But no.
I still clung, dangling off the proverbial cliff, too weak to let go and too weak not to.
God, please let it end!
I flinched as I sucked in a deeper breath.
Breathing...funny how I hated and loved the action.
Hated because another breath meant I’d survive another few minutes. Loved because another breath meant I still existed for Nila.
Nila...
My heart tried to hurry, conjuring the dark-haired seamstress who’d captured my heart. But all it managed was a pathetic patter.
Groaning with the weight of a thousand daggers, I looked at the cot across the dungeon from mine.
How we arrived down here, I had no fucking clue.
Why we had drips in our hands, blankets bundled around us, and crudely administered medicine was an utter mystery.
Who did this?
How long had we been here?
How much time had passed?
Was this perhaps purgatory? A place of in-between, a deplorable existence where only the worst went to pay penance?
We couldn’t possibly be alive.Could we?
A flickering light in the corner kept the vampires of the crypt at bay, but it offered no warmth—no reprieve from the ancient ice seeping into my bones from the godforsaken catacombs.
I stared fuzzily at the shape of a man cocooned in blankets. Only, he hadn’t moved, moaned, or made a sound in hours. My gift—no, my curse—no longer worked.
There was someone else down here with me. Yet, there were no thoughts, no fears, no pleas.
I didn’t want to admit it, but my brother...he was no longer alive. However, I had to try to bring him back from the dead. I had to remind him I was there for him—for him not to give up, even though slipping off the cliff became more enticing every minute. “You—you still a—alive, K—Kes?”
I never heard his reply.
The moment I finished, I fell into a stupor that lasted God knew how long. My energy flat-lined and I drifted into dreams, nightmares, and fantasies.
One moment, I flew through the forest on Wings.
The next, I was back in that hated room hurting Jasmine to fix myself.
One second, I made love to Nila, sliding inside her heat.
The next, I was shivering with ice running away from Hawksridge when I was fourteen.
Each hour, I grew weaker. Each hour, I slipped a little more.
If it weren’t for the terror at leaving Nila in the heinous world I’d helped create, I would just let go and disappear.
I want so fucking much to disappear.
I wanted freedom from pain.
