“Don’t be scared, Miss Sapphire.”
I need my dad, I tell her.
Running footsteps are muffled above us. Voices. A fog of lightheadedness. The pocket of oxygen thins. My stomach rolls with a foreign queasiness. And just as my lungs wheeze and my eyes shut, a pair of hands digs the dirt off of me, letting in a stream of bright light.
48. Summoning the Father
Sapphire
Dellilian disappears as a pairof strong, sturdy hands lock around my forearms and pull me out of the grave I’m buried in.
Dirt pours off of me like sand. And I cough and gasp, clearing my throat as the pair of hands wipe my face, brushing the debris from my eyes so I can see. So I can look up at the face that saved me.
But before my vision clears, I can sense his presence without the use of my eyes. The warm, giant hands steady my shoulders. The great height can be felt from far away.
I blink away the snow and grime and look upon my father’s face. His stern, serious brown eyes. Furrowed brow. Tousled chocolate hair.
It’s my dad.
My dad saved me.
“Are you hurt?” he asks.
Nothing could stop me from letting every emotion come detonating from my soul. I whimper with lips pulled behind my teeth.
Thank you, Dad. Thank you for coming for me.
My grief leaks out in sharp, grunting cries behind my teeth. Each racking sob is a call for someone who has never been able to be there when I needed him most. Warm tears cut through the dust on my cheeks, dropping from my jaw onto the slush beneath my numb feet.
My father looks down at me, eyes darting across my face, more surprised at my sudden hysterical outburst than the fact that I’ve been buried alive. And my face crumples like the little girl inside who has been waiting for her dad for so long and has finally found him. I throw my arms around his neck, despite the knowledge that he could seriously hurt someone for hugging him without permission.
But he’s my father.
And moments ago, I just watched him die.
I watched a sickle pierce his chest.
I watched his blood spill over my mother’s lap.
My cry is tired, aching, full of the need to tell him everything. I want to warn him, to give him the knowledge he needs to avoid falling into that coma. I want to save him like he has just saved me.
It’s me, Dad. I love you. I’ve missed you my entire life. I wish you knew me. I wish you knew Krimson. I wish you could hold Mom one more time.
My dirty wet face is pressed into the center of his chest, and he touches my back once before keeping his arms hanging in the air around me. If only he knew how badly I need him to hug me back. Just once. But not just any hug. One that means something. One from my dad who knows my name and loves me back.
A hand caresses my back. I peek over at my mother, holding her arms out to me. I nearly choke her neck as I leap into her embrace. Though she doesn’t know who I am, or what I will mean to her one day, a hug with my mama is long overdue.
“What happened?” Mom asks.
A hand is placed on my arm. “I don’t know if you remember us…but the two of you found us in the woods a few months ago…”
Niklaus’s guess of meeting a few months ago is bold. We have absolutely no idea how much time has passed since then. But his voice does not waver in its confidence when speaking to my parents. In everything we’ve read about Patient Thirteen, identifying any area of weakness is one of his many specialties.
“I remember,” my father answers with a heavy tone of judgment.“And you only have a minute to explain before I tie you back to that tree.”
No!
I stiffen though the vehement shivering does not stop even as I find intense comfort in Mom’s body heat.
