“I’ll chance it,” Xtina said. “Just as long as you don’t mind my gift of seeing your memories.”
Selene was interested in this. Could the woman really see someone’s past by just touching them? If so, then this was the first time she’d met anyone with abilities close to her own. “Everyone?”
“Everyone except my husband.” Xtina smiled and motioned towards her husband, Mike.
Selene was quiet for a moment as she thought about Scott. For as long as she’d known him, he’d never been affected. “There is one person I’ve never affected besides Tara,” she said quietly. Then she reached out and laid her hand in Xtina’s.
Something strange happened the moment she touched hands with the woman. For starters, Xtina didn’t jerk away with fear. Then, images flashed through Selene’s mind like a movie on fast-forward.
By the time Xtina leaned back and broke their connection, Selene knew that the woman had seen most of her childhood and life. She’d never felt so raw and exposed around anyone before. Except Scott.
“We can trust her,” Xtina said, looking deep in her eyes, and Selene knew without a doubt that she could trust everyone in the room in return.
At eight thirty that evening, Selene stood in the middle of the field with the rest of the gang.
“Put me where you want me,” Selene had said to the group. “No matter what happens, tonight we’ll all be fighting for our lives.”
In the end, the players had been moved around like pawns. Selene and Tara were the major pieces.
“Why here?” Selene asked when they stopped walking in the field.
“It’s where we were conceived,” Tara answered, motioning around them.
It was? Here? Why here? So many questions ran through her mind, but she knew time was running short. Glancing up into the night sky, she added, “My power is stronger at the full moon.” She turned to Tara. “Yours?”
“I… never thought about it. I suppose so.”
“Long story short, the moon is where the rest of the group locked up Thanatos, the god of death,” Colt said.
“Okay.” Selene sighed and glanced up to the dark sky. “What time does the moon rise?”
“Eight fifty-one,” Tara and Colt replied at the same time.
“What is it we expect to happen, exactly?” Colt asked.
“Darkness will fall,” Tara said, causing a shiver to race through Selene.
She was darkness. Maybe what everyone had actually seen was her death? Maybe she was supposed to somehow sacrifice herself to save everyone. Would she be able to do it? Hell, yes. Hadn’t she known from a young age that she didn’t belong here. Maybe things would be better if she wasn’t there.
“Is that what you’ve seen?” Selene asked.
“Yes, you?” Tara asked her.
“Not… exactly,” Selene answered slowly. “I’ve seen several things, all ending in a flash of bright light. Like an explosion.” That was the truth. For over a year now, she’d come to believe the world ended in light. That somehow, she’d been put here to block that light. To extinguish it.
“That could be— ” Tara started, but then a wave of power overtook them both, and they tensed and turned towards the sky.
“Something’s wrong,” they said together and then everything went dark.
CHAPTERFOUR
“What the hell?” Scott said, looking around him.
“Somnum,” a woman said, motioning to him. Instantly, everything went black.
The next thing he could remember was hearing a woman scream. The sound echoed in the empty space.
“What happened?” the blonde asked after light shot out of her fingertips.