We made it all of ten steps before my arms gave out. With a grunt, I sank to the grass, catching Julian’s head in my lap at the last second. Dark curls fell across my face in a disheveled mess. I tossed them back and wiped an arm across my forehead, rather amazed by the thin layer of sweat when my physical body was untold miles away in Bristol.
Glancing behind me, I cursed at the distance that remained to the spring. Stripped of his body, Julian should have been light as air. So why did it feel like I’d been hauling a sack of bricks around? My current form could have had some bearing, being spirit as well. Or had my physical expectations somehow joined me in the Otherworld?
I looked back at Julian to find his olive coloring leached away. “We’re almost there,” I murmured, brushing the hair from his eyes.
My hand froze as I stared unblinking at the raven black strands that fanned out against my skin. Grappling for a reason—any reason—to explain the darker color, my eyes popped when the lines of his face began to waver, the forehead broadening and his jaw becoming misshapen.
A startled cry broke from me. The face belonged to Julian, and yet not. He appeared a distortion of himself, sapped of strength and unable to hold even his spirit together.
Shoving my cape beneath his head, I jumped to my feet and raced to the spring before he wavered to the point of disappearing. Water sloshed over the edge of the silver cup in my haste back, soaking my hands by the time I knelt next to Julian and lifted his head up. His lips were already parted, and I tilted the cup to bring a small trickle of water to his mouth.
It dribbled out, spilling from the corners and over his bottom lip.
Oh, no, no, no...
Panic welled up inside me. I tipped the cup once more, and a scream gathered in my throat when the water dribbled out. In a matter of seconds, the remaining color left his skin, reminding me all too much of a corpse.
“Come on, Julian. Don’t be so stubborn.”
I stared at him so hard my eyes hurt. Nothing happened, despite my hope that a few drops had found a way to his core. Desperation took hold, and my fingers twitched to be of use, though my gift was intended to heal physical bodies, not fill depleted souls. But it had worked in the passageway between, surely it would be enough to help him swallow.
Fire flooded my hands, enough to create a small inferno that would have shaken his world if he were conscious. “Hold on...”
His lips twitched, the movement so slight it could have been a trick of the imagination. Then they twitched again, and the fire receded unused as I lifted the cup to his mouth. This time only about half of the water ran down his chin as the other half went to the back of his throat. I repeated the process over and over until the cup was empty.
Setting it aside, I cradled his head in my lap. “Come back, Julian.” The words sounded a cross between a plea and a demand.
Long seconds passed before the color began to creep into his cheeks, infusing the olive skin with reddish tones.
Oh, thank heavens.
Stirring, Julian pulled in a deep breath. Then his eyes cracked open, and he stared at me in obvious confusion.
“Selah?” he said tentatively.
“Yes, Julian. It’s me.” I tucked a lock of hair behind his ear, heartened to see that it had lightened the few shades to its original dark brown.
His gaze moved beyond me to a cluster of trees laden with a crimson fruit unknown to the mortal world. “Are we in the Otherworld?”
“You don’t remember crossing over?”
He frowned. “My last memory is being helped up some stairs at the tavern. Where did you find an altar?”
“Miss Rose brought some sort of stone that allowed us to link to a passageway from Bristol. I’ve no idea where we came through, just that I almost lost you in between.”
He raised a brow in question.
“Your spirit stopped moving, and I had to fight the Otherworld not to let go.”
Understanding filled his face. “Yet you held on even after everything I did to you.”
I cupped his cheek, overwhelmed by how close I had come to losing him. “Of course I did.”
He turned into my hand, and his chest lifted with another breath.
“Feeling better?” I asked.
“Like I’ve been brought back from the dead.”
I shuddered from the thought. “You were certainly close enough. Near the end, you didn’t even look the same.”
Julian stilled. “How so?”
“The changes were subtle, but for a short time you appeared an aberration of yourself.” My mouth tightened reflexively. “All I could think was that your spirit had grown too weak to hold a proper form.”
He held my gaze with a steadfastness that made the back of my skull prickle. “Did it frighten you?”
“Very much so. I feared you would fade away before I got any water down your throat.”
“And now what do you see?”
A handsome man with a devious air about him. I smiled. “Just you, Julian. The same as you’ve always been.”
This seemed to please him. He nestled deeper into my lap, and his eyelids drooped with sleepy contentment. Inhale. Exhale. His warm breath passed through the thin sheath to my inner thigh.
I stiffened. “Can you sit?”