Chapter 22 Svenn
I wake to the stench of blood and ash. Something wet and rough drags across my face.
The wet sensation comes again, insistent, accompanied by a whimpering sound.
Coral.
Her massive head hovers above mine. The wyvern's tongue flicks out, licking my cheek again.
"I'm awake," I rasp. My throat feels like I've swallowed desert sand. "I'm fine."
But Coral is not. Now that my vision is clearing, I can see the damage she took. One of her wings is torn. The membrane is shredded with arrow holes. Deep gashes run along her scales and there's fear in her golden eyes. She makes that sound again, a distressed keen that resonates in her chest.
"What's wrong?" I ask her.
Coral backs away from me. Her movements are stiff and pained. She swings her head toward something I can't see yet.
I try to sit up. My muscles scream in protest. Every fiber of my being aches with the agony that comes after losing control. I try to remember but the memories won't come. There's only darkness where the battle should be. The last thing I recall is a crack in the ground that split wider and wider.
I force myself upright using Coral's lowered neck for leverage. My hands are covered in something. Blood and black ichor.
I look around to find hundreds of bodies.
They're not elven or even fae. These are demons from Hel itself, the Hellspawn. Their savagely torn bodies lie in heaps around me. They're milky white now in death, but I can imagine how they must have looked in life. Burning with Hel's fire and hungry for mortal flesh.
Their corrosive blood pools beneath them, steaming and eating into the earth. My claws are still extended and dripping with it. Some of the demons are shredded to fucking pieces. No surprise there. Wendy is always hungry.
I walk through the field of corpses, Coral limping beside me. My throat tastes like blood. My hands are caked in it.
What the fuck did I do?
The evidence is written in the carnage all around me. Whatever emerged from the patchwork of monsters that comprises my being, it was thorough and merciless.
Coral nudges me again. She's looking past the demons toward a spot where the bodies are piled highest.
My heart splinters.
Rhianelle lies crumpled among the demon corpses, half-buried by them. She's not moving. Not even the slight rise and fall of breathing.
"No." The word comes out strangled. "No, no, no."
I'm moving before I realize it, stumbling over demon bodies in my haste. I drop to my knees beside her and my hands hover over her body. Her skin has taken on a translucent quality and her lips are colorless.
"Rhianelle!" Her name tears from my throat. "Please wake up. Open your eyes. Look at me."
Nothing.
There's no sign that she hears me at all. No flutter of eyelids, no twitch of fingers. Nothing.
I press two trembling fingers against her throat, searching for a pulse.
Please. Please be there. Please.
For a moment there's nothing. There's only my own heartbeat thundering in my ears, drowning out everything else.
Then I feel it.
A butterfly-wing faint beat beneath my fingertips.
She's alive.
There are smaller cuts and bruises all over her body. But it's the blood that terrifies me most. There's too much of it. It's everywhere. Soaking her clothes, pooling on the ground, staining my hands as I hold her.
Did I do this?
"I never meant to hurt you." I gather her into my arms with infinite care, but her head falls against my shoulder. "Rhianelle, stay with me."
I bite her neck without thinking. My fangs sink into the soft flesh where her pulse flutters weakly. Venom floods from my fangs into her bloodstream. I've seen it work countless times. The vampire's healing kiss. One of the few gifts in my arsenal of curses.
I pull back and watch desperately for any sign that it's working.
The venom should be mending her but the wounds aren't closing.
I bite her again, injecting more venom. Deeper this time. "Please, Rhianelle. Please don't leave me."
Even the bite marks I just made won't seal. My venom has healed her before. Why isn't it working?
Her breathing grows shallower. Each breath is a tiny, labored thing that barely moves her chest. I can hear fluid in her lungs.
"You can't die here," I tell her, pressing my forehead to hers. But she's not responding. She's so pale. Her skin is growing colder under my touch.
I reach inward with everything I have, searching for something, anything that could pull her back from this edge. But none of the monsters inside me are the healing kind. I was created to destroy, patchworked together by dark magic, animated by a curse. Every part of me was made to ruin.
"Help!" I scream the word across the ruins of Aelfheim. "Someone, anyone, please! We need help!"
Only the wind answers. Any elves who survived the burning fled long ago.
"Whoever's out there, please! Help us!"
But we're alone out here. Coral is panicking beside me.
I need help. Now.
"Coinneach!" I summon my shadow familiar.
