A Gift from the Goddess by Dawn Rosewood novel Chapter 94

A week. 

I lasted a week before I started to get restless, wondering how much longer I‘d need to wait before my body could finally cope again. 

But surely a week was long enough, right? Enough that I would be allowed to begin what I wanted to? 

And so I quickly grabbed the clipboard at the end of my bed, the one that was for my medical chart, and flipped the pages over to start writing on the blank side. 

...And I closed my eyes, concentrating as I gave myself over to the old side of me that knew how to effectively strategise an enemy. 

It took several hours over the course of three days before I finally finished. To be safe, I only worked within small windows every day, choosing to do so between when I would get another dose of pain medication and when I would need to let myself sleep. This was something delicate and I knew I needed t o be at my most relaxed for it to work. 

By the time I was done, it was an in–depth timeline of everything since I‘d been reborn. Correlating the different events to everything I knew Thea had done, and then using those to theorise why it had been done the way it had been. Even in the moments she hadn‘t done something, I was still able to use it to better understand it all. 

… This was it. 

This was a 101 guide to Thea over the last four years 

Now I just needed to have a meeting with the others to let them know. Something I was sure Aleric would be less than pleased with considering I was meant to still be resting. 

Fuck it. 

I knew the time window was perfect. This would be my only chance until tomorrow. 

...Not to mention, that thing* had finally arrived earlier. 

And so I threw my legs over the side of the bed, getting slowly dressed into some normal clothes, and started heading towards the meeting hall. Knowing Aleric, he was probably going to be there this time of the day. 

“Where are you going?” a voice then said behind me, making me jump in surprise. 

| quickly turned around to see Brayden there, right outside my hospital room. 

“… To see Aleric,” I replied, my voice a little tense at seeing him. 

It was because of him. 

If he had just done what he was told, none of this would have happened. 

But as I looked at him more closely, I noticed how he looked exhausted. He had dark circles under his eyes and didn‘t have that normal confident air about him that used to annoy me so much. 

“You‘re not supposed to be leaving your room,” he said. “Aleric was pretty strict on that.” 

“So, you follow orders now?” | replied back a bit coldly. 

*Breathe.* 

And I sighed, clearing my head. I needed to remember that there was no reason for me to get angry now. 

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“..I‘m sorry, Arla,” he said, his face crumbling a bit 10 show how quilty he felt, “I didn‘t. I didn‘t realise. I Just wanted to stop her from getting away. If I‘d known she was going to do that 10 you, I never would have engaged in battle. I feel terrible.” 

“Don‘t apologise to me,” I said. “Just.. learn and do better.” 

And with that, I turned around, continuing on iny way to where I wanted to go. 

“W–wait! Aria, seriously! We‘ve got this whole place on lockdown because you‘re injured. You can‘t just leave. Please. I don‘t want you to get hurt again because of me.” 

“Brayden,” I said calmly, turning back around to face him. “Stop If I thought I couldn‘t cope with this then I would still be in bed. I‘ve been stuck inside for over a week now. If you‘re so scared of Aleríc, just accompany me to the meeting hall yourself.” 

And so he did just that, though begrudgingly. Going as far as to drive me himself with several other 

wasn‘t complaining though. Whilst I was pretty sure that Thea wouldn‘t publicly attack m e on my way there in broad daylight, it didn’t mean the extra precautions weren‘t necessary. 

“...What are you trying to say?” I heard Aleric‘s voice speak from the other side of the meeting hall‘s door 

I had followed his scent to one of the smaller adjoined meeting rooms and found the door slightly ajar, allowing for me to hear inside. 

“I‘m saying we should consider hiding her somewhere else for a while,” Cai‘s voice then replied, “You‘re basically using all your available people to just keep her safe right now. Clearly, Thea knows where she is o r she wouldn‘t keep sending rogue attacks along the border to split your people and weaken your defences. It won‘t be long before you‘re fighting a battle from both within and outside.” 

“I‘m not saying you‘re wrong but–.” Aleric‘s voice then cut off abruptly mid–sentence, followed only seconds later by a disappointed sigh. 

“...Come in, Aria,” he finished. 

I‘d forgotten how sharp his senses were. Sharper than anyone else‘s. 

| slowly pushed the door open and entered, finding the two of them alone as they discussed the current issues the pack was facing Things they‘d obviously been keeping from me while I was resting. And they were probably right to do so. If I‘d known we had been suffering attacks because of me, I probably wouldn‘t have been able to sit by as idly as I had been. 

“You‘re not supposed to be here,” Aleric said. 

