“She did it, fucking hell, she did it,” Ristan says it as he stumbles back from the body and hands off the silent, blue, lifeless child. “She gave you a daughter.”
I’m up before I know it and my men release their hold, as I move to the child. She’s not breathing, and Eliran looks down at the helpless child and then over to where her mother lays lifeless on the bed, gutted. Ristan gutted my world to save my daughter, and maybe he had known, maybe he hadn’t. In the end, nothing matters beyond her children living, all of them. I step back from Eliran, knowing my menacing presence isn’t helping. “Save her, please, save my daughter.”
He moves into action, asking for things I have never heard of, but one of Eliran’s helper’s moves forward to help him.
Adam sifts in, his hands pulling at his hair as he sees Synthia. He looks around at the men; every one of them was as helpless to save her as I was. He must have felt their familiar bond shatter as her life slipped away. Devastation is written on his features as he stands there, trying to come to grips with what he is seeing. He spins and sifts out, only to return minutes later with Alden and Adrian, who wisely doesn’t lip off. Instead, he stands and watches the proceedings, unable to look away from the train wreck scene unfolding before his horrified eyes.
We all watch, waiting for a sign that one of the three will live. I stare at Synthia; where has her spirit gone? Did she go with Larissa, or did she join with her Fae ancestors? Or did demi-Goddesses have a cherished place among their own dead that I couldn’t follow her to?
One of the Fae assisting Eliran walks over to us and in her arms is a screaming infant. I hold out my arms, numbly. I then stare into azure eyes with a dark crop of midnight hair. He’s strong for something so small; his little arms push against mine as he frowns up at me. He’s tiny, born too early, yet strong like his mother.
Our link joins and I can feel the small boy. My son. I feel tears as they slide down from my eyes. Everyone in the room stops and looks at me and I don’t fucking care.
I break.
I cry for the mother they will never know, the one who will never hold them. I cry for my mate as the beast howls with pain at the loss of his equal. I know my men can feel my pain. It’s raw and brutal. She should be here with me, seeing the tiny precious lives we created together.
Another healer comes forward, her arms holding yet another fighting bundle, which she places in the crook of my other arm. He has white blonde hair and deep violet eyes, much like Synthia and Lasair, have as one of the colors of their matching eyes. I look into the child’s eyes and our bond connects. I can feel his heartbeat as if it’s my own. I hand off the first boy to Adam, and Ristan watches me as he shakes his head. Visions can change, we all know it, but if he had told me this would be my future, I’d have fucking stopped it.
Next comes the girl; she doesn’t fight like her brothers, and is almost still. As I move the thin blanket from her face, I’m filled with love as her golden eyes look up at me and I touch the wispy, fine platinum curls on the top of her head that’s so much like her mother’s. “Your brothers hid you and protected you,” I whisper into her ear as I kiss her tiny cheek. Her brothers had protected her, and kept her existence a well-guarded secret. Her mother never even got to know she existed. I feel the last bond connect, and my eyes lift to her mother’s lifeless ones.
“What now?” Ristan asks as he moves to the body.
“Don’t touch her,” I warn. I move, rushing to the body as I hand off my tiny daughter into Ristan’s arms.
“Ryder, she cannot be brought back. Danu has shown me what would happen if she intervened, and there was no world, no Humans, and no Fae left. She’s gone but your children are here, and they need you, brother, we all do.”
“What do you mean no world?” I snap.
“Nothing, nothing would be left of either world if you break the balance. This was supposed to happen, and you can’t break the balance by changing it. Synthia would never forgive you if you did, and you know it.”
“She’s my fucking world,” I say through the pain I know they can feel. I hate this weakness, and yet I don’t fucking care. She was my mate, and I was too afraid to admit it even to myself because of this, this useless pain. It eats at me, and consumes the beast with an anger that can easily overtake us all.
“Then tell her goodbye, brother, and let her go in peace,” Ristan says and I feel my brothers at my back, feeding me their strength. All of them await me, to see my choice. They’d kill this world if I ordered it, I know they would. Ristan is right, though. If I bring her back and kill the world to do so, I lose her anyway.
“Get out,” I whisper to everyone in the room. I scream the moment the room has emptied, and fall to my knees beside the bed where her body lays. I should have given her more; I should have given her everything she’d asked for in life. Now I was left with nothing, no warmth filled my body, nothing but regret and emptiness was left in my soul which could never again be filled.