She stepped back, trying to find a scalpel, something sharp, something that would be quick and painless. She wouldn’t let them be taken to West Port. All she could find were filthy bandages and empty bottles of medicine. She needed one scalpel.
Something under her clothes bumped against her leg. It took her a moment to remember what was there. The obsidian. She had been holding it when the bomb went off; she’d shoved it in her pocket without thinking.
She fumbled for it and slit her finger open. The piece must have shattered in the explosion, but it was sharp at least.
She was too slow. The necrothralls were already inside. There were bodies by the door, and several necrothralls had stopped there, dragging them away, while the rest moved deeper.
They weren’t moving fast, but they were faster than Helena. They reached the survivors before she did.
“No!” Helena rasped out, her raised voice splitting her chest.
One of the necrothralls moved towards her. She tried to fend it off. All she had was the obsidian. She slashed at the necrothrall with it. The soft, deteriorating skin split easily on contact, and then the tip hit bone.
She’d used barely any force, but that pressure alone caused enough pain that her legs failed her.
When her head cleared, she was on the ground—and so was the necrothrall.
Blood dripped from her fingers where she was gripping the obsidian, the edges of the black glass buried in her skin. There were still so many necrothralls.
They moved towards her, bodies blotting out the reddish light filtering through the door. Wind fluttered across her face.
Her eyes slid shut.
WHEN SHE TRIED TO OPEN her eyes again, they were heavy, as if her lashes had tangled. When she tried to move—her body wouldn’t.
She tore her eyes open. There was glaring light, and everything was blurred until she found a vague dark shape near her. She recoiled, then squinted.
Kaine was standing beside her, pale and wide-eyed, his face impossibly haggard.
“You …”
The word emerged cracked and croaking. Her tongue was thick and dry, as if she hadn’t touched water in days. She couldn’t feel anything below her neck.
She tried to look down but couldn’t move.
She was paralysed.
Her eyes crossed as she tried to look down her body. All she could make out was an intravenous drip in her arm. When she squinted, she could see saline and other things in upended glass vials all running down into the tube.
“What?” she asked. The words crackled in her throat and slurred across her tongue. “What’d you do …?”
“What did I do?” Kaine repeated slowly. “I saved your life.”
He was breathing unsteadily. “Crowther, with his endless demands, has the High Necromancer taking a myriad of precautionary measures. Only three people knew about that bombing before it happened. And I wasn’t one of them. When I got word, I thought I was being paranoid sending my thralls in. Surely, they’d understand that I can’t stop every fucking thing. This was for my peace of mind, I told myself. To see the fallout, so I’d know how bad things were. You wouldn’t be there, of course. I told myself you wouldn’t be there, you’d be safe in Headquarters, because that is the damned deal. Isn’t that what you promised? That they wouldn’t punish you? I knew—I told you this would happen—”
His voice broke.
“Wasn’t … Crowth—” Speaking moistened her tongue at least, but she was dying for water. Her mind was still foggy. She couldn’t understand how she was there.
“Don’t defend them!” Kaine looked feral with rage. “Do you have any idea how close you came to dying? It took an entire medical team to keep you alive. Why would they leave you alone in that fucking hospital if they weren’t trying to kill you?”
“Were … evacuating,” she said slowly, pacing her words, her tongue gradually complying.
“Alone?”
“I was—in charge.” She felt eerily lucid. “Soldiers—didn’t deserve to die alone.”
She tried to get up. She felt as if she’d be able to think more clearly if she could just sit up for a minute and figure out what had happened to her.
“Well, I didn’t see anyone there while you were dying.”
She wasn’t sure why she was trying to reason with him, but she wanted him to calm down so that she could reorient herself.
“It’s a war, Kaine. People die. Given your personal death toll, you should know that better than anyone else. You know that I’m not going to prioritise my survival over everyone else’s.”
He stared at her for a long terrible moment, the rage stark on his face. “Well, you should.” He was suddenly ice-cold, and his eyes gleamed so silver that they were almost white. “Because I have warned you, if something happens to you, I will personally raze the entire Order of the Eternal Flame. That isn’t a threat, it’s a promise. Consider your survival as much a necessity to the Resistance as Holdfast’s. If you die, I will kill every single one of them. Given that the risk to their lives is the only way to make you value your own.”
Helena stared at him, dumb with shock that slowly twisted into rage.
“How dare you? How—dare you!” Her voice rose so high, it cracked.
If she could have moved, she would have thrown herself at him and tried to beat him to death with her bare hands. She wanted to scream at him.
But beyond her fury was an even greater sense of horror at what this meant. He’d become the very threat that Crowther had feared. Once he would have been loyal to them for the sake of avenging his mother, but Helena had usurped that, given him a new and uncontrollable source of obsessiveness and rage.
She closed her eyes, unable to look at him, and the ouroboros flashed through her mind, that image of endless self-annihilation. A dragon forever consuming itself.
She gave a rasping sob that rattled her lungs violently, and as she fought to breathe, the room went still.
The surface beneath her shifted. Fingers tucked a stray curl behind her ear before brushing across her cheek.
“I know your face too well.” He sighed. “You’re thinking you’ll have to kill me now, aren’t you? That I’m too much of a liability.”
She said nothing, refusing to open her eyes.
“Would you really do it?”
She looked at him. “You know—you know I will not choose you at the price of everyone. It wouldn’t even save you if I did.”
He looked away then. “You’d never forgive yourself.”
Her jaw trembled. “No. I wouldn’t—” Her throat grew thick. She struggled to swallow, unable to lift her head. “But it wouldn’t be the first unforgivable thing I’ve done. What’s one more line for the history books?”
He was silent for a long time.
“What will you do when I’m gone?” he asked, as if that was all that mattered.
“I’m sure you can imagine.”
The ceiling blurred at the thought of a world where Kaine was gone and she was alone, with no one to blame but herself.
She hated this war. She had thought she could do anything. That she was strong enough for it. That there would be no limit to what she was willing to do or endure. Apparently, Kaine had become her limit.
She couldn’t imagine herself without him. She didn’t think she’d even exist anymore.
She gave a choking gasp, struggling for air, lungs rattling.
Suddenly Kaine was over her, holding her face in his hands, tilting her head so she could breathe. That was all the embrace possible.
“Just live, Helena.” His voice was shaking. “That’s all I’m asking you to do for me.”
Helena gave a low sob, lungs whistling as she fought to breathe. “I can’t promise that. You know I can’t promise that. But I can’t risk what you’ll do if I die.”
He kissed her. She could taste the plea on his lips.
“I’m sorry,” she kept saying again and again, “I’m sorry I did this to you.”
A harsh buzz broke the air. Kaine went rigid and jerked back with a curse. Another buzz. Two long and two short. Each time the noise came, the lights in the room dimmed, flickering ominously.