A Gift from the Goddess

Chapter 69

Chapter Sixty–Nine 

‘Reach for it... 

‘Stretch... 

I dug deep within myself, searching where I had felt that familiar energy first stem from. Before it used to always feel like it was just out of arm‘s length, as if only the tip of my fingernail could graze it, but now it felt as though I needed several more appendages just to get anywhere near it. 

But it was there. I had to believe that it hadn‘t just been my imagination. 

Stretch just a little further...‘ 

But then I exhaled quickly in release, panting from the strain it had caused to my body. 

I‘d been sitting on my bed practising ever since arriving back at my guest lodgings. However, since starting over an hour ago, there had been little to show in progress. 

I knew there had to be a trick to this, some sort of internal cue to summon it. Elder Luke had mentioned that this energy was something that could be trained but I was now trying to accomplish it with a severe handicap. So naturally, a part of me was kicking myself for not learning this prior to the collar. 

I threw myself backwards on the bed, laying down in defeat. This was becoming infuriating, not to mention exhausting. How was I meant to practice something if I couldn‘t even begin to grasp it? This 

stupid energy that was a byproduct of my curse. 

Squeezing my eyes shut, I tried again once more, digging as deep as physically possible. 

Grab it already. It‘s there. It‘s literally right there.’ 

Just grab it! 

... And then I felt it. 

My eyes immediately flew open as I felt the energy weakly pulse inside me. 

Just a dim flickering. Not much, but just enough to know it was there. 

‘HOLD IT. 

| gritted my teeth, fighting against all the different forces working against me... the collar, my now weaker body, the pure effort required to just utilise the energy itself... but it wasn‘t enough. 

| exhaled once more in release, heaving at the air around me. 

It was gone. Gone just as quickly as it had shown itself. 

But I couldn‘t discredit the noticeable differences and how they were definitely better when compared to my past experiences. There was no dizziness... no nosebleeds… no nausea. Not yet at least. It was mostly just aching and exhaustion from the attempts. 

What had been the trigger? My frustration? ...Emotion? I supposed that made sense. All the times it had come to me in the past were under circumstances of higher emotional investment. But would knowing that actually make it any easier? 

For now, I just needed to repeat this over and over again until I trained my body to grasp it on will, each time trying to hold it for a few seconds longer. 

And so, even though I knew how much it was probably going to hurt, I smiled at the excruciatingly slow grind ahead of me. 

How naive of me to think that at one point i‘d thoughi squats were bad 

“What the hell happened to you?” Aletic asked the next morning, eyeing off my appearance 

1 yawned but managed to bow my head in greeting per protocol 

“Good morning,” I said sleepily. “I didn‘t get much rest. Sorry for all of the fuss.” 

“I thought you were dead,” he said with all seriousness 

I‘d ended up staying up all night practising, pushing myself to my limit, before finally passing out sometime in the early morning My exhaustion had been so bad though that an attendant had to enter my guest lodgings with a master key after I‘d failed to answer the door. Apparently. Alenc had nearly smashed it down from knocking and had thought something had happened to me 

In actuality, I was just dead to the world sleeping. 

“I‘m sorry,” I repeated, though this time trying to make it sound more genuine. 

He sighed but his shoulders didn‘t relax. “It‘s fine. Grab your stuff and let‘s get going.” 

I wondered whether this had scared him off from ever bringing me with him again but I went back inside t o pack without questioning it. Truthfully, I wasn‘t even sure if I ever wanted to go to another meeting like this again but knew it was best not to push my luck whilst he was like this. I could tell that what I‘d done had really struck a nerve with him. 

little since the morning but my sleepless night was quickly catching up to me. Every inch of my body was aching for

I eventually drifted off to

voice called out

move, my eyelids

it repeated.

awake to see

can sleep inside,” he said,

siemmed from weighing up whether it would be better to stay in the car

we entered but I did my best to ignore them. All of them probably had a plethora of questions that I didn‘t care to answer. Instead, I followed silently

went back in there? Would I never want to leave

the door off sceptically.

behind me and placed a hand

the morning. Hopefully, he won‘t care whether

Chapter Sixty Nine 

Aleric‘s fault, his presence probably wasn‘t making the situation any better given the circumstances of why I hated this

I‘d ever dare to admit aloud. Why was it that this place continued to drain me more than anything else these days? Ironically, it

I finally decided. ‘I am not her and I will not cower.’

open then and took a second to take it all in. The overly familiar scenery,

it as far back as I could.

the literal authority of a goddamn Goddess, then there was no way I was going to let a room destroy me.

My goal was to get stronger. And

Hopefully, within all of that, I could also prevent an apocalypse in the process. It was just baby steps. Should be easy enough,

tone dismissing him. “I‘ll be okay from

should insist on staying or not, but he finally

his hand on the door. “Have a good

so often and I‘ll start thinking you have

smiled. “Unfortunately, just one very annoying

a Beta heir. This trip had been a nice reminder of what it felt like to speak freely again. Though not entirely free. Not as

not going

my bag down by the door,

with someone romantically had ended up being a mistake. I‘d been broken already once and had stupidly dragged myself back into

eyes narrowing. “I‘m telling you that you were right. At least about one thing. Are you

up my head anymore but I wasn‘t under any false pretence. Even though my make–up covered up the worst of m

No good wasting time with my

would still remain weak no matter how much I worked out. But even a

Chapter Sixty Nine 

of the two. The one that drained me more than just physically

before, slowly holding the energy inside me for longer periods of time. And whilst it may have only been a few

exhaustion finally became too much sometime after dark. I‘d had two nights of minimal sleep and my body was already overworked thanks to the

strength left inside... I passed out.

That is until I was suddenly awoken by the sound of my front door clicking open, a

the time via

in the morning. Why would anyone

bed and threw a robe over my nightgown. If this was an attendant then they were about to have

called out.

Silence. 

“...Aleric...?” 

someone‘s footsteps

was bad. This was really bad.

to listen to the darkness around m e. But I knew the unfortunate reality was that they would be able to see me easily with their better vision. Hell, maybe they could even hear the sound of my heart

were my options?

No, there was no way I‘d be fast enough. Hide? Nope, they probably could see me right now anyway. Order them to stand down? No, that option was way too risky and would probably not work given how much I‘d exhausted my body

room, he would be

as much

“ALE–.” 

shut, a wall of muscle encircling around my body. He‘d appeared from thin air; my senses having failed entirely to alert

werewolf standards, this guy was built impossibly large. Maybe even larger than some of our

hell was

mouth from making any further attempts to call for help. There was nothing I could do,

Chapter Sixty–Nine 

without any issue whatsoever.

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