“I know...,” I replied, coming over to sit opposite them at the table. “I feel well enough to walk though.” 

“Looks like you‘ve done more than just walk,” he said, staring down at all the pages of writing I was carrying with me. 

I bit at the inside of my cheek. 

“This is important. This is... everything you need to know about Thea. Everything I was able to figure out. If we really are undergoing attacks then this might be able to help us come up with a better plan” 

I looked up to Cai and saw his expression still stony, eyes narrowed. It wasn‘t as bad as it was... but he still didn‘t trust me. Fair enough. 

“I just need you all to sit and listen to me for a bit,” I continued. “This is going to take a while but it‘s important you all understand. The only way this works is if we start to trust each other implicitly. Any doubt or concerns over what the others are doing and she‘ll just use that as fuel” 

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Chapter Ninety–Four 

And Cai exhaled, softening his expression enough to tell me he was going to at least give me that much. 

“This is a timeline of everything,” I started, laying out the pages in front of me. “I‘ve used the events I‘ve experienced in this lifetime in conjunction with the things I‘ve learnt about Thea‘s history, to try and figure out how she operates. Luckily for us, she unintentionally told me more than she probably should have. I‘ve broken up her weaknesses into three key components; distance, detachment, distraction.” 

I grabbed my pen and wrote it down on a fresh page so they could follow along. 

“But, firstly, I need to tell you about the abilities themselves,” I said. “You two probably have never tried to figure it out since you‘ve just let it flow naturally. I, on the other hand, wasn‘t that fortunate and had to learn how to control it due to being stuck in the collar. The most important thing to know is that these abilities are primarily powered by emotional energy. The more intense feeling you‘re experiencing, the easier it is to utilise. So, for Aleric, that would usually be in the heat of battle when you‘re in high–stress situations, taking advantage of a heightened ability of strength and better senses, and... for Cai....” 

My eyes flicked back up to meet his. “An emotional drive helps create an atmosphere of devotion. It‘s something you probably won‘t understand completely unless you ever meet a proper God in person. Basically, it‘s like an intense pressure to give in and appease them, gravitating without even fully realising it‘s happening. A form of manipulation, even if not intentional.” 

And he instantly averted his gaze, realising what I was implying in my explanation. 

“Our abilities originate from Thea though – *not* Selene,” I continued, turning back to the pages on the table. “So if that‘s how our abilities work, it‘s logical to assume that it‘s also how hers work too. Which brings me to the first of her weaknesses – ‘detachment‘. All of her moves against me since the beginning were solely aimed at triggering a negative reaction. Because the more emotional I felt in that moment, the easier it was for her to weave her way in and magnify those already existing fears I had. It‘s how she eventually ended up taking over too; waiting until I was completely at rock bottom so I would give in to everything she was saying. Detaching yourself and reducing those spikes in emotional changes will help with keeping her out. The only one of us who doesn‘t need to worry about that one as much… is Cai.” 

“Thea admitted to me herself that it doesn‘t work on him in the same way it does on me… or, if looking at the previous timeline, Aleric.” 

“That can‘t be right,” Cai spoke up finally. “She was messing with me for months. No, actually, it was worse than that. Thinking about it now, it was a few months short of a whole year.” 

“Right, but you said so yourself– you didn‘t lose your sanity like I did,” I pointed out. “She can only manipulate you on a surface level because you‘re both too similar. Where hers is an outward focus in swaying others to see things her way, yours is more internal in how people perceive you specifically, both stemming from a manipulation in perception. She said it‘s like two magnets of the same polar, pushing away from each other. I take that to mean she convinced you of the physical effects of the mate–bond, like sparks, scent etc, opposed to you actually *feeling the attachment to her. You sort of never expressed that much interest in her emotionally when you spoke about ‘Caitlyn... something that was truthfully a bad sign from the beginning. If you are ever able to experience a mate bond one day, and I mean a *real one*, you‘ll know exactly what I mean. When that bond is formed... it‘s like nothing else, no one else. It takes over both your body *and* mind – not just one of those.” 

“I met with Selene in person who showed me the entirety of our kind‘s origin,” I continued. “Rather, I saw Thea‘s origin. She used to be pretty normal. Hardworking, dedicated to the people she cared for. She gave up her entire life just to make them happy. But when she was finally at her happiest, everything was ripped away from her. It destroyed her.” 

“I don‘t disagree,” I said. “It‘s not going to be easy, I know. We definitely still need to figure out a proper plan. However, in the meantime ... I was going to say that I didn‘t entirely disagree with what you were saying to Aleric earlier.”