by J. R. Ward
She blinked once. And then . . . again.
Oh, God.
"Do I understand you correctly?" he said. "Do you want this . . . to end?"
They were both crying in earnest now. And she didn't have to blink it out again, because he knew in his heart and soul what she wanted--and yet, he waited for the signal one more time. This was one of those moments when he had to get it right.
Or he would never be able to live with himself.
"Is it time?" he whispered.
She blinked once . . . and then again.
Now he shut his lids and found his body swaying as if a tremendous weight had been set upon his shoulders, and not balanced well.
When he opened his eyes, iAm and the physicians were back in the room. One look into his brother's stark face and he knew that whatever had been said had not been marked by much if any optimism.
As iAm came over, the male was careful to acknowledge and smile at Selena--which Trez really appreciated. Then he leaned in and whispered, "There's nothing they can do. The anti-inflammatories aren't working, and the last set of X-rays exhibited a change that the first episode didn't have. The joints--or what should be the joints--are showing bright white on the films, with the kind of intensity metal would have. That wasn't the case before. Her vitals are not good and getting worse, even though they've given her things to help with her slow respiration and heart rate. Their sense is . . . this is the end."
Trez nodded, and then took a moment to tend to Selena's face. "She's ready to go," he choked out. "She told me so. Is there . . . something . . . we can . . ."
Manny stepped over. "We can help her along. If she's sure."
"She is."
iAm leaned in close again and whispered something else.
Trez took a deep breath. "Selena, do you want to see your sisters? Phury? The Directrix? They're all here. They're right outside."
In response, she closed her eyes. Once. And then kept them that way until he felt a fresh needle of panic go through him.
But she opened them again. She was still with him.
Now, her tears were coming faster and faster, and he wished he could concentrate enough to try to get in her mind, but he couldn't. He was too wrung-out, too emotional, too filled with grief. And he understood what she wanted anyway.
"You don't want them to see you this way." Blink. "You love them, though, and you want them to know you're going to miss them." Blink. Blink. "You want me to say good-bye for you."
Blink. Blink.
"Okay, my queen."
Then there was this weird pause.
Later, when he obsessively reviewed every single thing that happened, every hour that passed during the crisis, every nuance of the room and the people, every twitch of her face and each word he spoke to her, he would dwell on that moment. It was, he would suppose, rather like staring down the muzzle of a gun just before you got shot.
"I love you," he said. "I love you forever."
Tenderly, he stroked her face and prayed she could feel his touch. He didn't know whether she could or not; there was an alarming gray cast seeping into her skin.
Switching hands, so that his right one was grabbing hers, he patted around thin air, searching for--
iAm, as always, was right there, grabbing onto his palm with strength, steadying him.
He was not going to make it through this unless his brother was holding him up off the floor.
"Okay," Trez said to whoever was listening, "we're ready."
Manny went over to the IV line, a syringe filled with fluid in his hand. "The first shot is a sedative."
Trez sat forward on the chair he had been given. Putting his mouth right next to her ear, he said, "I'll love you forever. . . ."
He repeated the words until he wasn't sure how many times he'd said them. He just wanted them to be the last thing she heard.
"This is the final shot," someone said. Maybe it was Manny, maybe not.
Trez started saying his words faster. And faster.
"I love youforeverIloveyouforever. . . ."
Moments later, he stopped.
He wasn't sure how he knew it exactly.
But she was gone.
Sitting back, he looked into her still-open eyes. They were as beautiful as they had always been . . . there was no life in them, however.
That mystical spark that had animated her had gone out.
And her soul, no longer possessing a viable home, had left with it.
The silence and stillness of death was a void in and of itself, a black hole that sucked everyone and everything around it in; and so powerful was the pull, the lives of others were halted, too, momentarily crippled by the tremendous, contagious force.
Trez put his face down on the exam table and released the two hands that had sustained him, hers and his brother's. Then he wrapped his arms around his love, and he wept over her with such grief that glass exploded all around the room, the doors of the steel cabinets splintering and falling free of their frames, even the screen on the computer and the segments of the medical chandelier above cracking into shards.
He had been preparing himself for this terrible moment ever since he had found her outside of the Sanctuary's cemetery, subconsciously bracing himself, trying on the grief as one would test how hot a stove burner was or how toxic a smell.
The reality was indescribably worse than he had predicted even in his most pessimistic moments.
In reality, he was just another piece of glass in the room.
Utterly shattered, beyond repair.
SIXTY-NINE
Well, now he knew what it was like to see someone you love get mowed down by a car, iAm thought as he watched his brother sob.
Trez's emotions had put the clinic into a deep freeze, the air so cold, breath came out of everyone's mouths in puffs and stripped whatever clothing they had on to metaphorical shreds. Glancing up, iAm noted that the three medical professionals were likewise in extremis, Manny rubbing his eyes with his thumbs, Ehlena taking a tissue out of the shirt pocket of her scrubs, Jane wiping her face with her palms.
iAm sat up on his knees and massaged his brother's back. He wasn't sure whether the contact was annoying or helping--more likely, it was a neither-here-nor-there that wasn't even noticed.
