Page 42 of When Death Called Life Home (When Deities Awaken #1)
Chapter 42
Blood and Tears
ALORA
N umbness fell over her first, hands steady but unmoving, frozen against the ground as her energy guttered at her fingertips. Then, everything burned. It spread downwards from where the blade sliced her throat and stole the oxygen from her lungs. It crawled over her chest, shoulders, arms and hands. Travelled down over her hips, into her thighs, calves and feet. The ground no longer brought her sweet relief.
Alora swore everyone else in the room disappeared. Everyone but the reaper with the blade coming for her life as he moved with the slow grace of a predator stalking its prey to circle to the front of her. The burning shifted into a sharp, loud ache in her throat and lungs. Her head, fuzzy. She lifted her eyes to his, more blood spluttering from her mouth. Her hands ignored her command to lift and wipe it away, and she barely felt it slide down her chin and drip to her dirt covered pants.
“How does this compare to drowning, Vitarce?” The reaper asked, crouching with his arms draped over his thighs.
The ringing in Alora’s ears drowned out the noise around her, only the man’s deep voice filtering through it. A whisper of Death caressed her ear. Her head grew heavy quickly, chin falling. The reaper caught it between calloused fingers, lifting it back up and grinning cruelly at her.
How sweet it’d be to kiss the earth. Allow it to swallow her – and her pain – and go back to numbness. This could be a dream, and she could wake back in the gardens on Earth with a handsome stranger’s black hair and dark eyes leaning over her. Maybe she had drowned and lay beside that pond unconscious. Maybe now she would finally wake. Maybe the blood she could feel running over her lips was actually water, clearing her lungs for her next breath.
Alora tried to draw it in, but her lungs failed to catch any of it. Her throat screamed at her until she whimpered and all the noise of clashing steel and people yelling caught up to speed with her brain once more.
She wouldn’t wake from this to find it a bad dream. No dark, mysterious stranger would be giving her CPR and forcing pond water from her lungs. She wasn’t on Earth. She wasn’t drowning. Not in water, anyway.
“Abo-about the sa-same, actually,” Alora coughed back in a weak retort.
“I imagine this to be far more painful,” he replied, tilting his head. “Did you know Osiris bragged about drowning you? He came up after every visit to the dungeons and preened about the things he was doing to a little, blonde haired Vitarce girl.”
Alora would’ve shook her head if she didn’t think it’d make the injury worse. She knew he hadn’t cut the large artery or vein in her neck, but with how difficult it was to breathe in, he’d definitely nicked her windpipe. Perhaps that’d been the plan. Perhaps he’d wanted her to feel an extended amount of pain, or he’d wanted to ensure Ascian saw her dying with no way to help.
The brute that stabbed Maelo with a dagger also knocked her out the second they shifted their attention away, thinking they were safe with Suoh and Cónán taking over, but they hadn’t noticed the extra pair slipping through the door. Not until it was too late. The woman put a knife to Suoh’s neck, the new male copying the action with Alora, but he didn’t hesitate when he knew he had Ascian’s attention.
Alora’s eyes snapped open when she realised she’d been tumbling into her memories, a whimper escaping her.
“You can feel it, can’t you? Life walking away. Abandoning you.”
Alora’s eyes drooped but she forced them open and up to meet the man's gaze. No , she wanted to reply . I feel her with me, cradling my soul as if it were her most precious possession . Her lips wouldn’t move, though. Her tongue would no longer obey her mind's command. She was losing, no matter how hard she tried to hold on.
The man tilted his head as he watched her, curiosity like a shadows hand lingering in the light. He didn’t notice the approach of another behind him, but Alora did. She recognised the long, slim legs, and the forever sharp nails.
Verena’s arm swiftly wrapped around the man's neck as her other hand gripped the top of his head and she snapped his neck in one quick movement. She growled over her shoulder, “Ascian, snap out of it!”
There had to have been further threat to her body if he’d waited. Or was he in shock? Was that what Verena meant by ‘snap out of it?’ He’d already created a grave site for her, Alora didn’t want him to have to bury her there and grieve her loss all over again.
“W-Wake.” Alora whined as pain rippled down her throat and chest. “Wake-Wake M-Mae-Maelo.”
“Maelo?” Verena asked, her brows pulled together. A second later and they smoothed out. “Osiris, Heart, right. Healer.”
Did she seem frazzled by Alora’s condition? Or was Alora simply losing touch on everything around her? Both were a high possibility.
Verena disappeared from view and dark spots dotted Alora’s vision. Her breath turned more ragged with each second that passed. She found herself falling, feet shuffled behind her, then strong arms enveloped her body. A sob racked Alora’s body and sent writhing pain after it. Her fingers curled weakly against Ascian’s thighs as he pressed his hands to her throat. It wasn’t enough. She and him both knew it, and he still tried. Salty tears dropped onto her forehead, lips following and pressing against the filthy skin there.
“Stay with me, Alora. You can’t leave me, not like this. I need you.”
Alora couldn’t get her mouth to work, couldn’t work her lips or tongue around the words she needed to say to him. I’ll never leave you . He had to know that. Even in death, she wouldn’t leave his side. Her soul was bound to his through fate, and time would never separate them.
“Alora,” Ascien whimpered, his voice breaking. “Please don’t leave me.”
I won’t . She pushed the thought towards him. Hoped she held enough energy left to send it into his mind, then her body slowly relaxed into his. Her arms slipped from his legs onto the marble floor, the cold no different to her own skin. A second longer she held on, a second more to feel the marble crack and flora climb up through to wrap around her hands. They greeted her with warmth, an extension of herself that she’d felt growing since the moment she returned to Elysia. Her soul reached for another, the flora giving her one last burst of energy.