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I rise to my feet as well, wanting to do the same. His words keep me halted. Everything fades. Why does it have to be so hard in the first place? Why can’t things just be easy? Why is it so hard to feel whole?

Everything fades.

I stare at the trees, and my pulse quickens. My cheeks and neck begin to burn, and my lips start to tingle. The onset of a panic attack. It’s happened before, I know what to expect. That doesn’t make it any easier.

There’s a tightness around my chest. An invisible weight pressing down, caging me in. There isn’t enough air. The tips of my fingers go numb, body shaking, and that’s when the apprehension kicks in.

Tears well in my eyes. I try so hard to focus on my breathing. In. Out. In. Out. I’ll be okay. It will pass. In. Out. In. Out. I’m standing here. My feet are on the ground. Everything is fine. In. Out. In. Out.

The gasps come faster and faster, the calming thoughts harder to focus on. I try to swallow, but even my tongue is prickling. It’s too hot. I can’t breathe.

I can’t breathe…

A pair of arms wraps around me, holding me close. My fingers clasp onto him, willing myself to come down.

“It’s okay, Vix. I got you.” There’s a warmth from his body pressed to mine as he whispers against my hair. The slight comfort it brings is only brief because an overwhelming sense of new emotions falls into me, swallowing up my insides. Grief rips through me, pouring down my veins like hot lava. And anger. So much anger. It’s mixed with fear and pain. The thick combination makes it hard to stand, causing my grip to tighten on Rhenn.

I know each of these sentiments well, but they are not my own.

I have barriers. He has them too. This place, somehow, it’s opening them, forcing what we keep buried out, inviting it to wreak havoc inside the other person’s mind.

It isn’t just his haunting inner torment I feel, but a hint at his thoughts. It’s distant, like a hushed echo, too far to hear, though it prickles against my skin. There is a hole in the beating beneath his ribs. It matches my own.

His hold on me is firm. It is the only thing keeping me upright.

I’m dizzy with emotions. They flood me, drowning me in a sickness I’ve never felt before. It’s all too dark. Too sad. I’m hurting. Not for myself. For Rhenn. For the deep pain he hides. It eats at him, pulling him in so many directions.

Dread tangles against my bones. Worry for what he knows is going to happen. I can’t see what it is, only that he doesn’t want it. It scares him more than anything.

There’s a flicker of something else. A shadow. Not like the kind on the ground. This one is much darker. It moves freely. Attached to him, though not his own.

I dig deeper, trying to better see it. It holds no shape, but I can feel the power it yields. It brushes against my subconscious, letting me taste it, the frosty kiss of death.

Inky patches blur my vision, delving into my lungs. Blinding heartache washes over me, so thick I can’t take it anymore, and I pull away from his hold.

My hands fall to my knees while I suck in large gulps of oxygen. It’s like I was trapped, suffocating. My own panic attack met with one of his.

That thing inside him terrified me. Whatever it is, it hungers for life’s demise, seeing only in black and white, no color. Somehow, I know it isn’t him, just a part of him. Something dormant.

“What just happened?” I ask, the places filled by him slowly fading until it is only me that’s left.

“I think,” Rhenn starts, running his hand over the back of his neck. He looks paler, like he’s seen something that made him ill. “I think we sight-ported.”

“You know I don’t know what that means.”

Rhenn doesn’t answer, just paces back and forth, raking his fingers through his hair.

I’m assuming that whatever the hell we just experienced is what he’s referring to. Some weird telepathic share of our innermost selves. Still… “How?”

“I don’t know.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know,” he answers again, louder, before stopping to stare out at the woods. “Was it him?” Rhenn asks, keeping his focus away from me.

“Who?”

Even from behind, I can see the muscles in his jaw tighten. “The one you told me about at the cove. The one you said you wouldn’t have been forced to live with if your mom never left.”