Eventually, Trez took a shuddering breath and eased back.
There was a table stand within iAm's reach, and on it, there was a stack of folded white and blue towels. Snagging one, he put it up toward his brother.
Trez was outside of any Kleenex capability at this point.
The guy scrubbed his face and took a number of deep breaths. Then he sat back in the chair he'd been using and stared ahead.
"I want to go through the preparations," he said hoarsely.
"You got it," iAm replied. As the medical staff gave a collective brows-up, he said to them, "I have everything he needs. I put it in the locker room a couple of days ago."
It had been something he'd done before he'd left to go to the Territory, just in case he didn't make it back.
Although that had been kind of stupid. If he'd been captured and held there, he wouldn't have been able to tell anyone where to find the shit.
"Is it okay for him to use this room?" iAm asked, even though it wasn't really a request.
"Absolutely," Jane said. "He can be assured of privacy."
"Thank you." iAm patted his brother's knee. "I'll be right back, okay. I'm going to go get the supplies."
"Thanks, man," Trez said dully.
iAm got to his feet, and as his knees cracked, he realized he'd spent quite a while crouched on the tile floor.
He couldn't bear to look at Selena. It was just too damn hard.
Going over to Manny, he hugged the guy in a manly way, and then gave Jane and Ehlena something gentler.
"Thanks for taking such good care of them."
Manny just shook his head. "Outcome would have been different if we'd been able to do that."
"Some things . . ." iAm
shrugged. "There's nothing you can do."
Heading for the door, he pushed on the panel . . . and frowned as paint chips came off in his hands. Jesus, the steel had warped, the fit in the frame no longer right.
Outside, there wasn't, as the saying went, a dry eye in the house.
"What can we do?" the King asked, stepping forward and putting his palm out into thin air.
Approaching Wrath, iAm gave what was offered a shake, and then was surprised to find himself yanked in against that incredibly huge chest. For a moment, he allowed himself to sag into all the strength of the King's body, to the point where he was quite certain Wrath was holding him up off the floor.
But then he needed to pull it together. There were practicalities that had to be dealt with.
As he stepped back, the group of Chosen in their robes registered, and he felt a special kinship to them as a sibling himself.
"Trez is going to tell you later," he said, "but she wanted you to know she loved you so much. It was hard, at the end . . . she couldn't really communicate. The love for you all was there, though." He focused on Phury's yellow eyes. "And you, too."
"She was a female of great worth," the Primale said in the Old Language. "A credit to her tradition and duties, and also an individual who mattered for her own special gifts. There is a place in the Fade open to her this night and e'ermore."
iAm nodded, because he just couldn't bear to think that the female's life was just over. That one moment a person was in her body and then . . . poof! . . . she was gone as if she had never been, nothing but the translucent, ever-fading memories of others to testify she had, in fact, been born and had lived.
"I have to get something for him. In the locker room." God, he felt like he was talking through molasses. "It's for our way of tending to . . ."
He left the rest of that one just dangling in the breeze.
As he passed by Tohr, he stopped. The male was white as a sheet and shaking in his shitkickers, his dark blue eyes pools of suffering.
"I'm so sorry," iAm found himself whispering.
"Jesus, why would you say that?" the Brother choked out.
"I don't know. I have no idea."
He hugged the male hard, and felt a deeper connection with him. Then he pulled back, squeezed Autumn's shoulder, and thought, Man, it was going to be a long couple of nights for the pair of them as Tohr processed his PTSD.
The Brother knew exactly where Trez was in this moment.
Rhage was the last of the line-up, and strangely, he seemed to be in the worst shape. At least his Mary was by his side.
"It's going to be okay," iAm lied.
The truth was, he didn't know what the fuck was going to happen next.
"You gotta give me something to do," Hollywood said around his gritted teeth. "I gotta . . . I gotta do something."
"You're here. That's enough."
iAm embraced the guy and then kept going to the entrance to the locker room. Pushing his way inside, he stilled and just breathed for a couple of moments. Then he proceeded to the lockers immediately on the right.
There were four Nike bags in four separate units, and he took them out one after another. Strapping two on either side, he hefted the heavy weights and squeezed back out through the door.
In the tradition of the Shadows, remains were cleansed with sacred minerals and purified water over and over again while a litany of prayers was said forward and backward. Then there was a wrapping process with fragrant cloth, followed by wax that had to be melted on.
He was about to pass by Rhage again when he stopped and frowned.
Looking at the Brother, he said, "What time is it?"
Rhage checked his phone. "Five in the morning."
"Actually, there is something you can do," he murmured. "At nightfall."
SEVENTY
As soon as the sun was safely under the horizon, Rhage was the first one out of the mansion. Leaving through the library's French doors, he stalked across the empty terrace, its iron furniture having been put in storage for winter. The pool had likewise been drained and covered, the umbrellas stored away, even the flower beds and the fruit trees had been battened down for the coming snow.
It seemed appropriate. Like the compound was in mourning along with the rest of them.
At his side, a Husqvarna 460 Rancher chain saw hung from his dagger hand, all ready and waiting.
