The Beast And The Blessed

Fifty-Eight: Joselin

Joselin's P.O.V.

Cyrus threw up for a long while. The healers pushed me aside when it went from stomach acid to blood. As much as I detested vomit, even though I was able to hold back some of my own, I stayed. He needed people, and I needed answers.

A line of sweat appeared across his forehead, and every time his eyes instinctively closed as he lost his stomach, he would jerk them right back open. He hadn't been kidding about the darkness he saw when he closed his eyes.

He looked haunted and terrified. The man, who typically looked like a teenager, was nothing more than a scared little boy right now, and it broke my heart.

Tobias had his chest to my back with his hands on my hips. While half of my mind was on Cyrus in bed, there was nothing I could do until this wave of nausea passed.

The other half of my mind was zeroed in on how Tobias had his thumbs sliding along my waist to show that he supported me.

It was so comforting, but I was still waiting for him to tell me that I smelled different or that he could hear or feel a little heartbeat inside me. I wondered if he would know before I did since I was stalling.

Once again, I pushed aside those thoughts. I didn't have the courage to take a test right now, nor did I have the time to run to a store, get one and then take it without anyone seeing me.

Deal with Cora first.

I had to keep reminding myself to stay on task. Cora was the threat here; the potential of a baby inside me was not. It was a distraction, one that I could push aside until I received confirmation that it was even true. Until then, I could continue to pretend it wasn't real and focus on the actual issue.

When the healers stepped back, they looked uncertain and uneasy. Flora's hands were up like she was backing away from a rabid animal and looked exhausted.

She had healed him several times, but it hadn't held. Trauma and magic were powerful things.

water. He took a large sip, gargled it, and spat

watered as I fought back the bile pushing its

hands on my hips slightly, and while he was worried, I also sensed his amusement at

that, I would look weak, and it would

than likely still tasting his vomit. His lips pursed, and his eyelids lowered as his stomach jerked

We needed to be ready to take action

see her, but she was trapped. I had been able to talk to her, to Rona. I don't know how it worked, and it was only for

almost made me feel relieved. I knew she was a terror as a kid, and I assumed that Cora controlling her had been recent. So, I still wasn't a huge fan of Rona, but knowing that the motive behind her most recent actions wasn't her own, that she had been

was trying to find out what Cora was up to, but she didn't figure it

This was it.

his water, shuttering as he swallowed it. "Rona suspected that Cora was after me after you brought me back here. That's why she was so determined to find out what I was. Rona didn't want my power for

rail of his bed to stay out of the way of any vomit or the healers in case they needed

even more by speaking so ill of someone he had bonded with before they died. They may not have been friends or anything more than that, but they went through something awful together. He had been there, in her mind, when she

taken her mother's powers without performing the ritual on her. Once she figured that out, she spliced the two spells and found a way to get to me without facing me." A tear leaked from his eye, and he wiped

I knew I was already going to hell from my past actions, but those were all intentional, and I owned those. This one was unintentional, and that made it

would never be the

her eyes and feel her pain. We were trapped in her body, but I couldn't talk or move. Cora was ranting about how the love of her life had been taken from her, how she had

room who had been around Cora for most of his life, but he looked just as lost

I could remember, and I

saying that she should have done what

interrupted him. "What had Rona been

I didn't even know if it was Rona pulling at the chains or if I was, but neither of us were strong enough to

through Rona's to get to Cora. I wasn't even sure if that was possible, but by his lack of attacks after, I had assumed Cora had gone far enough in the ritual to suppress his magic or weaken him too much to use