ELEVEN
My knees collided painfully with the earth, body folding in on itself. Each breath felt like razors in my burning, raw throat. Everything ached.
"Right on time, Aster," Indra's voice, soft and carefree, cut through the aching.
I looked up—too quickly, given the sharp slice of pain in my head. The Mothers sat comfortably in their high-backed chairs.
My fingers pressed into my temples. "What was that?"
"Yes, that was unfortunate," Avani observed, rising gracefully and moving to my side, positioning one deep brown hand on my forehead and the other on the back of my neck. Soothing coolness bled beneath the surface, driving the pain away. "You encountered the closest thing to our raw power in your realm."
"Does that always happen?" I asked with a shudder, imagining some poor, unsus
