Chapter 32
Chapter
Thirty-Two
Idon’t know how long I sit on the edge of the bed, my palm stroking his cheek as I watch the rise and fall of his chest. Each breath he takes feels like a miracle and a countdown all at once. The healer’s words echo in my head—We do not cure him—and I want to scream at the wrongness of it.
He’s immortal. He’s been alive since before humans learned to speak. He’s fought gods and monsters and the fabric of reality itself. Surely that has to count for something. Surely he’s strong enough to fight this off. To pull himself back from whatever edge the venom is dragging him toward.
I press my hand to his chest, feeling the steady thump of his heart beneath my palm, and I pray. Not to any god I know the name of, but to whatever force in this universe decided he was worth creating in the first place.
Don’t take him. Please. Not like this.
The skin around his wound has turned a sickly orange-brown, like dying leaves, and even with the salve dulling the pain, I can see the tension in his jaw, the tightness around his eyes. He’s fighting even in sleep.
As if he can feel me looking at him, his eyes open slowly, and I watch as awareness returns—the pain first, sharp and immediate, then confusion about where he is, and finally recognition when his gaze finds mine.
“Hey,” I whisper, my voice cracking.
“Hey.” He tries to smile and can’t quite manage it. He fumbles for my hand, then grips it with a ferocity that suggests I’m the only thing anchoring him here. “How long?”
“Couple of hours.” I blink rapidly, battling back tears. “How do you feel?”
He’s quiet for a moment, and I watch him take inventory of his body, of the poison working through his system.
“I’m losing,” he finally says, the brutal honesty like a kick to the gut.
“No. No. You’re immortal, dammit. You don’t get to lose to a fucking wolf bite.”
“Cora—”
“No.” Tears stream down my face, and I taste salt as I clench his hand hard. “You fight. You hear me? You have to fucking fight this.”
He reaches up with his free hand and wipes at my cheek with his thumb. “I am fighting,” he says. “I’m losing.”
Something breaks open in my chest. “No. Dammit, no. I didn’t survive everything I’ve survived just to lose you now. You don’t get to leave me. You don’t get to—”
I can’t finish. I’m sobbing now, and he pulls me down to him, his arms coming around me with a strength I didn’t think he still had.
“Listen to me,” he says, his voice rough against my ear. “You’re going to be okay. With or without me, you’re going to be okay.”
“I don’t want to be okay without you.”
“I know.” He strokes my hair, and I feel him shaking—from pain or fear or both. “But you will be. Because you’re stronger than you know. Stronger than I am.”
I pull back to look at him. “That’s not true.”
“It is.” His golden eyes hold mine, fever-bright and fierce. “You have power, Cora. Real power. Deep down, you know what you are. Who you are. The Emperor’s blood runs through you, and that’s not nothing. Hell, it’s everything.”
I start to answer, but he keeps going, his grip on me tightening.
“But Cora—listen to me. Don’t trust Adric.
Whatever he offers you, whatever he promises—don’t fall for his charms. He wants only what’s best for Adric.
Always. Everything he does, every move he makes, it’s for him. Not for you. Not for anyone else.”
“Chase.”
“Promise me.” His voice is urgent now, cutting through the haze of fever. “Promise me you won’t trust him. No matter what he says. No matter how good it sounds.”
I nod, my throat tight. “I promise.”
His entire body seems to sag with relief. “Promise me you’ll learn to use your power. Don’t be scared of it. Trust it. Griff will help you. You’ll find others. Don’t let the barriers fall.”
“Stop.” My voice shakes. “Don’t talk like you’re dying.”
“I am dying. It turns out immortality can end. Who knew?” He takes my hand, his grip so weak it makes me want to weep. “Or maybe it can’t. Maybe someday, we’ll find each other again.”
I can barely see him through my tears, and I gasp, choking on my sobs, wishing I could cure him as easily as he pulls a blade from the sky.
“You have so much power, Cora. Use it. Trust yourself. Be strong. You’ll be fine without me.”
“Stop.” I’m crying again, harder now. “Stop talking like you’re already gone.”
