Still, he comes.
Skidding to a halt, Tòrr lowers his head. His massive frame shakes with effort, breath hitching with every ragged inhale. Wounds bloom across his flanks. He’s broken, bleeding.
Silent and reverent, he kneels.
And the truth slams into me: He’s giving himself to her as a final offering.
My blood, Rian’s blood…it isn’t enough for what Sabine is going to have to face. So Tòrr is making up the difference.
Sabine throws herself on his prostrate body, running her hands over his thick fur, the broken black scales slick with blood.
“Tòrr…no,” she whispers, then her voice rises, fracturing. “Please. Please, no. I can’t lose you, too. My heart—” She presses her forehead to his neck, choking. “It won’t survive another goodbye.”
For a moment, he is still.
Then, with what little strength remains, he lifts his head.
His eyes find hers.
They’re already dimming, the red fire in them dying, but when they meet Sabine’s gaze, something ancient stirs. I don’tknow if her godkiss has returned, but something passes between them. A moment, I think, not meant for mortals.
A thousand unsaid thank-yous.
A meeting of minds.
A dirge for what could have been.
And then, her sob breaks free. Raw. Seismic. She shakes her head, tears spilling down her cheeks. “I won’t…I can’t…”
But he presses his brow against hers, like a priest giving a benediction.
Like anorder.
Sobbing harder, she bends and drinks from the wound. Her shoulders shake, her breath hitching with every swallow. For a second, she tries to pull back, but her body betrays her, clinging desperately to his offering.
She drinks deeply.
“I love you,” she whispers, finally pulling her lips free. “I will honor your loss. I’ll…I’ll never let the world forget you. What you did for us.”
Tòrr exhales one final time.
Sabine screams into his fur, the sound fracturing against my ears, full of bitter pain that she is only strong because he gave her his dying power.
Around us, chaos rages. Rian pushes back to his feet, slicing through corpses. Ferra and Suri appear from the smoke, wielding makeshift weapons, pushing back the horde inch by inch.
Seconds pass—but they feel like a lifetime.
Tòrr’s eyes, once full of starlight, go cloudy.
No blink. No breath.
His heart—all six great ventricles—falls silent.
And then?—
Sabine gasps.
She rises, shining like a fallen star, eyes burning with silver light, hair billowing as though caught in a whirlwind.
