Chapter 75 - The Healer Awakens
Athena didn't know where the shaking stopped and the stillness began.
Her hands were pressed to Silas's chest, her forehead resting against his as tears soaked into his burned skin.
Around her, voices blurred.
Elara speaking.
Wolves moving.
Kael barking orders.
None of it reached her.
All she could feel was the terrible, suffocating fear that he was slipping away.
"Please," she whispered.
Her voice broke on the word.
She pulled back just enough to look at him.
His face was too still.
Too pale beneath the burns.
And something inside her snapped.
"I love you," she said.
The words tore out of her before she could think.
Raw.
Unplanned.
True.
Her hands tightened against his chest as another sob broke free.
"I love you. You can't leave me. You can't."
Heat surged through her palms.
Not fire.
Not pain.
Warmth.
Deep.
Steady.
Alive.
Athena gasped as the sensation traveled up her arms and into her chest like something waking from a long sleep.
She didn't understand it.
She didn't try to.
She only pressed closer to him.
Begging.
Pleading.
Loving.
And the warmth flowed from her into him.
Elara froze.
Her eyes widening.
"Rowan," she whispered.
The blackened skin along Silas's shoulder began to shift.
Cracking.
Peeling.
Reforming.
Fresh skin pushing through the burns like they were being erased from the inside out.
Athena didn't see it.
She was crying too hard.
Her forehead pressed to his as she whispered over and over,
"Please don't leave me. Please don't leave me."
Silas's chest jerked suddenly beneath her hands.
A sharp breath tore into his lungs.
Athena gasped and lifted her head.
His eyes fluttered.
Rowan stepped back in stunned silence.
Elara's hand covered her mouth.
Silas's gaze found Athena first.
Confused.
Then aware.
Then something else entirely.
Recognition.
He swallowed hard, his voice rough and barely there.
"Goldenthorn..."
Athena's breath hitched.
The warmth drained from her hands as quickly as it had come.
Her body sagged forward.
Exhaustion crashing into her all at once.
Silas's arm lifted weakly and wrapped around her as she collapsed against him.
Unconscious.
But alive.
And so was he.