“Eli,” Eislyn murmured, swiping away the blood dripping from the deep cut in her forehead.
Beckoned by her call, Eli’s attention landed on us, and a blow of air carried Eislyn’s name from him to us. At once, he began hobbling in our direction, his gun hitting the asphalt like a drum, his no-longer-blond hair whipping at his nape, the waves dark red.
Despite the stain on his shoulder, where his basil-green sweater had turned brownish, the rips and tears, the strip of fabric wrapped around his thigh, he plodded toward us.
Eislyn’s wheezing spurred me on, renewing my efforts in hauling her down the street.
“Hold on,” I gritted out, adjusting my hold on her. “We’re right there.”
Thirty feet from us, Eli’s mouth stretched into a smile, and the jagged scar flowing from the corner of his lips to his jaw stretched out. “Eisly?—”
He lurched left.
As if struck by something invisible.
Time stopped, and so did Eislyn and me. Her weight eased off my shoulders as she stood taller, her spine ramrod straight.
A second ticked by. Eli’s face grew slack, his head slightly tilted aside.
Another one, and his rifle clattered to the ground. But he didn’t bend to pick it up. He remained in a relaxed stance, staring ahead and yet at nothing at the same time.
A third, at the end of which he…collapsed on the asphalt. Sagged precisely like a person with a bullet in their skull.
My fingertips grew numb. The street began to undulate under my feet. And Eislyn's gut-wrenching scream paralyzed me to my toes. My joints became icicles, unbending, locked, as the blood-pumping organ in my chest paused its thundering.
“Eli,” she sobbed, and before I knew it, I was pulling her with me.
Step after step, I heaved Eislyn down the road. Breath after breath, I wished for Eli’s lungs to inflate. Grunt after grunt, my facade of courage fractured as Eislyn’s wailing ebbed into a wheeze until finally, it…hushed.
The neighborhood vanished from my peripherals, dissipated like swirls of steam, my sight fixed on the unmoving shape ofa man who’d taught me how to fight together with Zion, who’d become Eislyn’s salvation, who’d been a part of the family I’d built.
“Come on.” I uncurled her arm from my neck?—
She slumped.
I almost barreled into the ground with her, catching her by the waist at the last moment.
“You have to help me. I can’t hold you up myself,” I ground out, trying to stay upright with her leaning against me. Flames weaved around my sinews, snapped my tendons, set my muscles ablaze, but I didn’t care about their state.
Because a winter storm had frozen me from how Eislyn gave no answer to my plea.
Straining, I lowered us both beside the man lying on his back and gazing into the drab sky. My knees banged on the asphalt with such force the pain radiated all the way to my eyes.
“Eislyn.” I raised her chin?—
A glassy look met me.
Utter vacantness raged in her eyes.
“No.” My soul withered like a basil plant left in the sun for too long. “Please, gods,no.” Nausea crept up my esophagus as her body fell on the asphalt. “No,” I whispered. “You have to live, Eislyn.Live.” I traced my friend’s features, searching for a hint of life and finding none. “Live, please—” My voice cracked. “Live, Eislyn.”
Her name quivered off my tongue again and again as I stroked her tear-streaked face. The dampness permeated my skin, imbuing me with hatred for Ilasall, so fierce I threw my head back, presenting myself to the assault of the day’s fog.
An unrepressed scream shredded my throat, announcing my location to anyone on a hunt, and I wished for them to succeed.
Because the fire flowing down my cheeks was nothing compared to the realization that two individuals of my familyhad died before they could reach each other. Fall in an embrace. Have the child they cared deeply about before it was even born.
With shaking hands, I took both of theirs and clasped them together, closed their eyes, one set brown and the other amber, and prayed for my friends to awaken.
