Zyxel had left shortly after she had fallen asleep due to his sleep command.
When her father had returned from his discussion with Amara, he found Trinity sleeping peacefully. She hadn't even woken up when he came to get her after he'd cooked dinner. This began to worry him, but when he brought up the situation to Amara, she didn't seem too concerned about it and just informed him to let her sleep and she will be alright.
Father Kiran watched outside the window. The rain had been increasingly escalating these past two days. Hail and tornadoes had already begun forming, which Amara had been working on dispelling the twisters when they would form. Everyone had been advised to remain indoors, and schools had already been canceled for the following day.
As he stared out the window, he glanced back at Trinity's room. 'She knew this would happen. When the rain first began, she warned that it would only get worse. Did she know ahead of time that this would happen, or did she recognize the signs only after it started?'
Father Kiran curled his palm into a fist. He hated doubting his daughter, but he had no clue just how much that demon had been able to manipulate her over these past three weeks. When he heard her speak those chilling words that he had attempted to seduce her, his heart froze in shock and fear. She claims that his attempt hadn't succeeded, but how could he know for sure?
And then there was the matter of whatever had happened in the forest. She mentioned pain, burning, and fire. This fit with what she had told him about the last thing she remembered was the sense of feeling as if she was being burned alive.
However, what he couldn't understand was if he had attempted to seduce her, why would he then proceed to torture her? Was he furious that she had rejected his attempts? Or did he take pleasure in the fact that he could toy with her how he saw fit? If she hadn't seemed so determined to defend him, he would have assumed that her faith in god is what had protected her from his torture.
~*~*~*~*~
The next day, the rain, hail, and tornadoes had let up, but in its place came sleet and snow, along with dangerously high winds that continued to escalate throughout the day.
Trinity still remained fast asleep and hadn't woken even once yet.
Rachael and Jessica had both attempted to call and speak with Trinity, but all his attempts to wake her had failed.
As the hours progressed further into the day, Father Kiran grew more and more worried over her condition. Her face and body was pooling with sweat. Her expression was contorted as if she were in intense pain.
As he watched Trinity, he stared down at his hands in regret. Was this all his fault for allowing Amara to push her mind as far as she had? Should he have stepped in sooner and forced her to stop? Or was this due to something with the demon?
He looked over at the staff in the corner of the room and narrowed his eyes in anger. What had been the point of him giving this to her? She had been injured, he knew that. But why would he have given her the staff? Was it just to lower her guard with him? He just couldn't see him giving it as an attempt to help her.
That's when he had another thought. What if it was spelled? Amara had confirmed that he had spelled Trinity before, so why not an item. Trinity would have used the staff while healing from her injury, giving ample time for any spell that might have been concealed inside, to slowly take affect with her, without realizing it was happening.
This possibility made the most sense to him. Convinced that this was the root cause of her feeling protective over him, he wrapped his hand with a cloth, and grabbed the staff before exiting her room.
~*~*~*~*~
Trinity had remained asleep for a full forty-eight hours straight. When she had finally pried open her eyes, all she could feel was a deep pain in her stomach. The same sensation that she had felt before the rain had started, only this time it was more severe than before. She could feel her bed soaked with sweat, beneath her.
Groggily she peered around the room. A wooden board had been nailed to the outside of her window. Confused as to why this might have been, she pulled back the covers and forced herself to climb to her feet. She glanced in the direction of where her staff had been, only to find it wasn't there.
She scowled at the fact that it was missing. She used the bed to support her until she got to the door, then let the wall help to guide her until she could get to the living room. When she entered the edge of the open room, she noticed more boards that covered all of the windows out here as well. 'That's strange!' she thought.
She found her dad at the stove cooking. "Do you mind making me some while you are at it?" she asked in a hoarse whisper. Her throat was dry and her voice came out raspy and strained.
Her father whirled around, startled when he heard her speak. As his eyes fell on his daughter, he rushed to embrace her in a hug! "My darling girl! You're finally awake! I have been panicking with worry if you would be alright! Are you feeling ok? How is your head?" He was scared that the reason she had slept so long was because Amara had caused some type of brain damage without realizing it.
Frowning, Trinity held a hand up to her head. "My head feels fine actually! Although, my stomach feels as if it is twisted in knots." She slid slowly into a chair at the table.
