Her skin burned against mine, but it wasn't the healthy heat of exertion. It was a dry, friction-born heat, like a machine running without oil.
"Look at me," I commanded, cradling her head.
Her eyes rolled back, the amethyst irises swallowed by a milky, opalescent white. But it was the markings on her skin that stopped my heart.
The golden markings, the beautiful, living map of our bond, were changing. As I looked at her, the gold was bleaching out, turning a stark, sickly silver. The light didn't pulse anymore; it flared in jagged, strobe-like spasms.
She tried to move her arm to reach for me.
The sound was audible over the screeching of the Harpies.Crrr-k-k.
It sounded like ice cracking on a winter lake.
"My... arm," she wheezed, her voice thin and reedy. "It feels... stuck."
I looked at her elbow. The skin had gone taut, shiny, and hard. It looked less like flesh and more like spun sugar.
"No," I whispered, the diagnosis hitting me with the force of a physical blow. The ancient texts in the Great Library of the High Seat had theorized about this, but I had never seen it. I had prayed I never would.
"Elias!" Kaelen was beside us, his sword whirling to deflect a Harpy’s talons. He dropped to one knee, his face a mask of terror. "What is it? Is she drained?"
"Worse," I said, my fingers trembling as I hovered them over her chest. "Something terrible…"
"Speak plain!" Thane roared from the perimeter, swinging his hammer to crush a Harpy’s skull. "We are a little busy!"
"Friction," I snapped, looking up at Kaelen. "We are four divine souls poured into a mortal vessel, Kaelen. We are too dense. Too heavy. Every time she channels us, every time the bond flares, it creates metaphysical friction."
I looked back down at her. The silver light was spreading from her neck to her jawbone, turning the skin rigid.
"We are cooking her from the inside out," I whispered, the horror of it tasting like bile. "Her mortal frame can no longer handle the pressure."
Aria convulsed, a stiff, jerky movement. "It... burns," she gasped. "Cold. It burns cold."
"If she moves too fast," I told Kaelen, meeting his golden eyes, "she will shatter. Literally shatter."
Kaelen went pale, the dragon fire in his eyes dimming to a flicker. He looked at her arm, at the way the joint seemed locked in place. He reached out to touch her, then pulled back, terrified.
"How do we stop it?" Flynn shouted, appearing out of the melee, bleeding from a scratch on his cheek. He skidded to a halt, seeing her condition, and the blood drained from his face. "Unbind her? Let her go?"
"We can't," I said, my mind racing through permutations, deducing outcomes at the speed of thought. "The bond is structural now. If we sever it, she crumbles into dust. If we keep it, then she will probably turn into a statue."
The irony was not lost on me. We were in a hall surrounded by statues, had recently been fighting living statues, and now we were turning the woman we loved into one.
Three harpies synchronized their dive, aiming directly for the huddled group of us, each of them letting out an almighty screech.
"Defend her!" Kaelen roared, rising to his full height. The dragon surfaced, scales rippling across his skin, his fear transmuting instantly into a violently protective rage. He unleashed a cone of fire that vaporized the lead attacker.
"Thane!" I yelled. "I need a shelter! She cannot be moved!"
The Bear Prince slammed his hammer into the floor. The marble buckled and rose, curling upward like a stone wave to create a crude, low dome over us. It was dark inside the shelter, lit only by the sickly silver glow radiating from Aria’s veins.
I held her still, using my body to cushion her from the vibrations of the battle raging outside our stone cocoon.
"Elias," she whispered. Her lips were turning pale, the color draining away. "I can't feel my fingers."
"Stay with me," I murmured, stroking her hair. It was brittle, dry as straw. Even her hair was dying. "Focus on the sound ofmy voice. Calculate the rhythm of your heartbeat. One, two. One, two."
"It's... slowing down," she said.