“I’m not gone.” He pulls me down for a kiss, and I taste salty tears—mine or his, I don’t know. “I’m right here. Right now.”
“Then stay here.” I kiss him back desperately, trying to pour everything I feel into it—love and terror and refusal and need. “Stay with me.”
“Come here,” he says roughly, and I do. I ease onto the bed beside him, and his hands find me even through the pain, pulling me close.
We kiss like we’re drowning, like we’re already saying goodbye, and I hate it.
I hate that this might be the last time.
I hate that the venom is winning and there’s nothing I can do.
Except there has to be something. There has to be.
His hands are on my skin, sliding under fabric, and heat blooms between us despite everything. Despite the poison and the pain and the fear. Because this is us, and we’re still here, and I need him to know.
“I love you,” I whisper against his mouth.
“I have loved you forever,” he says back. “I never thought I could love you even more. But I can. I do.”
His fingers tease between my legs, and I whimper. “Chase, no. You’re hurt.”
“I’m more than hurt,” he says. “I’m dying. But I need you before I go.”
I want to run from the room. To hide in a corner and weep.
Instead, I let him undress me, then help him slide out of his clothes, grateful the painkillers seem to be doing their job.
I’m careful, though, but there’s nothing careful in the way he touches me, like he’s memorizing every inch, like he needs this as much as I do.
Considering how hard he is, I think he does.
I hate knowing that loving him like this might hurt him, but I still want it.
And I hate myself a little bit for that, too.
“I won’t survive losing you,” I whisper.
“You will,” he says, then presses a finger to my lips.
“Now,” he murmurs, holding my hips and shifting me, our eyes locked on each other as I straddle him.
As his cock fills me. As his eyes go dark with need despite the pain etched around them.
I move slowly, testing, and he groans my name like a prayer.
We find a rhythm that doesn’t hurt him, and I lose myself in it—in him—in the desperate need to prove we’re both still alive.
His hands guide me, hold me, claim me. And when I break apart above him, it’s with his name on my lips and tears on my face, because this is too much and not enough. Not even close to enough.
He follows me over the edge with a shudder and a broken sound, and then we’re just breathing together, holding on.
After, I curl against his too-hot chest and listen to his heartbeat. It’s steady now, but for how long? The thought makes fresh tears spill down my cheeks.
“Look at me,” he says softly.
I do. His eyes are starting to glaze with fever.
“I meant what I said. You will be fine. You know what you are. You have power. You just have to trust it.”
You know what you are.
The words linger like a tease. Like a crooked finger luring me down a path.
The Neutral Zone.
The flowers.
The way reality bent to my will.
I sit up with a start.
“Cora?”
“I wanted the flowers,” I say. “I wanted them, and they appeared. Flowers that should never have thrived in that desolate landscape.”
His brow furrows. “Either I’m delirious from fever, or you’re not making sense.”
I press my hand to his forehead. He’s burning up, beads of sweat on his skin, his hair damp. I squeeze his hand hard. “Fight,” I say. “Don’t ever stop fighting. I’ll be back soon. I think—Chase, I think there’s a chance, so you have to hang on.”
I dress in record speed, then squeeze his hand once more. “Hold on,” I repeat, and I kiss him again, deep and hard, wanting to leave him with something to fight for.
Then I pull away and race for the door. “I love you,” I say. “So don’t you dare die before I get back.”
And then I take off running.
I don’t know how I find my way to the library.
I should be lost in this maze of a castle, turned around by identical corridors and endless staircases.
But somehow my feet know where to go, carrying me down and down through levels that grow quieter, cooler, until I’m standing before massive double doors of dark wood banded in brass.
I don’t slow. I hit the doors with both palms and they swing open, and then I’m inside.
The library opens before me like a cathedral to knowledge itself.
The ceiling soars impossibly high, disappearing into shadows that even the chandeliers can’t reach.
Bookshelves tower on every side, creating corridors of leather and paper that seem to stretch on forever.
The air smells of old parchment and ink and something else—something magical, like the space between lightning and thunder.
And there, in a cozy armchair near a reading lamp, sits Uncle Finn with a single book open in his lap.
“Uncle Finn!” I run to him, my bare feet slapping against cold stone.
