoulder and rammed it into his throat all while forcing my fire into the wound despite the pain it caused me. He looked very surprised as he choked out blood, wept fire, and collapsed. I tried to turn and use the knife on Marcus when fingers gripped the hole in my shoulder and squeezed. At the same time Edward snapped us somewhere new. The devilkin grabbed me on either side and held me up. The knife slipped from nerveless fingers as I sagged under an impossible pressure.

“Welcome to the Granite Realm. Edward, take her to her cell and patch her up. I do not want her bleeding to death before I get what I want.” Marcus barked out.

I felt like I was trying to breathe in syrup. It wasn’t so much of a drowning sensation, but instead like I was surrounded by a heavy, viscous fluid. I was literally dragged into a cell and dropped onto a cot. The cell Alex had stuck me in was all metal and invoked the feeling of security; this cell was all stone and invoked the feeling of a dungeon. Edward peeled the little green blood soaked sweater off of me and I could see the jagged tear in my shoulder, which only served to make it hurt more. Then much to my surprise, Edward cut his two fingers open and jabbed them INTO the gaping wound. It definitely did not make the wound hurt less to have two long fingers rammed into it and probing around a bit; but the most horrifying part was that I could feel the real Edward trying to push Marcus’ influence away, it just wasn’t budging. The demon blood burned away the shocked, numb feeling that was settling in. I couldn’t even scream, instead I could only sob in pain and yet I could hear a woman screaming nearby so I focused throguh the pain onto the fact that I wasn’t alone. Even if she couldn’t hear me I swore to the screaming woman silently that I would get us out of here. Having that bit of focus gave me the strength to push away my slight despair at being captured. I still didn’t know what Marcus wanted me for. And from what little I’ve learned about him, I could tell he wasn’t the chatty type so I was probably going to remain ignorant for a while longer.

Finally Edward pulled his blood coated fingers out of my shoulder and smiled at me as he stuck his fingers in his mouth, sucking them clean. I could faintly feel Cassie whimper in my mind; it was so very faint, so weak that at first I was terrified that she was hurt. But it wasn’t until I tried to reach out with my sensate skills that I figured things out. Even pushing past the pain in my mind my sensate skills felt useless, like I was trying to read a book in a fog bank. It wasn’t that I was unable to do it, but as if I was experiencing extreme interference. That would probably be due to the weird pressure that was stealing my concentration. In Underhill, all magic was amplified, so I’m guessing that the Granite Realm had the opposite effect on magic, dampening it down. My shoulder began throbbing in a hot, painful wave, stealing away even my little bit of concentration. My entire body started jerking in hard spasms in time to my heartbeat and the pain increased with each second until finally I stopped being able to breathe through it, and I just had to gasp for breath around those moments. Finally every muscle in me eased down and I took in breaths while I could. I groaned and curled up on my side, holding my arms, which was when I noticed that my shoulder was working fine. I looked down at it and saw wet blood stains and a dark jagged mark where the wound had been. I swear it looked like a scar that had turned bronze instead of white.

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