Page 56 of Hellfire to Come
DOMINIC
Something had to change.
Long-lived or not, I had a feeling my heart would give out if my mate continued to throw herself at danger at every turn.
She thrashed all night, fighting unseen monsters from her psyche that I could not tear apart or shred with my bare hands. So, I watched her now from where I stood near the threshold of the shaman’s house barely lit by the coals still smoldering in the fire-burning stove, her silhouette hunched, fingers pressed to her temples like the weight of the world still hadn’t finished grinding her down. Her breathing was shallow but even. Her spirit, though, it was unraveling. Just in silence now, instead of screams and whimpers.
She’d given too much. Again.
And like a fool, I let her.
The guilt crawled down my spine like something alive; Feral and unrelenting, its claws sinking into every vertebra with merciless precision. I had sworn, sworn with every breath in my body, that I would never again stand idly by while she bled for the people she loved. And yet, I had done just that. I had watched as she stepped willingly into a circle etched with power olderthan the bones of the earth, and offered herself, body, soul, and magic, to spirits that existed long before time itself.
I didn’t stop her.
I couldn’t.
Because somewhere deep beneath my skin, in the place where instinct and reason warred, I understood: had I tried to interfere, she wouldn’t have hesitated to fight me. Not with claws or fangs, but with the sheer fire of her will. And it wasn’t the pain of her fury I feared. It was the fracture it would leave between us. Her rage would not cut me down, but it would cast me out. And in that moment, nothing was more important to her than the war she chose to fight. Not the Syndicate. Not her own survival.
Saving Alice.
That was her holy ground. Her line in the sand. And I… I was just trying not to lose the only thing in this world still tethering me to something good.
Still, the question pulsed beneath every beat of my heart. How long could we survive like this? How many more sacrifices before there was nothing left of her to save?
The door creaked behind me. Laughing Crow’s light tread brushed the wooden floor as she entered. She didn’t speak. Not at first. Just stood beside me in the shadows and stared at Brooklyn the same way one watches the sea after a storm: searching for what it left behind, and what it took.
“She’s stubborn,” I said, not looking at the shaman. “I wish she wasn’t.” I muttered to myself.
Laughing Crow didn’t move. “She’s fire walking on bone.”
“Is that your poetic way of telling me she’s breaking?”
“No.” The shaman finally folded her arms. “It means she’s dangerous. To herself. To others. But mostly to the things that would try to take her light. She says she doesn’t care what she pays but she will defy the universe to keep her light intact.”
I let out a humorless breath. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
“You fear she’ll die,” the old woman said simply, still not looking at me.
I didn’t answer. What was I supposed to say to that? Lie?
She turned her head slightly, studying me now. “You carry the weight of a protector. But what happens when the threat isn’t from outside?”
My jaw clenched. “Then I protect her from herself. Even if she hates me for it.”
A quiet hum of approval. “Then you’re not as blind as I thought.”
I looked at her now, finally, forcing my hands to curl into fists so I didn’t grab her by the throat. “Did the spirits take something from her? Tell me the truth.”
Laughing Crow’s expression gave nothing away. “They always take something. But not always in the way you expect.”
“That’s not an answer.”
She gave me a small, sharp smile. “And yet, it’s the truth.”
I turned away before I did something reckless, like kill her, or drag her into another circle and demand clarity. The only clarity I needed was in Brooklyn’s pulse, in the way her eyes stayed open now, not clouded by pain.
She was alive.
