Raven
Odi et amo.
(I hate and I love.)
—Catullus
Atticus lies sprawledon the stone floor, his eyes glassy and distant, and all I can do is fall to my knees and grab his hand. Dorian’s tearing off his gloves. “Dorian, what are you doing?”
“Hold on,” he says, speaking to Atticus. “Just hold on.”
Dorian’s hands are touching Atticus’s flayed skin. The malum’s claws sliced through his clothes, revealing flesh. His back is wet with blood, and I don’t know how to stop the bleeding. Dorian’s sweatshirt is already soaked through with it. The blood is almost black, and it covers the floor. There’s so much…
Dorian lays Atticus down on his side, murmuring for him to keep holding on.
The malum prowls the chamber, stalking, visible sometimes in the scant light of the lantern lying forgotten on the floor. Everything about this is wrong. It’s so wrong, I don’t have time to process it. So much is happening all at once.
“Atticus,” I cry.
He doesn’t answer. He just lets out a low moan.
“We’ve got to get him out of here!” His hand is limp, he’s fading, his skin growing colder under my fingers. He’s dying. My love is dying.Atticus, no.
Dorian’s hands are still moving, still pressing hard on his back. He’s up on his knees, throwing his whole weight down. And now, I realize, his hands are glowing.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
He screws up his face, concentration pulling his features taut. “Let me try—let me just…” He doesn’t finish.
“Dorian?”
As if yanked, his head is thrown back, and his eyes roll upward. He goes rigid like he’s being electrocuted.
“Dorian!”
His whole body seizes up, and I fear he might snap in half. He grimaces, agony spreading across his mouth, his eyes unnaturally wide and pure white. If he could scream, he would. I move to push him, to snap him out of it, but that’s when I notice the gashes in Atticus’s back are closing.
I jump to my feet and stare as his skin folds itself back together, mended by invisible sutures. The bleeding slows, and Atticus’s breathing evens out. At first, I think Dorian’s healing him, but then bright red blotches appear on his own back, soaking through his white shirt.
I put my hand to my mouth to stop from screaming.
He’s taking his wounds. He’s absorbing them into his own body.
I didn’t know that was possible.
His eyelids flutter, tears stream down the corners of his eyes. He’s doing too much. He’s dying, too.
“Dorian, no! You need to stop, or I’ll lose you, too!”
He doesn’t. Maybe he can’t.
“I said stop!”
I hit his chest, and his hold on Atticus breaks.
With a yelp, he stumbles, falling heavily on the stone beside Atticus, the two of them unconscious. What did he just do? Iwant to scream. I can’t lose both my best friends, not here, not now—
I flip Dorian over, pulling at his shirt, expecting to find his back flayed, just like Atticus’s. There’s blood, but there’s no open gash. All that remains are three bright pink scars, looking freshly healed. Atticus’s back is the same.
