As I came back to myself, I sat up, my head aching, the feeling odd. I so rarely experienced pain, and this was for sure pain.
Before I explained anything to her—how was I supposed to explain something I didn’t yet understand myself?—I thought back to the feeling just before I’d passed out.
Source.
It took a moment to identify it, but that was exactly what it was. It was as if a huge tear had opened, pouring source through the room. The massive influx had overloaded my synapsis and essentially forced a shut down.
But what the hell could have done that? I’d lived for a long time without ever experiencing something like that.
I hopped to my feet, a bit dizzy but unwilling to let that stop me. Anything that could bring me down like this I couldn’t ignore.
Now that I knew what I was looking for, I closed my eyes to sense it. Source left a lingering feel, like ripples in water. I moved forward, following that sensation, until my foot struck something. I opened my eyes to find myself right in front of her bed. On the nightstand sat the item that had caught my attention—a lamp with a moon at the top.
“Where did you get this?” I asked as I picked it up, pulling the plug from the wall.
“It was a gift from a work acquaintance of my mom’s.”
“When did you get it?”
Her lips tipped down, and I got the sense that she had to think about it. It meant she must have gotten it a while before, something that made me even more uneasy.
Finally, she nodded.“About a year before I changed.”
That made sense. The way she’d turned into a shade, her high source levels, the time in Medical when the Warden had implied Hera hadn’t changed naturally—it all fit together.
“We need to go see Deacon.”
“Why?”
I held up the lamp. “Because I’m pretty sure this turned you into a shade.”
* * * *
Wade
Deacon carefully examined the lamp Kit had brought in. It didn’t strike me as anything odd, but that didn’t mean much.
As an elder, Kit could sense things the rest of us couldn’t.
Hera had seemed unsettled upon returning, but that was to be expected. She’d revisited her old home. I had no idea what I’d do in that situation. It made me sit beside her and press my covered arm against hers, trying to reassure her just by being close by.
Deacon grasped the top of the lamp and twisted, the wood cracking easily beneath his strength. The pieces split, and Deacon tossed the base of the lamp away. After that, he pulled apart the wood that surrounded the top, where the moon was.
When it gave way, he had something that looked nothing like the lamp. It had a large crystal in the center, but the crystal didn’t appear like anything I’d seen before. It was a deep purple, and the insides moved as if alive.
I peered closer to realize it didn’t swirl exactly. Instead, it was as if something inside it shifted around, staring back.
“It looks weird,” I said, “but how can you be sure it’s anything? People are all into New Age healing now. I heard doctors had to tell women that crystals should not beinsertedanywhere.”
Kit went to answer, but before he could, his answer became unnecessary. A wave of power left the object, something like pure source that I immediately identified.
Kit collapsed, and I moved without thinking. I grabbed the item from Deacon, wrapping my hands around the oddly warm crystal.
The moment I did, a wave of source rushed into me. It felt like holding six Kits, and the power astounded and overwhelmed me. Still, the moment I touched it, Kit blinked slowly and sat up. It meant it had worked, allowing me to absorb that source rather than him getting affected by it.
He shook his head in a hard jerk, then exhaled in a loud rush. He turned his gaze toward me. “That is extremely unpleasant. Are you okay?”
I grit my teeth together but nodded. The sensation was hard to put into words, sort of like a brain freeze after eating too much ice cream. It didn’t feel good, but I still kept at it anyway. “It’s not the best feeling, but it shouldn’t hurt me.”