Black Blood (Series of Blood Book 4) by Emma Hamm (scary books to read .TXT) 📕

could no longer hold. Wren stood in the center of the chaos, her vibrant hair swirling in the wind.

Jiminy, her Dream Walker, reached for her just as her foot touched a portal.

“No!”

The scream sliced through her as though a blade drove into her chest. She felt his heartache, his pain, his worry, but most of all the incredible sense of loss.

He loved her, she realized. He loved her so much that he hadn’t realized it himself.

Wren’s thread thrummed, urging her forward in time so she could find the girl. Find the woman who already meant so much to Pitch.

To her.

She zoomed through the golden threads, her mind searching for the bright light that tasted of a thousand and one emotions. There. Surrounded by dark smoke, Wren’s thread was weak and infected by Malachi’s poison.

Stepping into this future made gorge rise in the back of her throat. Stomach acid burned as she glimpsed what Malachi’s plans were. Use the Legion as his personal library of creatures. Take over the world. Destroy everything until he was the only person left to burn.

There was only one other option. Let him kidnap hundreds of others, devour their souls, and destroy so many lives. But Wren was needed to save the world. Lydia had already promised her for that.

She felt blood drip from her physical body’s nose as Time pressed down upon her shoulders. This choice was a final one. She couldn’t fix what she now chose.

A story from her childhood blinked through her memory. A train barrels toward a group of five people tied up on the train tracks. She could flip a switch for it to kill one person and save the five. The bottom line of the story was to kill one and save the many.

But what if the one could save the world?

There was no right choice in this situation. Only two wrong choices which led her straight to hell.

She desperately reached forward through Time, her voice and magic so strong that she felt it bend to her will. Pitch had always been the one to manipulate the future for her. She sent him on errands and hoped he did what she told him to.

Now it was her turn. Her magic sparkled like fine champagne. She jumped from thread to thread, searching for the one piece of the future she could change that would stop this.

“Jiminy,” she whispered both in the mind and through physical lips.

He was the key. His love was strong enough to find her, but he would need help. She found his line of the future, floating through his bedroom while he raged at his loss.

She jumped onto another line. Lyra, the little Siren on his team, had connections. She would be the first to search for answer for although she was selfish, there was also a thread of kindness in her. The Black Market was the next step, she would search for a group of Harpies who would give her amulets.

She had gone too far. Racing backward in time, she thrust herself back into Lyra’s line. They would search for Wren but they would go through the Five.

For a second, she jumped onto the light representative of Time. A burst of awareness and recognition made her leap back, her mind feeling as though it was burning.

“That was a mistake,” she whispered. She heard Pitch shouting her name, but she wasn’t done yet.

Lydia ignored her body’s convulsions. There was a puzzle to solve that her mind could figure out. Bodies were insignificant.

She swirled around Lyra, pausing time as she and the Five stood in a meeting room. The air was heavy with magic, but she cut through it. No one would notice she was here. No one but Lyra, whom she would use like a puppet.

White light pooled like mist on the ceiling above Lyra. It funneled down and burrowed into her ears, unnoticed by any. Lydia needed to not only invade her body, but also take control of it.

Siren minds were unusually locked for such a weak willed creature.

There were many secrets hidden here. Lydia whispered through the walls of protection Lyra had built around herself.

“She is hidden in a mountain. Search in the Ice Realm for her magical signature.”

Lyra repeated the words as though in a trance.

“Good,” Lydia whispered. “Now this is just for you, Lyra. I’m sorry I had to use your body and mind like this. I will make it up to you. Until we meet again.”

Certain that the future would remain safe, she loosed her hold. Lydia sank back into her physical form and pain exploded behind her eyes.

She arched off the floor, her spine bowing as pins and needles vibrated from her hands to her neck. Everything was black, not blurry, but black as night.

“Pitch?” She asked as her hands dug into the carpet. “Pitch, where are you?”

Warm hands covered her own. She felt the velvet touch of his lips before he murmured, “Right here with you, my love.”

“What happened?”

“You tell me.”

She had overdone it. Her body, although strong, was still too weak to house the power she needed to. Slumping back to the floor, she tried to ignore the pain tingling from every limb. “I saved Wren.”

“She’s in danger?”

“Malachi already has her.”

His hand convulsed, bruising her fragile bones. “When?”

“Just now. I manipulated Time by myself. I traveled through Wren’s line and found someone who could find her. They will retrieve her and she will be relatively unhurt.”

“Relatively?”

“He will not be kind.”

Pitch cursed. Her hand dropped to the floor, and she heard him pace in a circle around her. “What can we do?”

“Nothing.”

“We can’t leave her there.”

“Her people will find her soon.”

“You are certain?”

She tried to access the future once more, but stopped when lightning flashed behind her blind eyes. Blood trickled out of her nose. Pressure built behind her eyes until they threatened to pop out of her skull. “Yes.”

“What are you doing?” He paused in his pacing.

“I tried to see the future again. My body didn’t like it.”

“I thought you