He looks up slowly, his expression befuddled, like he’s not quite sure what he’s seeing. “Cora?” He blinks, then smiles in that loose, dreamy way. “Oh. You’re here too. Did your mother send you?”
My heart lurches. “What?”
“We talk about books. Have you ever seen such an incredible library?” He leans forward, crooking his finger to draw me closer. “It’s just a dream, of course, but I have so missed my big sis.”
I blink back tears, wishing I had the time to tell him that I’m so sorry that Kali got him twisted into this strange half-dream reality. And that I’d come here to rescue him. And even though that plan’s all gone to hell, somehow, I’ll find a way to get him back home.
Right now, better to just let him think his body’s back in his cluttered house, tucked into a comfy reading chair.
“A dream,” he whispers as I crouch beside his chair.
“Have you explored the library?”
“Oh, yes. It’s a little bit of heaven. Such a collection. I don’t think I’ve even explored half of it.”
“What about books on medicine? On healing. Have you seen anything like that?”
He considers this, his brow furrowing in concentration. “Medicine…yes. Through the second arch, I think.” He gestures vaguely toward the far side of the room. “Or maybe the third? The dreams are all mixed up sometimes.”
“Thank you.” I squeeze his hand. “I’ll come back soon. We’ll talk more then. I promise.”
“It’s fine, sweetheart.” His smile is peaceful, content. “This is a dream I’m happy to stay lost in. You go ahead. I’ll pass the time chatting with your mother.”
My heart twists. I’m glad he’s not scared, not suffering. But the fact that he’s so detached from reality that he thinks I’m just another dream and my dead mother is with him… Well, that breaks something in me.
But I can’t think about that now. All that matters is Chase.
“I love you,” I whisper, then I’m up and running toward the arches he indicated.
I pass through the first arch and keep going, my heart hammering.
The second arch opens into a circular room that takes my breath away.
Shelves line the walls from floor to ceiling, curving around in an unbroken circle.
There must be thousands of books here, maybe tens of thousands, all of them ancient and strange.
I stop in the center of the room and turn slowly, overwhelmed. There’s no order I can see, no system. The spines are marked in dozens of languages, some glowing faintly with symbols I don’t recognize. How am I supposed to find anything in here?
I start walking along the perimeter, my eyes scanning titles I can’t read. My hands trail along the spines as I pass, and that’s when I notice it—the ring on my finger is warm.
Not burning, just…noticeable.
I stop walking and take five steps back, away from the shelves. The warmth fades slightly. I take a step forward, and it grows warmer again.
It’s guiding me.
I close my eyes and hold my hand out like a divining rod, thinking of Chase and begging for the cure as I turn slowly, waiting for the heat to intensify.
It does, and I walk in that direction, following the warmth as it pulses and grows until I’m standing before a section of shelves that look older than the rest, the leather bindings cracked and faded.
But which book?
I draw a breath, thinking again of the garden I made with Adric. About pulling what I desired up through the earth.
This time, I just need a little wiggle. A simple sign.
Even as I think that, a thin clothbound book slides out, as if an invisible hand were tugging it off the shelf.
I reach for the book, pulling it free as the ring pulses heat against my skin.
Please. Please be the cure.
I put the book on a reading table, then press my hand to it, whispering that I need the cure.
Beneath my skin, the book seems to tremble, as if working hard to keep a wild energy contained, an analogy that seems even more accurate a moment later when I pull my hand away and the pages flip of their own accord, finally stopping on a page written in an ornate calligraphy in an alphabet and language I can’t read at all.
“English,” I say, striving to make the word an order, not a request.
To my shock and delight, the words shimmer, and I watch, transfixed, as the letters slide and shift and rearrange themselves like living things.
They flow across the page, reforming into shapes I recognize, words I can read.
The transformation spreads from the top of the page to the bottom, and then it’s done.
English. Clear and simple and devastating.
I look down and read.
My breath catches. My vision blurs with tears. This is it. This is how I save him.
And with the book held tight in my hand, I bolt out of the library with hope paving my way…but the horrible knowledge of what I must acquire hanging over me like a sword.