127. Violette
VIOLETTE
“Where is he?” The words tear from my throat, yanking Levi and Lazarus’ attention to me. The concern lining their faces tells me I must look wild. Drenched and wind-tossed in nothing more than a soaked robe plastered to my skin. Levi is the first to reply. “The bathing chamber.”
I fold into the adjacent ensuite. Azrael is sitting in a bathing pool filled with bubbles that nearly reach his neck. As if he doesn’t have a care in the world.
His features tighten at the sight of my obvious distress. “Seraphim, what’s happened?”
I can’t manage the words.
Realization slackens his features as if...
He knows.
He knows he’s dying.
The door to the bathing chamber swings open as Levi and Lazarus join us.
Azrael’s brow hardens at the sight of them. “You told her.”
Levi and Lazarus scowl in unison, looking oddly similar.
Lazarus’ voice drops to a growl of displeasure. “No. We didn’t.”
My jaw plummets. “You knew?”
Remorse twists Levi’s features. “I was going to tell you. We were going to tell you. We just didn’t want it causing you any additional distress or distraction considering?—”
I understand the reasoning. I would have done precisely the same. The shifting of my attention cuts Levi off. My eyes frantically search Lazarus’ gaze as if I might find hope.
“Give him half of your magic—that will fix this.”
Lazarus’ throat dips, brow hardening.
Levi’s gaze wanders to his as if also seeking some salvation from this horror.
We are met with silence.
Azrael’s voice is soft behind me. “I am so sorry, sweet seraphim.”
I shake my head, unwilling to accept this fate. “I don’t understand. Why? How? You’re a god of death. You’ve survived since the birth of creation. This doesn’t make any sense.”
Azrael remains silent. The guilt and shame harrowing his expression is palpable in the air.
Levi steps closer to me, his voice the dark harbinger to my heartbreak. “By not fulfilling his vow to you.”
It takes several moments for the words to properly register in my mind. As though all my logic and reasoning faculties can’t fathom such a betrayal. When my eyes finally return to Azrael, the guilt in his eyes tells me just how naive I’ve been.
My voice is little more than a whisper. “You planned this... ?”
Azrael folds out of the bathing pool to stand directly in front of me. Reaches out to cup my cheeks in his hands. “I didn’t think that you would..."
One by one, tears plummet from the precipice of my eyes seeking their own oblivion.
“That I would what?”
Azrael’s frown deepens. “I was certain my affections would be one-sided.”
The admission pierces my heart as he continues.
“It’s why I had Somnus show Levi our bargain when we first struck it.”
Shock rings through me, and I briefly turn to face Levi, who gives a short nod in confirmation. I shake my head in disbelief.
“How could you possibly think we would do anything but fall in love with you?”
His eyes glitter with tears as a sad smile curls and trembles at one corner of his mouth.
“I don’t deserve either of you, little seraphim.”
My brows knit together. “You do. Don’t you dare say that. You are a radiant light in this hellscape of three-dimensional reality, and I can’t fathom enduring it without you.”
Azrael's tremulous smile dims as he swipes away one of my tears with his thumb.
“Nor can I.”
What?
The lameness of my words makes my tongue feel heavy even as panic begins to rise in my chest, and threatens to close my throat. My mind reels, grasping for straws of hope that don’t exist as I willfully reject the meaning of his words.
“I don’t understand... All we have to do is fulfill the courtship rituals, and you’ll regain your immortality, right?”
Azrael remains silent.
Even then, my very being rejects the evidence presented to me in the anguish twisting his features.
“Even with my blood, you and Levi will eventually die. And again, I will be left behind. No matter how distant a future that may be, it is as inevitable as the entropy of this world—and the entropy of every world I have quietly been forced to watch die, along with everyone I have ever loved. And I have never loved anyone as I have loved you.”
Still, my mind refuses to accept this.
It can’t be.
My hands tremble as I begin to pace, and I’m almost certain I feel the ground beneath my feet rumble, but I’m too far gone to care.
“What about Winnow? Perhaps she can heal you... Or I can create an elixir to alleviate this malady. Or Queen Theia? Her powers of the mind are nigh limitless..."
A pressure builds in my chest, its weight increasing exponentially with each silent moment that passes. In my peripheral vision, I can see Azrael exchanging pleading looks with Levi and Lazarus.
Levi’s hand slides around my waist, pulling me against him. “Violette..."
I shake him off, stepping out of his embrace only to come face to face with Lazarus. “Surely you know how to fix this? You have to do something.”
Pain carves lines of tension into his expression—and something else that takes me a moment to realize what and where it stems from. “You knew... You knew that he wanted to die, and yet you still bound our souls to yours.”
Lazarus’ features darken. “I told you I would do cruel things to keep you, Violette.”
The ground beneath my feet shudders, sending rippling vibrations up the walls. The crystal hanging from the chandeliers tremble and sing in protest.
This can’t be happening.
Little sparks of magic crackle and prick my fingertips.
The weight on my chest becomes unbearable, increasing to the point of pain–until it feels like a sickle of ice is piercing my chest with each shallow breath.
Levi’s hands gently grasp my shoulders. “Violette..."
A distant rumble and crack echoes in the distance.
Lazarus, Azrael, and Levi exchange words, but the sound is drowned out by the pounding in my ears. Distantly, my mind registers that something cold is pooling around my feet, drawing my gaze.
Water.
When I look back up, Lazarus’ face is inches from mine. “Violette. You have to stop. Draw your magic back in. You can control this.”
Suddenly dizzy, I shake my head. “I don’t know how.”
The sound of distant screams reaches my ears.
Oh, gods, all of these people.
The desperation and terror coursing through me are making it worse. The water is almost up to my knees. At least half of Sinsól can’t breathe underwater or merely fold away.
Akash, make it stop.
The realization that all of Sinsól is in peril because of me only causes my panic to surge further, and a moment later, a thunderous crack sounds and sends the floor beneath our feet splintering in a spiderweb of fissures that travel beyond the room.
No.
The sight causes my panic to reach its zenith.
Something inside me seems to burst in the same moment; the walls around us crack and give way. Icy water crushes us. My mer form bursts free just as a slab of marble slams into me and pins me to the floor.
My vision sways and narrows as my consciousness tries to leave me.
Until a familiar, bronze hand twined with shadows floats past my line of sight, causing a surge of adrenaline to push back the darkness threatening to swallow my consciousness.
I fold out from beneath the jagged hunk of marble to grasp an unconscious Lazarus.
Blood gushes in inky tendrils from a cut on his head.
Frantic, I quickly scan the vicinity for Levi and Azrael.
My eyes lock on a pair of motionless legs peeking out from beneath a splintered marble wall. The fact they aren’t tattooed tells me it's the only person in this room who couldn’t recover from such a blow.
A deafening roar fills my ears as if the sea itself is grieving what my mind refuses to accept, even as my heart fractures beyond repair.
A large hand grasps my shoulder from behind.
Levi, eyes glowing with that dark, unsettling fractal-light.
The water in my gills seems to still as the sea surrounding us trembles.
The very fabric of reality surrounding us warps and bends as it rushes towards us, as it seems to collapse in on itself.
Terror fills me as his magic consumes me, and everything around us.
It feels like being swallowed whole by some cosmic entity—all reality as you know it transforming into something utterly alien as you free fall into the unknown.
I feel like my soul is being ripped from my body, and though I have never experienced it, I somehow know that this is death.
Levi pulls me against him as his lips press a kiss to my forehead just as the hungry, collapsing structure of existence snaps its jaws around us, closing us in, and everything goes black.