And an hour later, the spell began to fracture beneath his persistence. His fury tore through the ward until the Veil shrieked like shattering glass, letting him break through, her emotions pulling him forward like a compass.
A pain had struck him in his stomach five steps out of the house, and he knew what it was. Knew it from the times he’d driven a blade into himself.
He’d felt it the instant she was stabbed, and it had torn through his gut,through his goddamned heart.
It almost dropped him to his knees, but he funnelled that pain into his stride and ran harder. The cold rain lashed at him, and although he wasn’t wearing his gloves or coat, he felt nothing but the screaming pulse of Sanora through the bond.
She’d been stabbed, and judging by the depth of the pain, it had been bad.
Deep.
Fuck.
He sprinted past the site of her ritual, barely registering the bodies lying on the ground until he stepped over one.
Now he was running faster, knowing exactly where she was going.
The cave.
She was heading there to do the one thing he had begged her not to. She thought she was dying, and she wanted to leave him with the last piece of herself. Leave him alone in this cursed world.
“Sanora!” he roared, running past the creatures Selvanyra had sent after her. For once, they wanted the same thing—for Sanora not to reach that cave. Hell, they had wanted the same thing from the start.
Selvanyra didn’t want him to get the soul.
He never wanted Sanora to die for him.
Never.
“Sanora, don’t you dare!”
His heart hammered, not from exhaustion, but from the gnawing fear of being too late. The fear that she might step into the cave before he could reach her.
He could feel her closing in. He could feel the cave’s pulse echoing through her.
“Sanora!” His voice cracked through the forest, mingling with the shrieks of monsters, the crash of thunder, and the pounding rain.
He reached the twins—one slumped against a tree, the other on hands and knees, head bowed in devastation.
He ran past them, and in the black curtain of the storm, he saw her disappearing into the cave’s mouth.
“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”
He pushed harder, vision blurring with rain. This was why he had never wanted her near that place, why even the mention of it had made him furious.
The cave could harm anyone and anything…but them. Its boundary wouldn’t kill her as it would others.
No, it would welcome her.
He reached the mouth of the cave and slammed into an unseen force, the impact throwing him back so hard his boots skidded on the soaked ground. He staggered once, twice, then lunged forward again, crashing into the barrier with a snarl, his fists slamming against it as though brute strength could break something born of a supernatural will.
“Sanora,” he rasped, breath hitching, almost out of air. “Sanora. Come out, please.”
He hammered the invisible wall again, his whole being fraying from the endless barrage of spells and wards that had kept him from her all day long.
“Sanora, come out! Don’t you dare try that.” His voice rose, raw, hoping it could reach her through the cave’s darkness. “What makes you think I won’t kill myself the moment I become mortal? Huh? You know it’s pointless without you. Come out of there,Nher.”
His fists collided with the unseen resistance again and again, even knowing he couldn’t break it. The only way to reach Sanora was if she chose to step out herself. And deep down, he already knew she wouldn’t.