He materializes instantly. One look at Rhianelle and something shifts in him, the careful shape he holds for her benefit falling away all at once. The shadow Rhianelle once teased and called Ken dissolves. What stands in the ruins beside me now is what he was before she softened him.
This is what he truly is. Not a trick of shadow. But a creature born of death and silence.
"Take us back to Volundr," I command.
He doesn't hesitate or question.
The shadows rise around us like a tide, pooling at our feet before surging upward.
I clutch Rhianelle tighter against my chest, trying to shield her from the chill of the shadow path.
The Ysendral's realm has a bone-deep cold that can sap the warmth from living things. She has no warmth left to spare.
"Coral, come!" I call to the wyvern. She limps after us, stepping into the shadow curtain just as it closes.
The journey through darkness feels endless. I whisper desperate pleas into the void. To gods I don't believe in, to anything that might be listening.
Take my immortality, my life, everything.
I'll give anything. Just let her live.
The darkness doesn't answer.
We emerge in Volundr at twilight.
Volundr is a disaster. The two massive waves left destruction everywhere. Water still floods the lower streets, reaching halfway up buildings in some places.
I'm running before the shadows fully dissipate, my legs shaking with each step. Coral paces beside me despite her injuries. Her distressed chirping draws attention.
People see us coming and react.
I don't blame them. I must look like something from a nightmare, drenched in blood with demon ichor still dripping from my claws. They press themselves against the wall to clear a path.
"Move!" I shout when someone doesn't get out of the way fast enough.
I have to navigate around collapsed buildings and through flooded intersections. The water slows me down, dragging at my legs. A group of knights appears ahead, helping to clear rubble. They see me and immediately draw weapons.
"Stand down!" one of them shouts. "The vampire is—"
"Out of my way!" I roar. "The queen needs help!"
They see Rhianelle in my arms and hesitate. One of them, a woman with a captain’s insignia, takes a step forward.
"What happened to her?"
"Demons from Hel. Where's the healing house?"
The captain’s face goes pale. "This way. Follow me!"
She turns and runs. The other knights fall in around us, forming an escort.
The healing house rises before us. It's one of the few buildings that seems mostly intact, though water damage is visible on the lower levels. The white walls are stained with ash and mud. Anastarros temple is dedicated to the healing arts and the gods who govern them.
I hit the entrance and healers turn toward the commotion.
"Please, someone help her!" I call, voice raw with urgency.
The Hlaryan healers see me and several back away instinctively.
But one doesn't.
An older woman with steel-gray hair strides forward. She takes one look at Rhianelle and gestures to an empty table at the side. "Bring her here. Now."
I follow her along with the knights.
She's already clearing the table, sweeping aside instruments and supplies. "Lay her down gently."
My arms feel empty without Rhianelle's weight. The healer begins examining her immediately, pressing fingers to her throat and lifting her eyelids.
Other healers crowd around now to attend to their queen.
"Her pulse is thready and weak," the old healer announces. "I need blankets and hot water. Fetch Lady Siofra. The queen will need blessings."
The acolytes scramble to obey. They cut away her blood-soaked dress to expose the wounds. One of them gasps. "Is that—"
She looks at the bite marks. Fresh ones, still weeping. Then she looks at me.
Every eye in the healing house turns to me.
The blood-soaked vampire standing in their pristine sanctuary. I see the moment understanding dawns. Their expressions shift from shock to horror.
"He bit her?" Several of the younger healers back away from me.
The knights who escorted me move forward, hands on sword hilts.
"Get away from her!" One of the knights draws his blade. He's young, his face twisted with righteous fury. "Monster! Get away from our queen!"
"I tried to heal her," I tell them. "My venom usually works but it's not working."
The older healer holds up a hand for silence. She's examining Rhianelle's wounds again.
"Yes, he's telling the truth. The venom in her system is slowing the bleeding," she says finally. "It's probably the only reason she's still alive. But the wounds are too severe."
"Can you save her?" I ask.
She doesn't answer me. Instead she turns to her staff. "Bring me linen and clean water, not from the flood. Taryn, go and burn sage. We need to cleanse her of whatever dark magic caused these wounds."
"Will she live?" I try again.
This time she looks at me. Her eyes are hard but not unkind.
"I don't know," she says simply. "But you need to leave. You're frightening the others and I need them focused."
"I can't leave her—"