Quarn’s body was sprawled across the blackness, his weathered features covered in dirt and blood and ash. I couldn’t see the Seventine. I couldn’t see anything as the force of my agony dropped me to my knees beside him.
“No, Quarn. No … please. Please don’t do this.”
I gathered him to me, expecting to feel his solid weight. Prayed to feel warmth and movement as his lungs lifted and heart beat. But there was nothing.
I screamed and screamed and screamed. Someone lifted me, but I refused to let go of my guardian. I wouldn’t accept this. Francesca was bad enough, but Quarn’s death was not allowed. He had saved me and everyone I was connected to, and in doing so had his own tether severed, his energy released back to the gods. He would be with his Hallow now, but I wanted him here.
Eventually my screams morphed into sobs. I clutched his body to me, but the substance of my guardian was fading away. Freeing a hand, I slapped at the rivulets of liquid pouring from my eyes, trying to clear my vision so I could see his familiar face. No. Please no. He was fading away, the features shrinking into themselves, the vessel dissolving. Without his essence, Quarn’s shell was no longer needed. It was going to dissipate back into the earth.
I dropped my head down close to what remained of my guardian.
“I love you,” I said between gulping sobs. “Fly free, my friend; find your Hallow. I’ll meet you again in the next life.”
I let him go then and, like a mist in the breeze, he shattered into a million beautiful pieces. In that moment, my heart did the same thing.
I realized that I was cradled in someone’s lap. Strong arms held me and warmth surrounded me. I recognized the tantalizing scent, all spice and male. Brace had me. He was holding on to me, to the point of almost crushing. We didn’t speak for a few minutes. He must have reached me seconds after Quarn had, and he’d lifted me into his lap and held on while I raged at the world. While I clutched at my guardian for the last moments of his mortal life.
I sucked in deeply, trying to quell the intense sobs which still shuddered through me. This wasn’t over yet. I couldn’t fall apart. I had to finish the Seventine or Quarn’s death would be for nothing. If they managed to sever my tether, we would all fall.
I struggled up from Brace, and he let me go. On my feet, I glanced around, trying to sense where the first was. Brace’s heat was at my back, and I let myself feel it for just a moment before a cold resolve washed over me. I brushed away the last of the moisture on my face. Focus.
“There,” Brace said, his long arm coming around me to point across to the large pit.
I could see the red hair standing out starkly against the dark ash. I started running. The first was close. I reached him in moments.
“Why is he on the ground?” I asked Brace, slowing in caution of what game the Seventine was playing now.
“I might have hit him really hard when he wasn’t expecting it,” Brace said with an angry shrug. “I might have also blasted out a few bursts of energy to help him along.”
“You hit him with your cyclone-energy?” I almost wanted to smile at that, but I wasn’t sure smiling was part of my capabilities any longer.
“The Seventine are lucky that my priority was you, and that a single burst was all I had time for.”
The dark anger brewing in Brace’s tone had my head snapping up to meet his gaze. It was the first time I’d really looked at him since Quarn’s death, unable to stand the sadness or sympathy I expected to see in his eyes. I could barely hold my own emotional breakdown in check. I couldn’t deal with anything more.
But now I saw him and my blood turned to ice in my veins. He was angry, rip-the-world-apart angry. Black eyes dominated the hard lines of his features. Brace was god-like and alien in that moment, as if he wasn’t quite a real being any longer, but something carved by the very gods themselves.
“This is my chance,” I all but whispered to him. “I’m going to trace the first now.”
His forehead dropped down to rest against mine. “That’s twice now, Red. Try not to make it a third time,” he growled. “I didn’t get to you in time … all day I’ve been a step behind.”
“It wasn’t your fault. You were saving everyone else. Keeping our people safe.”
Brace’s next growl ripped across the plains. “You are my everyone. My first duty is to you.”
My perfect warrior.
I lifted my lips and touched them gently to his face. The sting was light, my cuts already healing. “Let me finish what we started. If we don’t end them, then this will all be for nothing. I need you to bring the other girls into the dark mountain.”
I sensed his desperation. He was fighting hard with himself.
But he let me go.