Page 80 of The Demigod

“Well, maybe just… care for him,” Lenore suggested. “See if it helps.”

“What if it doesn’t?”

“I will do some research. There has to be a way to heal a fractured essence. But while I work on it, be here with him. Talk to him, clean his wounds. See if he starts to surface.”

“I can do that,” I confirmed.

I felt wholly inept.

But if all he needed was someone to love him, who else could do that better than me?

Once everyone made their way out, I went into the bathroom, got some water and a washcloth, then went back to wipe the blood away from his handsome, but bruised and swollen, face.

“Your family thinks I can maybe help heal you,” I told him, feeling silly, but willing to trust the process. “I’m not sure they weren’t just blowing smoke,” I went on. “But I’ll play along until they figure something else out.”

As I washed his wounds, I told him all the things he’d missed: saving Aggy, freeing Nemesis, the visit from my mom and sister, going back to Arick, and even my first impressions of his loved ones.

Save for the occasional grunt or hiss when I cleaned a particularly nasty wound, he showed nearly no signs of life.

“I have no idea what I’m doing here, Daemon,” I said, climbing up on the bed, suddenly exhausted. Not my body or my mind—the ambrosia was still doing its job on that front.

I was soul tired.

It had been an exhausting few months. With the last week full of soaring highs and sinking lows.

This, though, was the lowest.

“You have to come back, okay?” I said, sliding closer to him. Reaching down, I drew the blankets over us both. “We have so much we need to talk about still. Like… I still don’t know your favorite ice cream. Or what season you like best. If you see a future with me,” I finished in a small voice as I carefully lowered my head to Daemon’s chest.

“I love you, you know,” I said as I drifted closer to sleep. “I’ll love you even if you stay stuck in there. But I would really, really like it if you came back...”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Daemon

“Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch,” I said, my voice a little rough and raspy from all the screaming I’d done. Screaming so loud that my throat bled, copper blood sliding down my throat, choking me as more howls escaped me.

Nox, having been stuck somewhere in that place between sleeping and awake had slipped back in bed beside me after an early morning shower.

She’d been right there in the bed with me for… shit, I didn’t even know how long. Hours? Days? I had no way to track the lost time.

All I knew was she was always there. A warmth at my side. A voice speaking to me. Never giving up.

At the sound of my voice, Nox went from half to full awake, shooting up off of my chest.

“Fall,” I went on, reaching out to touch her soft, mostly dry hair. “You’d think it would be summer, since it’s warm and familiar. But summer’s got nothing on one of those perfectly crunchy leaves under your shoe.”

“Daemon,” she whispered, her lower lip trembling for a second before the first tear slid down her cheek.

“And I see a fuckingeternitywith you, shadow girl,” I told her, reaching out to wipe the tear from her cheek.

On a cute-as-fuck little sob, she fell forward into my chest.

Then it got less cute as she fucking… shattered.

“Hey, now, sweetness. I’m not a plant; you don’t need to water me,” I said, getting a snorting laugh out of her as my fingers sifted through her hair.

“How long have I been gone?” I asked, listening to her sniffle.

---