A Matter of Heart by Heather Lyons Read Free Book Online Page A

time as hands drag me back against a hard
     chest. And then, like a nightmare vividly springing to life, a piercing keening
     fills the woods surrounding us, a sound I haven’t heard in nearly a year. My
     bones ache in terror.
    Kellan lets go of my upper
     arms and grabs one of my hands instead. And then we’re running back in the
     direction we first came from, but not before I see flames exploding from
     Nivedita’s fingertips.
    The Elders are here.
    “Kellan!” the Guard whose
     name I don’t know—why don’t I know it?—calls out, and my Connection barks out a
     series of orders to delay the Elders. Protect the Creator , he says, and
     it’s surreal, because he means me , I am to be protected, and it
     makes no sense, not with Earle lying in a crumpled heap against a tree.
    Earle’s husband died because
     of the Elders. Please, oh please, do not let him have died, too, at the hands
     of the same beings. I cannot even begin to wrap my mind around that horrible
     irony.
    “We need to go back,” I
     yell, my hand crushed beneath his vise grip, but Kellan doesn’t respond. He’s
     running through the woods, practically dragging me, and I’m flashing back to
     the time I raced across the Bay Bridge with Elders hot on my trail. Instinct
     took over then—survival is such a strong motivator—and it’s here, now. But even
     so, I can’t leave Earle, and Nivedita, and that other guy. What’s his name? I
     should know his name.
    Walls of water rip from the
     ground, churning sheets that curve into an arc that reaches above our heads.
     “Harou!” Kellan shouts, and he angles us to the right. “Get them off us NOW!”
    Flames entwine through the
     water. Harou must be a Tide, and he must not be too far back. Nivideta, too. A
     quick glance behind shows two Elders, all black and nebulous, distorted beyond
     form, at the most, ten feet back.
    And they are gaining.
    “Kellan! Behind us!”
    Impossible at it seems, his
     hand tightens around mine. “Already on it!” And then the screaming behind me
     intensifies, sounds of agonizing pain.
    Kellan is attacking them.
    I refuse to be a victim.
     There are three Guard somewhere behind me, fighting to keep me safe. One of my
     Connections is here, too, and I absolutely will not allow anything to happen to
     him. I rip the trees down from around us, shredding the forest as I throw
     everything I can at the shape-shifting beings.
    But it’s no good. The Elders
     are flames at our heels within minutes as we crash through the woods. My legs
     are cut, a series of vicious slashes from bushes and fallen trees seeking
     revenge for the havoc I wreaked behind us. “Chloe?” Kellan yells. “Know that
     I’m sorry about this.”
    Like a whip, he yanks and
     then hurls me into a series of bushes nearby. I land hard, my knees bruising
     instantly while bubbling red. What just happened?
    I find Kellan twenty feet
     away, his feet still, hands out, face determined. The two Elders are squealing,
     twisting up high in the air and then flattening, like towels whose water is
     wrung out. He thought to take them on himself? Oh, hells no. I scrabble
     forward, ready to build some kind of hole like the one I’d helped construct
     last year that now houses Elders below the streets of Annar, but new hands grab
     hold of me and jerk me to my feet.
    Harou. The Tide.
    I’m running once more,
     although this time, not willingly and not with the person I want to be with. I
     order him to let me go, but he ignores me. It takes a few tries, but I
     eventually rip free of his grip. Unlike my Connection’s, it’s not ironclad.
    Harou tries to reclaim me,
     but I dart out of his reach. “Lilywhite!” he hollers, but I’m already off. “I
     have to get you to safety!”
    Screw that. Screw him. I’m
     going back to find Kellan, and then—and only then—will I concede to find any
     so-called safety, if such a thing can truly exist in these woods.
    The screaming intensifies,
     and I