"Your stomach?" her father asked, confused. "Well, you have been asleep for two days, so that would make sense. You must be starving! Let me crack a few more eggs and I will give you mine that is almost ready, then I'll cook my own! You need it more than I, right now."
"Two days?!" Trinity shrieked
Father Kiran set down a plate of seasoned scrambled eggs, sausage and buttered toast, along with a fork so she could eat.
Trinity ate the eggs slowly. The strange feeling in her stomach still felt twisted in knots, and she didn't want to end up eating too fast due to hunger.
After about ten minutes of eating, her father was done cooking and sat down opposite of her at the table. He was about to speak up when Trinity ran from the table, and began throwing up inside the sink. Little bits had spewed on the floor that had escaped before she could get to the sink in time.
As Trinity sat there bent over the sink, Father Kiran ran to help her. He grabbed a few paper towels and cleaned the outside of her mouth, then grabbed a large bowl from the kitchen cabinets before guiding her into the living room to lay down on the couch. He laid the large bowl down next to her in case she needed to use it again.
"I'm gonna call Amara over to check what's wrong, then I'm gonna get this cleaned up. He called one of the staff members inside the church to notify Amara that he needed her here, then proceeded to clean up the mess in the kitchen. Once the sink and floor was cleaned, he heard a knock at the door and quickly ran to let Amara inside.
When her father opened the door, Trinity spotted snow blowing inside the house. Her father seemed to struggle with closing the door from the high winds that were blowing around outside 'Snow?' Trinity thought, confused. 'But it's summer! And what was with that wind? Is this why all the windows are boarded over?'
"What seems to be the problem, Father?" Amara questioned as she entered the house.
Father Kiran nodded at his daughter. "I need you to evaluate Trinity for anything that the demon might have done to her. For the past two days her body has been sweating profusely. I have been trying to keep her as cool as possible, but nothing has seemed to help. And with the weather outside, I really don't understand how she is burning up so much. She finally woke up not too long ago, but she's complaining about stomach pains and isn't holding down any food. I don't want to risk taking the chance that it might just be a normal sickness."
Amara nodded. "You did the right thing by notifying me. Right now, we should assume that any strange behavior might be due to the demon's hold over her." She knelt down by Trinity's side. Holding her hand about an inch from her skin, she began running her had across her body. A soft white glow emanated from her palm.
She checked her whole body from head to toe, before finally returning back to her stomach area. She could see what Father Kiran meant by her sweating so intensely. Just in this short amount of time, Trinity had become drenched in sweat all over again.
Amara removed one hand and reached up to feel her forehead. Just like before, she felt the zap from her brother's protection spell and flinched her hand away in a rush. Her hand felt numb just from the brief half second that she had touched her skin. 'Damn him and his spells!' she said as she clenched and unclenched her hand as she worked to regain feeling back again.
"Trinity shows no signs of being physically sick, so this is definitely not a natural illness. However, I am also sensing no signs of any traces of his divine or demonic energy inside her that might be causing her to react in this way." Amara finally spoke as she finished her diagnostics check over her body. "However, despite the fact that I cannot physically touch your daughter due to his spell, I can feel that she is burning up at an alarming rate, which I'm sure you can verify yourself, as well."
Father Kiran nodded. He had definitely noticed her body temperature when he had helped her over to the couch.
"Trinity, do you know what might be causing this?" Amara asked in a sweet voice. "Did he do anything to you that might cause this?"
Weakly, shook her head no, before closing her eyes.
Trinity was grateful for the fact that she was feeling too delirious to speak properly right now. If she were to try to lie, she was afraid that Amara might be able to sense it. She was afraid of what Amara might do, if she knew.
She knew exactly what was causing it. She could sense it. However, due to Zyxel's silence spell, even if she wanted to say what was causing it, she wouldn't be able to. Zyxel made it clear that the link between a demon bonded to a human was a widely kept secret that had remained hidden even from the angels' knowledge.
She could feel that something was wrong with their link, ever since her body had become overloaded with the divine energy, that day in the forest. She just didn't know what she could do to fix it.
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(Questions in the Author's Comments below!)
Books I am currently writing:
- The Forbidden Luna
- Divine Banishment