The daylight hours had been torture, the strange neutral aftermath of the death coupled with everyone having to stay indoors turning the house into zombie land.
The good news was that he was finally free and he was going to get to cut things.
Striding down to the trees at the far edge of the lawn, he penetrated the line and proceeded to the twenty-foot-tall retaining wall that ran around the compound. There was a reinforced door about twenty yards over, and he went to the thing, entered a security code on a keypad, and waited for the chunking slide that meant the internal bar had retracted.
Pushing the weight open, he stepped out and left the door wide for his brothers as well as Beth, Xhex, Payne, and all the others.
The trees beyond were mostly pines, and in the moonlight, he assessed the sizes of the trunks. He was going to avoid the old growth and stick to the young'uns.
Firing up the saw, he smelled gas and oil, and he reveled in the power as he approached a conifer that was about a foot in diameter. The blade went through the bark and into the meat of the thing like a dagger through flesh, the cut as fast and clean as a surgical strike. And as the fluffy-headed pine landed with a bounce, he moved on to the next, revving up, slicing through, monitoring the landing so no one got hurt.
In his wake, Tohr picked up the first twenty-foot-long section and dragged it off to the opening in the retaining wall. Beth was next. Z. Payne. Butch. John Matthew and Xhex. Blay and Qhuinn. On and on they went, working like an assembly line, nobody saying a word.
None of them had bothered with coats or even work gloves.
The blood that was spilled on those trunks as palms were scratched was part of their tribute.
On the autumn night air, the sweet pine pitch smelled like incense.
Rehvenge had helped him with the planning during the day. In the symphath tradition, funeral pyres had two parts: A triangular base of nine nine-foot vertical posts that was topped by a sturdy platform made of nine six-foot lengths, and an upper portion that was constructed out of ninety-six logs, of which ninety were nine feet long and six were six feet long. For the top part, each of the nine-footers was set nine zemuhs apart--which was roughly nine inches--and the succeeding layers were set across the one below perpendicularly.
The goal was to ensure plenty of airflow and a bright fire.
So that was the way they were going to do it--because none of them knew any other alternative, and although neither Trez nor Selena was a symphath, everybody figured it was best to go with something that had been proven to work rather than run the risk of a homegrown solution that failed.
Upshot was, Rhage was going to fell about sixy-five twenty-foot-plus trees. Then they were going to strip the branches and the bark using a combination of daggers, saws, and other tools, and set the whole thing up on the flat stretch of lawn to the west of the house.
As he worked, with the saw jumping at each and every cut like it was a wild animal barely leashed, he kept going back to his own past with his Mary.
He had been there, right there, where Trez had sat at the bedside of his beloved. He had known that frigid fear and disbelief that life, with all its endless permutations, had come to such a point. He had gone home and undressed and knelt on diamonds that had cut into his knees . . . and he had bowed his head to the only deity he had known and begged and pleaded for Mary to be saved.
And the Scribe Virgin had come unto him and provided him what he had asked for--but at a tremendous cost.
His Mary would be saved, but in exchange for the gift, she could not be with him. That was the payment for the incredible blessing, t
he balance to the miracle.
That pain had been a galaxy that had opened in his chest, an infinite wound that was so deep and of such a mortal nature, he had been surprised he had not started to bleed . . .
Rhage watched as another tree fell to the side in a dead faint to the cold ground.
He knew exactly what Trez was feeling right now.
The difference? At his nightfall, some two years ago, after he had sworn to give her up so she could be saved from her disease . . . his Mary had burst through his bedroom door alive and well, cured and saved, restored to health.
And able to unite with him.
It was the only sunshine he had known as an adult: Sure as if the roof above him had disappeared and the sun had risen just for him, warmth and light had shone down upon them both as he had held on to his female.
They had both been restored by the Scribe Virgin's mercy in that moment.
Later, he had learned that because Mary had been rendered infertile due to her earlier cancer treatments, the Scribe Virgin had decided that that was enough to balance the gift of everlife.
And so Mary and he were together to this day.
Trez had not been granted such a miracle.
Selena had not been saved.
It was Tohr and Wellsie all over again.
Even though Rhage wouldn't have admitted it to anyone, he didn't understand why he and his shellan had been spared. Especially given how the Scribe Virgin had cursed him with his beast earlier in his life for being so out of control.
And yet she had then seen fit to return his beloved to him.
Thanks to the mother of the race, his Mary was now free to exist without death until she chose differently--which would be when he went unto the Fade.
The fact that they had been spared . . . seemed just as random as why Tohr and Trez had been condemned.
At least his brother had managed to go on.
He could only hope the same for that Shadow.
*
"Take this," iAm said to Fritz, "to my condo at the Commodore. Place it on the outside of the glass slider on the terrace."
"My pleasure, sire," the butler replied. Except then the doggen's brows went up. "Is there aught else?"
"No."
As Fritz just stood there outside the exam room, looking confused, iAm couldn't figure out--
Oh. Right. He wasn't letting go of the note.
Forcing his hand to release its hold, he stepped back. "Thanks, man."
"If there is aught else you or your brother require, please call upon me. I would do anything to be of service, especially now."