Page 90 of Caelum

THIRTY-ONE

REED

Silence.

There were no words, no reasonings or justifications. There was only pain.

The exquisite pain of knowing she was gone. That she’d dived into the pit of Hell because we’d made our wish, taken her free will from her when she’d wavered in her path.

I knew the guilt would live with us forever, knew that life itself would lose meaning now that the one woman who had completed us was no more.

Even as we trudged out of the cave, me clinging to her lifeless body like a rag doll, I prayed she’d wake up. Prayed this was a joke. But it wasn’t. This was real.

This hell was real.

I moved because Frazer said I had to.

I carried her to the surface because Stefan demanded we bury her in Caelum.

I breathed because Nestor insisted we destroy this cave.

But after that?

I wasn’t sure what I’d do.

She was still warm in my arms, her body not rigid. I didn’t know how long it took for rigor mortis to set in, but the thought seemed to reverberate inside my head. Clinging to me so I couldn’t stop thinking of it.

In my mind’s eye, I saw the Earth taking her back into its soil, taking her further and further from my grasp, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to cope in a world without Eve. I needed her. Needed her so badly. I was her Chosen—I wasn’t supposed to roam this realm without her.

When we reached the surface, I didn’t even realize it. My eyes were blind, and I was working on the Hound’s instincts, relying upon it to get me where I needed to go since my brain was incapable of functioning.

I listened to my leader because Frazer spoke in that tone of voice that told me to obey.

Staring blindly at him as we hovered by the SUV that had brought us here, I listened to the wish he broke in two to confuse the Jannah so we could utter it as one.

We had no idea if it would work, but Eve was still Jannah , and we had no explosives to finish the job ourselves. The city of caves needed destroying now the falls of fire and water had disappeared, and the Jannah was our only means of making that happen.

“We wish that Eve’s sacrifice wasn’t made in vain.”

We spoke it as a septet, but we broke off the instant the wish was out in the open. The universe grabbed a hold of it, and before our eyes, a plume of dust soared from the opening on the rocky face of the hill.

“We need to move,” Nestor growled, his voice hoarse from emotion. “If we just triggered another landslide then…”

He didn’t need to finish the sentence.

Hustling toward the car, I clung to Eve as Dre opened the door for me. When we all squeezed in, Frazer drove us away from the scene of devastation behind us.

I didn’t need to look to know that the hill was imploding, the hive of caves disintegrating into what was, hopefully, a billion pieces.

I didn’t care.

All that mattered was that Eve had taken her last breath.

“I wish that Eve were alive.” It was a pointless wish, one I knew wouldn’t work, but it didn’t stop me from whispering it. From hoping it would work, and when it didn’t, I clenched my eyes and pressed my forehead to hers.

Everyone left. Everyone who mattered. Because I did something that took them away from me, and Eve was no different. She’d gone even though she loved me, and now that love was dead with her.