“We’re losing her,” the doctor shouted as Uther grabbed me, yanking me out of their way.
“You can’t save her, and neither will our God. He abandoned us when we agreed to betray him and the Holy Lands. He won’t be answering those prayers.” Uther’s stare held mine as frustration tore through me.
“Neither will fucking medicine,” I snapped, pushing the doctors away from her as I picked her up. “I need holy water, help me, Uther,” I demanded as I moved towards the elevator.
“She will die,” the doctor snapped.
“She will not die; Erie was born dead until I brought her to life. I brought her to life again after that, and I will do it again. I will always bring her back to me.”
Chapter 24
I moved into the bathroom, not stopping until we had entered the shower and Rhett turned on the water, staring me down. I wanted them out of here, but to save her, I needed them. I hated that I’d trusted anyone else with her, and yet I’d needed space so that I hadn’t gone off on her, or done something irrevocably bad that I wouldn’t have been able to take back.
“Turn on the hot water,” I requested as I sat on the floor, pulling off her light blue scrub top. The bottoms took effort, and Rhett didn’t hesitate, moving into the shower beneath the spray to help me remove them. “Beneath the cupboard is the lavender soap, hand it to me. What the fuck happened, Rhett?”
“They brought her into the medical ward and started the injections to null her powers,” he said as he bent over, digging through the cupboard until he pulled out the boxes of soap, the same ones I’d had made and left where she could find them for the last seventy-five years. “They pushed too much, and she OD’d badly, and I made them stop pushing it, but fuck, it was bad. Your father ordered it, and no matter what I said, they wouldn’t listen. They didn’t stop the fertility drugs, and afterward, I put her in that fucking box as I was ordered, and started calling you. You didn’t answer.”
“You should have called Uther sooner,” I snapped as I used the soap to wash the filth from her, water running red with the blood that seeped from her head.
“It’s not like I did nothing,” he argued. “I sat beside that cell, and I did tell your father that he was breaking her by placing her in there. I was with you the last time this happened, and I remembered it. I fucking put her in it, Mason. I did it because I don’t have the power to override your father, only you do, and you left us,” he swallowed as he grabbed a washcloth, pushing it over her head, which was already beginning to mend. “She isn’t pregnant,” he stated, dropping the cloth into the shower and staring at her in horror.
“The last fucking time this happened, it took almost an entire year to bring her back, and he still did it.” I couldn’t believe he’d be so fucking stupid, or that he would let Arthur build a replica of the same fucking room the druids had put her in as a child when it had been Arthur’s fault the last time she had been caged.
Uther snorted from the doorway. “He didn’t care if she was coherent, Mason. To him, she is merely the cure. There is no person attached to it, no soul. He doesn’t know what you have been through to save her, nor does he fucking care. He only agreed to allow you time because you are his son.”
“I gave this girl my fucking name,” I growled.
“You gave that girl your heart the day you cut her from the rotten placenta that still held her. Before then, way before then, if we’re going to be honest here,” he returned softly. He walked over to the tub, nodding towards it as the younger lads entered, dumping the buckets of holy water into the tub while he turned on the hot water.
I watched them in silence as they worked together, adding the raw lavender into the water while candles were lit around the far edge of the tub. Erie hadn’t moved yet, hadn’t made a fucking sound, but she was warm, still alive.
“Don’t you fucking leave me,” I uttered against her ear. “Stay with me, Erie, stay with me.” My throat bobbed against the words, and the moment the lads were finished, I lifted her and moved her to the tub. Uther held his arms out, and I stared him down, unwilling to let him take her even for a moment.
“You can’t get in the tub with your armor on, asshole. Give me the girl and get undressed so I can hand her to you,” he growled, watching me closely. “It isn’t like we haven’t done this shit before. She’s just older now.”
I shook my head, handing her slight weight to him as I ripped off the soaked armor and clothes, before stepping into the tub to take her, uncaring that Rhett was about to make monster dick remarks as he snorted.
