Chapter 162

Theodore’s POV

“Violet?”

The concern in Marcy’s voice pulled my attention to my wife as I closed the back door. I rushed to her side, her body tense as she stared in terror at the empty kitchen table. “Alari,” I murmured, firm but calm, “talk to me.”

Violet clutched my arm I had wrapped around her, her nails digging into my skin. She didn’t take her eyes from the kitchen table as she swallowed roughly. “She’s not here,” she choked out, sounding like she didn’t quite want to believe it.

“Who’s not here?” Marcy asked carefully behind me. I didn’t know the answer, but I didn’t need to.

“Get the High Priestess,” I commanded, catching Violet as her knees buckled. No one else moved.

“Now!” I snapped. Bennett and Marcy straightened in shock, then Bennett splintered out of the room.

I lowered Violet to her knees as she grew heavier in my arms, tears streaming down her face. “She’s not here, she’s not here, she’s not here.”

“No one’s at the kitchen table, Violet,” I whispered into her ear. Her pain was palpable, and I hated that all I could do was hold her. “I’m sorry.”

Marcy finally moved, coming to Violet’s other side and wrapping an arm around her. Together, we formed a little cocoon around Violet while she gaped unblinkingly at the kitchen table, repeating the same words over and over. “She’s not here, she’s not here.”

Bennett popped back into the kitchen impressively quickly with the High Priestess at his side. She took in the scene before her, then approached us with raised, glowing hands. She began passing them over Violet.

“Do you need us to move?” I asked.

The High Priestess shook her head, her usual serenity welcome in this moment. “Tell me who’s not here, Violet.”

My mate choked on a sob, and I squeezed her tighter while Marcy pet her hair. Bennett kneeled behind her and laid his hands on Violet’s shoulders.

“Mom.” Violet’s voice broke on the single word.

Marcy’s eyes widened in shock and concern as she met my gaze. Her confusion only seemed to grow when I didn’t look particularly surprised to hear my wife was seeing a dead person.

“How does she appear?” the High Priestess asked.

Violet’s eyes never left the kitchen table, even going so far as to incline her head to look around the High Priestess when she blocked her view. “Like she did during the altrosis,” Violet answered through her tears. “Same clothes and everything.”

“Is she saying or doing anything?”

Violet’s fingernails stayed embedded in my skin. “She’s just sitting there, staring at me. She keeps saying, ‘Leave’ over and over.”

“No other words?” The High Priestess lowered her hands, her magical evaluation complete.

“No.”

The High Priestess checked over her shoulder as if to verify that her late sister was not in fact sitting behind her. Then she slowly lowered to her own knees, not blocking Violet’s view of the table but more at her eye level. “Violet, do you understand that your mother is not here and that this is a manifestation of your unstable magic?”

“Yes,” she responded, but she kept staring at that table.

“I need you to look away from your mother, Violet,” the High Priestess instructed as gently as possible.

Violet’s entire body tightened, and her tears intensified. “What if she disappears?”

The High Priestess laid her hands on Violet’s thighs, and I wondered if she was using magic or if the mere touch from a loved one was more powerful. “She will disappear, Violet, and that’s okay. Because she’s not really here in the first place.”

Violet shuddered as she sobbed harder, quickly blinking away the tears to clear her vision. “I don’t want her to go. I miss her.”

The High Priestess’ voice never wavered from the calm one Theodore had always known.

“I know, my niece; I miss her, too. But the longer you stay in the hallucination, the more harm the unstable magic does to you. That is not your mom because your real mom would beg you to look away.”

Violet’s body shook with more force, and I scented the coppery tang of blood as her fingernails pierced my skin. I didn’t shake her off though. She needed me, and I would heal.

With a final cry, Violet slammed her eyes shut and bowed her head, pulling her hands up to cover her face as she gasped beneath the hands of the four people who loved her. I fought the urge to pull her into my lap, knowing I wasn’t the only one she needed right now.

Only a few seconds passed before Violet looked back at the kitchen table. I recognized the cry of pain she let out then, and I knew she could no longer see her mother. It was the sound of losing someone she loved all over again.

She crawled into my lap then, but as the others released her, she grabbed the nearest hand – her aunt’s. “Please,” was all she said. Then the High Priestess laid that hand on her niece’s shoulder, Marcy laid a hand on Violet’s foot, and Bennett placed one on her shin.

Once they each had a hand on her, Violet hid her face in my neck while I wrapped her in my arms, and she sobbed.

An unknown number of minutes, maybe hours, passed like that. Eventually, Violet’s breathing eased, and she straightened out of my embrace. She thanked everyone for holding her and apologized for soaking my shirt with her tears and snot.

“It was and always will be my honor to be your human tissue,” I teased as I brushed an errant hair out of her face. My light-hearted words had the intended effect, pulling a tentative smile from her lips. But I made sure she saw in my eyes the deep and unconditional truth in those words, too.

Marcy stood up and made everyone some tea. We drank it in the sitting room instead of at the kitchen table. Bennett made no quips about Marcy finally fixing him a drink.

“It felt as if…”

We all waited in silence, save for the slight slurps of our tea, while Violet shared more.

“As if I was being pulled into it. Even when you told me it was hurting me, it felt like I had to fight to pull away. Like something wanted me to stay in the hallucination.”

The High Priestess nodded. “Unstable magic is like an autoimmune disorder. Your body rushes to fight off the foreign entity, but then it starts fighting itself, too.”

“So I shouldn’t trust the pull to stay in it?”

“No. It will only harm our chances of restabilizing your magic.”

I huffed. “You mean it will kill her faster.” I probably shouldn’t have said it so harshly, but if my mate’s life was on the line, I didn’t want us beating around the bush.

“Kill her faster?!” Bennett spoke for the first time, and his voice almost sounded foreign. “I’ve been keeping quiet here, but if my cousin’s life is in danger, I think I deserve some details.”

Marcy’s mug clanked on the side table where she set it down. “This isn’t about you, Bennett.”

“Well, that’s easy to say if you have all the information,” he retorted.

“I have as much information as you do, you brat!”

“Okay,” Violet interrupted, “alright. It’s okay, Marcy. I appreciate you protecting my privacy, but I wouldn’t ask you both to witness all that without an explanation.”

I set down my own mug to wrap my arms around my wife as she took a steadying breath.