He was too pure for such gore.
Reality finally slammed back into me.
Geryll didn’t feel right.
He didn’t move.
He wasn’t breathing.
Shaking, I looked down.
I squeezed my eyes shut a moment later.
Half of him had been ripped from the waist down.
He was gone.
His eyes were still wide, like always. But fear had frozen in them.
He’d left this life horrified.
Because I hadn’t saved him.
I pressed a trembling hand to his chest, as if I could feel the flutter of him hidden somewhere.
Only brutal cold reflected back at me.
He was covered in blood.
On the armor I’d helped him pick out a year before, when he’d shot up five inches in just one summer, laughing that he’d almost caught up to my height.
On his cheeks, now even paler.
In his beautiful blond hair, which he always kept neat and pushed back.
The rain had messed it up, plastering the strands to his forehead.
My trembling hand rose and pushed his locks back, shaky fingers trying to rearrange them as he used to.
Useless.
The rain ruined them again.
“You shouldn’t have been here, Geryll,” I muttered.
Pain.
Pain was choking me.
No.
Those were the sobs trapped in my throat.
They’d killed him.
They’d killed Geryll.
Nothing made sense anymore.
