Page 90 of Fated In Forever
It wasn’t that I didn’t trust the healers here, it was just…we were in unfamiliar territory, my mate was failing, and I couldn’t get my feet underneath me.
And while this beehive of activity around us buzzed, this room was quiet as a tomb. Not dead, exactly. Just… waiting.
Waiting for Evangeline to die.
I leaned closer, counting her breaths. Not because I doubted her strength—but because Ineededto know they were still happening.
Each one was too ragged. Too shallow.
Her lungs fought for every last drop of oxygen, and the effort was taking its toll. Her skin was as pale as moonlight, translucent and shot through with so many of those black veins, I’d lost count. Her magic—gods, hermagic—the shadows that had felled an Elder and stabilized a rift, was gone.
She was candleflame, clinging to the end of a dwindling wick.
Riordan came and went like a ghost, whispering curses under his breath. He never looked at me anymore. Like if we made eye contact, this might all become real, not some nightmare we could pretend wasn’t happening.
“She used too much magic,” he’d muttered, the night we dragged her back, barely breathing, her fingers still stained black from magic, an unnatural darkness that had taken days to fade. “And that goddamned rift. She was too close, for too long.”
But something else was broken, and much like fixing her body, I couldn’t fucking fix the root problem.
Not unless I wanted to go into the Underworld and drag back a certain bad-tempered, taloned monster from the dark depths. My gaze drifted, as it always did, to the small book lying on the bedside table, the golden key resting on top.
That was the first thing I’d tried. After Sylvester had done all he could, and Fiona had done all she could, I’d decided fuck it, I’d take a chance on a childhood fairytale.
I’d unlocked that ancient book, spread out the pages and wished.
Wished with every ounce of my being for her to wake up, to be whole and healed. To look at me with those blue eyes and tell me I was a possessive, overprotective idiot. Anything, other than…this.
But like Evie, the Wishrender remained asleep, not so much as a hint of life.
I reached for her hand. Cold. Too cold. I wrapped both of mine around her fingers anyway, holding them tight, like I could keep her tethered to me. Like I could command her to remain among the living, through sheer force of will.
“Evie,” I whispered, pressing my forehead to hers. “I need you to stay with me. Just until I figure out how to save you. Just…promise me you’ll stay.”
She didn’t answer.
Sometimes her lips moved, like she was caught between dreams, and I’d give anything to know what she was dreaming, anything to be part of her life, not staring at this shell, waiting for the moment she took her final breath. But her thoughts were soft, twisting blackness, there was nothing for me to grasp, to understand.
“You know what is happening.” Nikolai leaned in the doorway, watching the both of us and I fought the urge to curl my body over her tiny, prone form.
“You’re back,” I said, instead, an edge to my words. “Unless you can heal her, or the world is about to end, go be somewhere else.” The Elder had taken to popping in every few hours, both to check on Evie and to give us an update, even though I could care less about the rift or the ley line or even Ravok.
“Everything is remarkably stable at the site. Your mate bought us a reprieve this past week, otherwise, the rift would have swallowed up the mountain and most of the surrounding area by now. Fiona figured out how to siphon the ley line magic into a deep vein of obsidian, which, for now, seems to have stabilized the ruins.”
He paused, and I hoped he might just go away, and then, “Brendan and I managed to get down to the room with the portal. The water appears to have been…corrupted by something. It’s black now, not a hint of silver.”
I couldn’t bring myself to care.
“If that’s all, you can leave.” My eyes stayed glued to my mate, and Nikolai might as well have been a fly, buzzing in my ear.
“I bring other news. My sister…” Nikolai cleared his throat. “My sister has finally arrived. She is a talented…witch, I suppose you would call her.” He scratched his neck. “She is…here, downstairs, actually.”
“Here?” I stood, my chair scraping against the wood floor, too loud in the hush of the room.
“The sister who you called for weeks ago? That one?” I clenched my fists tight enough my knuckles popped. “The sister who could have prevented all this from happening?That one?”
“Sabine is…difficult. Not purposefully.” Then he shook his head. “Well, oftentimes, itispurposeful, but this time, I believe she was off in another realm, and did return as quickly as she was able.”
Ah. Right. The sister who could cross into other realms. I squeezed my eyes shut. The universe either had really shitty timing, or really good timing, and I couldn’t decide which.