“Of all the blessings you got, I envy that one the most,” he snorted, his eyes alight with silent laughter. “How the ladies would love me even more if I wielded that sword.”
“You think it a blessing?” I snorted as I settled into the water, lifting my arms to accept Erie’s unconscious form. I position her between my legs, holding her head out of the water as I cradle it against my chest. The moan that escaped her lips punched me in the gut.
“I think the monster within you made sure it was larger than most. Although, I’m still the better lover,” he shrugged as he spoke. “I’ll guard the door, I’m guessing that you don’t want anyone else inside your apartment?” he asked.
“I don’t want anyone coming in until she’s healed,” I agreed.
“And Arthur?” Uther asked.
“Fuck him, he can’t get to her while she’s here, now can he?” I challenged as my hand cradled her chin. I took in the damage to her face. It was swollen enough that she hardly looked human, let alone female.
“You need to face the fact that she may have brain damage after she smashed her head against the glass,” Uther said as he knelt. Staring at her, he reached out and touched her forehead. “You may have to kill her, and pray she comes back quickly.”
“Erie didn’t smash her head against the glass, at least not consciously. They placed her into an exact replica of the room she was locked within for months. Her mind snapped; combine that with the drugs they gave her and she wasn’t aware of what she was doing. She was only trying to get out of the cage, away from it. Her mind probably told her that death would be easier than allowing her mind to break again. That was her flight kicking in, the need to survive whatever happened at all costs.”
“That’s some fucking instinct,” he replied as he grabbed a towel and dried his hair off. “You do know that if she doesn’t come back, you’ll still need to do what is needed, right? He won’t let everyone die. Neither would you, no matter what happens. We swore an oath to protect them, to do it at all costs. The price you paid, Mason. The price you paid to keep us alive, to have that girl born, it was the highest cost of any of us. You can’t let that sacrifice be in vain.”
I closed my eyes against the memories that his words evoked. The memories of a blue-eyed child who smiled at me as if I’d hung the moon just for him. No, Rhett was fucking right. I wouldn’t let my son’s death be in vain. His life was the cost I paid to allow the cure to be created, the same cure that would save our people. Carolina had cursed me to hell for it, and I hadn’t blamed her for it. Our son’s life was taken so that others could live.
“Get the fuck out,” I uttered as I inhaled the smell of her hair, drinking in the scent that was my sanity. She may have used the soap to escape the past, but to me, she was the escape from the sins I’d committed to save the Templars, to protect the guardians of the Outer Realms, who defended mankind against those monsters getting into this one. No matter what our past had been, she was my salvation, my home.
We kept the other monsters out of this world, and if we died, this world would be lost. Not to mention, we protected this realm from the invasion of other races, like the ones that the world thought were wiped out so long ago. So I’d done what it took, kept a promise that I’d made thousands of years ago. When the witches had cursed us, I’d made a deal with the druids to save both of the races
from the curse. But it had come with a heavy price, one that had taken a piece of my soul, and I’d killed the one thing I had craved the most soon after. The cure, it had cost my son his life, and with it, I’d watched everything fall apart until I’d walked into the decrepit church to ensure it wasn’t all for nothing, only to find Erie unmoving in the placenta they’d left on the floor.
Evil, the nuns had called her. Satan’s blood; no, no, she was much darker than that. She was created of the oldest magic in this world. I’d knelt, pulling the sac away from her, and then lifted her from the cold, icy floor. She hadn’t moved, born premature and too tiny to survive in a world that cruel and unforgiving. My mouth had covered her face, and I’d blown my air into her lungs, and then closed my eyes as I’d prayed to any God who hadn’t abandoned us. When I’d looked back down at her, wide blue eyes stared up at me, unhappy that I’d stolen her death from her. As if she’d sensed the life she would live even at the first moment it began.
“I’m going to tell you a story, Erie.”
