Cold sons of bitches. My arm was finally free, so I lashed out. From the way the hands stopped yanking on the pelt, I’d made contact, but it wasn’t enough.
I had enough time to take one deep breath as the pelt was ripped from my shoulders, and then I was swimming desperately for the surface as the merfolk watched.
My lungs burned. There was no fucking way I was getting all the way up to the surface.
I was dead.
* * *
SAMAEL
Panic woke me.
I’d gone from being unable to sleep here, to spending most of my time resting in an effort to conserve my strength.
I reached along the bond as sheer, unadulterated terror swept through me. There was no logic to temper it.
The fear gave way to grief. And I knew what that meant.
No. No. No.
She wasn’t dying. Danica couldn’t die. I wouldn’t accept it.
She didn’t get to die attempting to save my life.
My lungs burned and realization punched into me. Suffocating. Or drowning. A bad way to go.
“I’m here, little witch.”
She was unconsciously reaching for me, so it was a simple matter to solidify the connection.
“I’m sorry, Samael. I tried.”
I ignored that.“You will live.”
I could feel her light, dimming faster than I could have imagined. This was my fault. If she had never met me, Danica would still be hunting her mother’s killer. Would still be a bounty hunter working for the Mage Council. Wouldn’t be dying, far enough from where my useless crumbling body lay that I could barely feel her.
I poured my energy into her. If I could even give her a few more moments of life, I would do it.
She reached for me down the bond. All I could do was give her as much comfort as I could.
“Fight for me, Danica. I love you.”
She couldn’t even respond. I’d burrowed deep enough into our bond to sense her brain begin to die, starved of oxygen. Lights flashed in front of my eyes, followed by a strange feeling of peace. Danica’s body attempting to soften the blow of death.
The roar that broke from me was so loud it seemed to shake the strange between-world I was trapped in.
I refused to accept this. Refused to so much as entertain it. I closed my eyes and poured every ounce of my will and strength down the bond.
18
DANICA
It was so quiet. Quiet and still in a way that should have been peaceful.
There had been so little peace in my life up to this point that I didn’t trust it for a second.
I was in a garden. But there were no sounds of birds chirping, no buzzing of insects, no scent.
