Chapter Forty-Eight
Willow spentthe next two days hunting at night and supplying Declan with blood while she pleaded with him to come back to her. There were many hours she lay awake and caressing his cheek while she waited for his eyes to open.
His heartbeat and breathing had returned to normal yesterday, and when she checked the wounds on his legs, they were little more than swollen, red blisters marring his flesh. The color had yet to fade from his skin, and the more time he spent unconscious, the more her anxiety grew.
Sometimes, she discovered herself pacing the barn and muttering like a crazed animal with no memory of how she’d gotten there. She felt like she was losing her mind as her emotions swung from despair to fury at the assholes who did this to him.
Her growing feelings of helplessness and uncertainty didn’t help. She was beginning to worry that he’d sustained too much damage and would spend the rest of eternity trapped in this realm of unconsciousness, and there was nothing she could do to save him.
Now, she sat beside him in the straw as she examined the sword for the hundredth time since arriving here. When she lifted it, the sun filtering through the slats reflected off the silver blade and cast shards of light around the barn. The weapon was amazingly lightweight for its length and killing ability.
She’d never seen anything like it before, and though she’d studied it for hours over the past couple of days, she still marveled at its beauty and feared its wrath. The blade was the color of mercury, and in the rays of the sun, it flowed in a way that reminded her of the Terminator, who turned himself into liquid.
Careful not to touch the blade, she turned the hilt over to examine the red-orange stone set in the center of it. When she looked closely, she could see deeper flecks of red and orange color deep inside it. And sometimes, she swore, those colors coalesced and swirled together. Like the blade, the stone was something she’d never seen before.
At three feet long, the sword was like holding liquid fire and sunlight in her hand. After seeing what it did to those Savages, it wouldn’t surprise her to discover that’s what it was. That somehow, the Savages or demons, managed to infuse the killing power of sunlight and fire into the blade. No markings etched the sword at all, and there was no way to tell where it came from, but she would eat worms if they discovered it originated on earth.
Declan’s eyes cracked open to discover Willow sitting beside him with her head bent forward and her blonde hair falling about her shoulders. His gaze fell to the sword in her hand as she ran her fingers over the jewel.
She looked so achingly beautiful with the sun spilling over her, but where had that weapon come from, and where were they?
He closed his eyes as he tried to recall what happened. And then he saw the sword plunging into a Savage and turning it to ash. Whatwasthat thing?
His eyes flew open in time to watch Willow stroke the blade. His breath caught, and he almost shouted at her not to touch it, but he was afraid of startling her. She pulled her fingers back and moved a few feet away to stash the sword somewhere.
Her face remained blank, but he sensed the fear churning beneath her outwardly calm exterior. “You’re beautiful,” he murmured.
Willow’s head jerked up, her mouth parted, and she scrambled across the straw to kneel at his side. “You’re awake!”
Declan smiled as he pushed himself into a seated position. His stiff muscles protested the action, but he didn’t feel anything shifting around inside him, which meant no broken bones.
“I’m awake,” he muttered.
When she released a sound part joy and part sob, he clasped her cheek in the palm of his hand. She looked about to throw herself into his arms, but she held back as her lower lip quivered.
“I was beginning to think you’d never come back to me,” she whispered.
He pulled her close to kiss her forehead. “I’ll always come back for you.”
She released a small sob and rested her forehead against his. He cradled her cheeks in his hands, kissed the tip of her nose, and then her lips. She’d never been so happy to see anyone in her life. It took everything she had not to turn into a sobbing mess, but she’d made it this far without breaking down and wouldn’t start now.
“What happened? How long have I been out?” he asked.
“Too long,” she whispered as she wrapped her fingers around his wrists and pulled his hands away. Leaning back, she smiled as she gazed into his beautiful, silver eyes. That color was still staining his skin, but his eyes were back. “Three days.”
He’d left her alone and vulnerable to attack forthreedays. He’d been worse off than he realized. “Tell me what happened.”
Willow filled him in on the details of their run through the woods, the man in the truck, her conversation with Vicky, where they were now, and how she’d been hunting to supply him with blood.
“I knew you would heal,” she said. “I didn’t think it would take so long, and I was beginning to fear you’d never wake up. That you would stay trapped in this… this…state. And then there’s this.…”
Her voice trailed off as she pulled his hands away from her face and held them out between them. Declan’s eyebrows rose when he saw the color still staining his flesh. He didn’t feel out of control anymore, and he wasn’t overwhelmed by rage and the emotions of others; there was no reason he should still be in this almost demon-like state.
“The color,” he murmured.
“The color,” she said.
Declan turned his hands over between them as he tried to figure out why his body remained in this state.