Chapter 25
Erie
I listened as he spoke, unsure whether it was true or not. The sound of his voice comforted me, sending the pain away as his hand stroked over my ribcage. I could feel Uther watching from the doorway, where he protected his lord master while he tended to me.
“It was a beautiful day,” Callaghan uttered thickly. “I had just whittled a wooden sword for Evan. A small one, as he was only a tiny lad of five winters. I watched him light up as he took in what I had made him, and at that moment, I never loved anything or anyone more than I did him. My son, with my eyes and my hair,” he said hoarsely, adjusting his hold, cradling me closer as if I gave him comfort.
“He died the night I gave him that sword. The cost I paid to create the cure for what the witches had done to our people. I’d made a deal with the druids themselves to heal our people and save us all. I knew they had the cauldron, and so we worked together to save our sorry asses. If we died, creatures like the ones that lived outside of this world would be free to bring war and plagues of which this world had never known before. We agreed to protect this world, and our race is the one thing that stands between the walls of this world and the ancient ones from cracking and crumbling. Lucian Blackstone, his seal only brought down a few walls, lesser walls. What we protect is so much more, so much worse.
“There once was a maiden, one so beautiful and pure that to look upon her was a privilege men died for. She ruled a race that protected this one from invasions and worse things than you could ever imagine. She brought men to their knees with a simple look, but she left this world. We continued to protect it, no matter the cost, and we became the Templar Knights. While the world thought we merely protected pilgrims, we protected the realm from the monsters who sought to destroy it.”
I heard Uther exhale as Callaghan kissed the side of my head. “The witches were among the creatures who wanted the others to enter this world, to bring those who challenged them and their magic to their knees. The witches sacrificed humans to these monsters by the village-full. They slaughtered women, children, and men as a sacrifice to the monsters that they wanted to bring here, but we had sealed the gates, preventing it,” he whispered. “When their actions drew the eye of the king and others, we were called to hunt them down and deliver God’s justice upon them. We’d warned the witches to stop, to quit before it became too late for them, and yet they refused. As dawn approached, the Order set them afire, burning them at the stake as a warning to any others brazen enough to continue their foolish evil ways. We’d predicted the curse, having already agreed to pay, whatever the cost, in order to secure the line, keeping those who needed and deserved the cure, safe from the darkness.
“On that day of my sacrifice and all others to be paid, I grieved, and as I did, I knew hate for the first time. So I did what was needed of me. The druids agreed and told me of the cauldron and where it would appear during the moon cycle. They told us how to secure a child of both races. They told me of the evil and light that it would create, the purest of both races mixed into one female, who would be mine. I raced to Scotland where the cauldron was hidden, while Uther and Lance set about finding your parents. Jacques’s own daughter was your mother. Your father was the strongest, highest ranking druid of age who could father a child. They were pushed into the cauldron and drank of the darkness within. It wasn’t a fast process. I waited in the village for weeks, and then months, until rumor came that they’d emerged. They weren’t the same people who had gone into that cauldron. Your mother was pure when she’d gone into it, but something changed. They nested as if they had grown something evil inside that cauldron.
“Then her belly began to grow round with child. I still waited with my men to see what we had done. We waited to know if we had cursed this world to its end. On the day you were born, a great storm filled the world. It was unlike anything the Knight’s and I have ever witnessed. I made my way to the church, knowing whatever was happening, it was the center of it all. I entered the church, and there, on the floor, was this mass of blood and muck. I bent down, touching it, and this tiny perfect face was inside of it. I freed you, I freed you and then I blew air into your tiny premature lungs. Erie, you never cried. You just stared at me as if I had somehow cheated you of death. This tiny, fierce little female glared up at me with bright blue eyes and red hair and looked as if she wanted to beat me. I named you outside of that church; I named you after the land from which you were created. Erie, Erie of Ireland, with eyes the color of the skies after the rain had gone and the sun had filled the land; with hair as wild and untamed as the land itself.
