Chapter 83: THE WEIGHT OF HIS EYES

Alda's POV

Siofra's voice slowly dragged me out of what felt like a bottomless void of pitch-black darkness. As the fog in my mind cleared, I was startled to find her standing there, clutching her chest in agony. A profound, crushing pain was written vividly across her elven features. Her free hand gripped my arm tightly, holding onto me as if I were the only anchor keeping her from collapsing entirely.

“Siofra, are you okay?” I asked, panic instantly flooding my chest.

“Alda... are you back to your senses?” she whispered, her voice incredibly weak and strained.

“Was I... out of it?” I muttered, the words meant more for myself than for her.

My eyes frantically scanned our environment, and a cold shock hit me when I suddenly felt the sharp chill of the wind biting at my face and tangling my hair. What on earth were we doing back on the cliff? I could have sworn that just a single moment ago, we were standing inside my parents' quiet sitting room.

“You don't remember bringing us here, do you?” Siofra asked, her eyes searching mine.

I shook my head slowly, utterly confused and terrified by the gap in my own memory. “I brought us here? Why?” I asked, the questions piling up in my chest without a single answer.

“I don't know, but you suddenly said you needed to remember,” Siofra explained, her voice trembling. “But let's just get the hell out of here. I don't know what's happening, Alda, but it feels like bringing you back to the places that hold your trauma was a very bad idea.”

She made a desperate attempt to stand on her own, but the moment she shifted her weight, her legs completely gave out beneath her.

I lunged forward, catching her in my arms before she could hit the dirt. Looking at her ghostly, pale face, a heavy sense of responsibility washed over me. “I think we should consider walking out of here in one body,” I suggested gently, helping her up.

I pulled back my consciousness, opening myself up to let her spirit step into my body. The moment her essence adjusted and fused with mine, a wave of pure, debilitating weakness crashed through me. I could feel her exhaustion in my very bones.

What on earth happened to me? I thought, my mind racing. I could distinctively remember staring at my parents' old photographs, and then... nothing. It felt as though I had been violently swept into a hollow void, letting something dark take the wheel.

“Do you think you can take us out of here?” I asked her internally.

“I could try,” Siofra murmured against my mind. “Where should we go?”

As she asked, a profound, heavy exhaustion settled over my heart. I couldn't go back to Xender's family home. I was certain he had already left, and after the way he looked at me—like I was a lunatic—going back there wasn't an option. I was just so incredibly tired. I wished more than anything that I could just book a quiet hotel room somewhere far away from this nightmare and sleep for days.

“How long do you think we have until the next portal arrives?” I asked Siofra, desperate for an escape back to her realm.

“I don't know,” she admitted, her thoughts laced with anxiety. “I don't even know how Elba could predict its arrival.”

I let out a heavy, defeated sigh. “I guess we are stuck with going back to Jaxon's.” I didn't even try to hide the bitter disappointment cutting through my voice.

“I guess so.”

With that, I let Siofra take over our movements. I braced myself, waiting to feel the familiar warp of the wind shifting us back to Jaxon’s living room. But when the scenery finally solidified, the walls weren't right. Instead of Jaxon's house, we were standing directly in front of my company’s building.

“Okay... this is strange,” Siofra said within my mind before I could even voice my confusion. I could hear the tremor of lingering weakness vibrating through her spirit.

“It's fine,” I said, a cold, sudden resolve hardening in my chest as I stared up at the glass building. I refused to see this destination as a mistake or a cosmic accident. I was at a point where I was just entirely fed up with everything.

The terrifying reality that the next portal might actually be my last—despite all of Siofra’s desperate promises—kept gnawing mercilessly at the back of my mind. It left me wondering if that looming expiration date was the exact reason I had blacked out earlier, letting my raw, unyielding pain lead us to the cliff.

“Alda,” Siofra called out, her mental voice softening into a deeply worried, pleading tone. “I think we both know what happened. You linked too deeply into your past pain, and that triggered the gemstone's magic. Going upstairs to see the man who caused the pain that killed your parents... it is not a good idea. And Alda... you were able to tap into my power. You controlled the gems.”

I paused at the entrance, listening as her panic escalated.

“Usually, only the elven candidates linked to the stones can control them,” Siofra urged. “But somehow, you did. We don't know what might happen to your human body if you do it again.”

A small, bitter smile crossed my lips as I reached out and pushed through the heavy glass entrance doors.

“If you're worried that I will kill him, Siofra, then don't,” I replied coldly, and every single ounce of my soul meant it. “Because that would be a far fairer death than the one he gave me.”

Heading toward the elevators, I stopped when I saw a maintenance sign placed squarely in front of the doors. Out of order. A sharp flare of impatience hit me. I immediately turned on my heel and headed for the emergency exit door, pushing through to the concrete stairwell. Seth's office was on the fifth floor; walking up wouldn't be much of a challenge.

I made my way up the first flight, my boots echoing loudly against the concrete. Second stairs, third stairs... but as I turned the corner onto the fourth flight, the sound of hurried footsteps caught my attention. I looked up and saw a figure heading down toward me.

It was Anna.

