Free Emanate: Insight Series ((Insight) Web of Hearts and Souls) by Jamie Magee Page A

Donalt vanished along with the cold, the whispers, the evil I felt in the room.
    For a few seconds , I managed to stand, but then the room began to slide at awkward angles around me. The next thing I felt was the stone floor, the next thing I saw was darkness.
    It was quiet, so quiet. Then out of the vast darkness , I saw something. A small, vague light. I walked forward, trying to reach it, trying to find my way back to consciousness.
    Within that light, I saw something familiar: Aella, or rather me. Only now the image was reflecting bright blue eyes. The last time I was knocked out cold by Donalt, I faced an image of myself, along with an image of Nathaniel—I left that deep dream with a curse. A curse of changing the weather with the slightest emotion. I wasn’t going back down that road again, especially since I’d just recently overcome that. 
    I recoiled, moved further into the darkness. I would not openly accept that curse—any curse— again.
    M y image with blue eyes moved forward, and though she gave me no words, she invaded my mind with knowledge. With images of Justus at every age.
    The images didn’t stop there. They started to reflect another world, another voice. I saw a woman with ivory skin and dark auburn hair. She was silent but strong. The scent of warm honey encased me. Her lips never moved, but I clearly heard, “Listen to your First, my precious Fated.”
    Part of me wanted to stay and understand this, figure out who she was or what she meant with the words I heard her speak, but then a bigger part of me said to r un, said that this was a trick. That part won. I was not going back to the pain I had escaped. I was furious that I was ever put through that in the first place.
    I ran into the darkness , and all at once my eyes flew open with a gasp.
    Where the hell am I?
    It looked like a bar, some kind of tavern. I was in a dark corner in a round booth whose cushions were torn and tattered. It smelled sour. If that weren’t odd enough, the black robe over me surely was. I was dressed to be in public in Esterious, hidden behind a tent of clothing.
    This tavern was full of people , mostly men, but there were a few women in here that looked like they had seen better days for sure. It was almost like I was sucked back in time to the 1800s, Esterious style.
    “Sleep well, Sovereign?” Justus said in a hushed voice.
    That was when I noticed his arm around me, when I realized I was leaning into him. I jolted away and on instinct pushed the hood on my head back, but he stopped me from revealing my face.
    “Where am I ?” I breathed.
    “Underground.” He nodded wryly to the bartender who noticed my abrupt movement.
    My eyes dodged away from her , trying to understand how I was in Esterious, how I was hearing laughter, seeing people at ease in this dark, secluded room. There was even some kind of game going in the corner that looked like a cross between pool and golf. It was clear by the crowd around the four players that heavy bets were placed on the game that was in play.
    A waitress that was showing way too much cleavage came to the table where we sat. She filled the glass in front of Justus and leered at me.
    Justus threw what looked and smelled like a bar of lye soap toward her. “We’ll take that privacy now,” he said sinfully to her.
    She seemed disappointed as she picked up the bar of soap , but she never said a word as she pulled a tin door across the front of our table, locking me in a makeshift stinky box with Justus.
    I could hear whistles and catcalls from the other side of the thin wall, but that was soon stifled as the most horrible music in creation began to play. I could not even fathom a word to describe it.
    “Get me out of here ,” I said in a harsh whisper as the walls seemed to close in around me.
    “If you had left when I told you to , we would be in Chara by now. But no, you wanted a history lesson. So now we are stuck here until he gives up his hunt.”
    I grasped my