“I took you to the druids and left you. They were warned of how precious you were. I marked you with my name, giving you my protection to ensure no harm came upon you. I left you there, thinking you would be treasured by all. I stayed close enough that I often was able to watch you as you grew. You were the wildest child I’d ever seen. So fearless as you did everything the other children couldn’t do yet. I went to war though, and when I did, everything changed. I returned after ten years, ten long years and not a day had gone by that I hadn’t received a report of the progress you’d made. Lies, every fucking one of them had been lies. On the last letter I had received as the battle ended, I noticed that it no longer spoke of you. Only that the female had shown darkness and had left them wondering who your true parents had been. You had mastered what their most skilled druids could not. You excelled at everything you ever tried to do. You fucking terrified them, and when I figured that out, we rushed back to you.
“I found you in a glass room, beaten and broken,” he swallowed as he exhaled. “Just like the one my father put you in. When I found you with the druids that day, I left you with Uther as I hunted them down and allowed the monster within me to feast on the flesh of those who had tortured you. I killed them all, and I know I stole them from you, taking your revenge. I couldn’t stop it because to me you were just an innocent girl who had the misfortune of being the purest, most beautiful thing this world had ever created.
“We took you from that place of hatred that day, to my home, where I bathed you in lavender to rid your body of the filth you laid in for months. You were unable to die, but you might as well have been dead to this world. I fed you, held you, and sang to you of the land of which I’d named you after. I pleaded to any God who would still hear my prayers to heal you. I begged them to take me in your place should they be merciful enough to listen. Eventually, your body healed, but your mind was so far gone that nothing I did brought you back. One day, as I sat in my bed, cradling your unmoving body as I am again today, you looked up at me as if you had never been gone at all.
“You asked me once if I knew it had been you who murdered every male druid you’d ever befriended, and I did. I watched you hunt them down. I was there, Erie. I watched you cut them up as you took everything that they had used to hurt you from them. Only once did you ever see me, and the loo
k in your eyes was the darkest magic of creatures staring out of the most perfect blue eyes.” His thumb trailed over my cheek as he pushed the hair away from my face.
His chest trembled beneath me as he sat up, pulling me with him, and he whispered against my neck. “On that rocky cliff that I named you upon, I felt you with me. I felt something so deep inside of me stirring that it terrified me. You are the mate to that which crawls beneath my flesh. You were created for me and me alone. You were born of the greatest sacrifice, and the monster within me knew it long before I did, how much you would come to mean to us. That first look into your eyes and everything clicked into place like a puzzle that had been scattered coming together by a power greater than anyone could ever know. In the woods, I felt it again. I should have been abhorred by what you did to them, and instead, the monster within me preened, as if he couldn’t have been more proud of you for finally fighting back.” He lifted me without warning, and I groaned as my head swam, my vision blurring as Uther accepted me, allowing Callaghan to step out of the bath and reach for a towel.
“Is she awake?” Uther asked, his shamrock green eyes watching me. I mumbled as I struggled to lift my head.
“No, she’s not back yet,” Callaghan said as he grabbed my chin, tilting my eyes to where he could see them. “Her pupils are blown,” he muttered. Uther held me up as Callaghan wrapped me in a towel, slowly picking me up, before he walked us into his room, dimming the lights as he placed me on the bed. When he’d finished with the lights, he crawled into bed, naked, pulling me against his flesh. “That day I came to collect you, I knew you were beyond my reach. I knew you’d never come to me willingly, and neither I nor my men blame you. We failed you, called to duty by the Order, and every time I returned, you were worse off, farther to reach. One day I watched you outside of the Druid’s Den, and your eyes were dead. As if there was nothing that could reach you or change what you had become. Two days later, I watched you at a fair as your eyes lit up with the wonder of a child. You watched the rides as you inhaled the cotton candy that filled the air. You were filled with wonder. I want to watch you look at me like that, Erie. I want to watch you look at the son we will create with that wonder in your eyes. I promise you, he will be loved,” he whispered huskily.
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