The moment her eyes landed on my face, they widened in absolute, paralyzing shock. She stumbled backward, a guttural gasp of pure horror escaping her lips as she scrambled away until her spine hit the concrete wall behind her. Her hands flew up, clapping tightly over her mouth to mask a terrified scream. She was shaking violently, staring at me as if I were a vengeful ghost she had prayed she would never have to see again.

I stopped on the steps, staring up at her. For a long, agonizing moment, I wanted to say something—anything—to her. But as I looked at the woman who had helped ruin my life, a familiar, toxic anger began to boil in my chest, choking out any words.

I took a slow step up toward her. The movement broke her paralysis, and Anna immediately made a frantic run for it, dashing wildly past me down the steps. I wasn't going to look back. I wasn't going to say a single thing to her, until a horrific, echoing clashing sound shattered the quiet stairwell behind me.

I spun around, my breath catching in my throat.

Anna had tripped. She was tumbling violently down the concrete stairs in a massive, brutal crash. My eyes widened in pure shock as I stood frozen, watching her body flip and slam against the hard steps until she finally hit the flat landing below—resting perilously close to the next flight of stairs that would have led to another terrible fall.

A painful, deep groan left her lips. She struggled against the impact, trying to stumble back up to her feet, but her hand immediately flew to her forehead. She was bleeding. A thick streak of crimson was already pouring down her face. She stood there trembling, her arms wrapping tightly around her stomach as she whimpered in agonizing pain.

And then, the blood came.

A heavy, terrifying stream of blood began running down her bare legs, staining her shoes and hitting the gray concrete.

A sharp gasp tore from my lips. Before I could move, a blood-curdling, desperate scream echoed off the walls as Anna looked down at herself. She began crying hysterically, scrambling backward in pure terror.

“No, no, no, no! Someone please help me!” she shrieked, her voice cracking with a maternal panic that pierced straight through the air.

I could see the danger before she could. I wanted to scream, to warn her about how dangerously close she was standing to the edge of the next flight of stairs behind her. But the exact moment I took a single step toward her to help, she let out another massive, terrified scream. She took a huge, frantic step backward to get away from me—and her heel slipped right over the edge.

Another horrific, heavy crash echoed through the stairwell as she tumbled down the next flight. I dashed down the steps, my heart hammering against my ribs as I reached out, desperately trying to catch her hand, to grab her clothes—anything.

But it was already too late. She had fallen too fast.

The moment her body crashed brutally into the far concrete wall at the bottom landing, she didn't move again. The crying stopped instantly. There were no more sounds, no more breathing. Just a dead, suffocating silence.

I stood completely frozen on the stairs, my entire body shaking in shock.

“What... what just happened?” I whispered to myself, my voice hollow. My eyes locked onto the pool of blood spreading across the floor below, and a sickening wave of guilt and horror made me tear my gaze away. My blood went completely cold.

“We need to call someone to help her, now! She's still alive, Alda, but she might lose the little life growing inside her!” Siofra’s voice erupted in a frantic, sobbing panic inside my head. “I can feel it... I can feel the little life fading away!”

Before I could even process Siofra's words, the heavy heavy sound of running footsteps echoed from above. I turned around, my heart leaping into my throat.

Standing on the third-floor landing—the exact spot where Anna had first slipped—was Xender. His chest was heaving, his eyes wide with an absolute, breathless shock as his gaze darted from Anna's limp, bleeding body at the bottom, straight up to me.

Xender. What on earth was he doing here?

I felt the burning weight of the unspoken accusation hanging in the air between us. I saw the sharp, questioning horror in his eyes before he broke into a sprint, dashing right past me without a word. He didn't even look at me as he ran toward the blood on the floor.

“Miss Anna! Anna, can you hear me?!” he yelled frantically, kneeling beside her. His hands hovered over her injuries, his gaze snapping back up to look at me for a split second.

And in that one second, I saw it clearly. That look. Suspicion. He thought I had done this. He thought I pushed her.

A bitter, heartbreaking smile touched my lips before I could even stop myself. The absolute irony of it cut deep into my soul.

Xender immediately whipped out his phone, his fingers trembling as he dialed emergency services. But I couldn't stay here. The walls were closing in, and I needed to leave right now, or I knew I was going to do something even more reckless.

I turned away from the horror and the blood, heading back up the stairs toward the fifth floor, where I knew I would find Seth.

“Someone fell down the stairs, and she's currently bleeding massively!” I heard Xender’s frantic voice echo up the stairwell behind me as I climbed. “Yes... there's blood running down her legs!”

As his conversation with the operator continued to ring out, I forced my legs to move faster, increasing my pace because I desperately needed to drown out the sound of his voice. I just wanted to get away. I refused to let my feelings for him break me right now.

“Alda! We have to go back down there and help her! We need to tell him the truth—we need to tell him that you didn't push her!” Siofra argued fiercely, her voice vibrating with a desperate, emotional plea.

I ignored her completely, forcing my heavy steps forward until I finally stood directly in front of the door to my former office.

“It's not my problem, Siofra,” I whispered coldly into the empty hallway, the venom dripping from my words. “She can die for all I care.”

The moment those ruthless words left my lips, a heavy, devastating silence fell over my mind. I felt Siofra go completely quiet. Her warmth, her voice, her very presence—shattered and gone. I was entirely alone.