“Shut up, okay?” Hadrian snapped. “Both of you, just shut up!”
Hadrian stared at her face, watching her head droop lower and lower, as if she were falling asleep.
What does that mean? Is she losing? Slipping away? Dying?
Frustration gripped him. His stomach twisted and every muscle tensed.
Her shoulders slumped and she tilted. He caught her with his free hand and pulled her to him, pressing her limp head to his chest.
Still humming—is that a good sign?
He thought it was. He cradled her with his left hand while still holding tight with his right, his palm growing slick with sweat.
Arista jerked her head as if she were having a dream. She did it again and her humming stopped and she mumbled something.
“What is it?” he asked. “I didn’t hear you. What did you say?”
Another mumble, too soft, too slurred.
She jerked again and appeared to cry out. He held tight as her body went limp against him, her head hanging.
“Arista?” he said.
She stopped breathing.
“Arista!”
He shook her. “Arista!”
Her head flopped, her hair whipping back and forth.
“Arista, come back! Come back to me! Goddamn it! Come back!”
Nothing.
She lay like a dead weight against him, as loose as a doll.
He pulled her tight. “Please,” he whispered. “Please come back to me. Please. I can’t lose you—not now.”
He lifted her head. She appeared to be sleeping, the way he had seen her dozens of times. There was a beauty about her face when she slept that he could never explain, a calm softness—only she was not sleeping now. There was no reassuring rise of her chest, no breath on his face. He pressed his lips against hers. He kissed her, but her lips did not move. They remained slack, lifeless, and when he pulled back, she still hung in his arms. He hoped that maybe some power from within him could awaken her, like in a fairy tale. That the kiss—their first—could somehow call her back, awaken her. But nothing happened. Their first kiss—their last—and she never felt it.
“Please,” he muttered as tears began running down his cheeks. “Oh dear Maribor, please, don’t do this.”
His own breath shortened, his chest too tight. It felt as if a blade had sliced through his stomach and he was falling to his own death. He held tight to her, pressing her body against his, her cheek against his face, as if holding her could keep him—
Her hand jerked.
Hadrian held his breath.
He felt a squeeze.
He squeezed back, harder than he had planned.
Her body stiffened. Her head flew back. Her eyes and mouth opened wide and she inhaled. Arista sucked in a loud breath, as if she just surfaced from a deep dive.
She could not speak and drew in breath after breath, her body rocking with the effort. Slowly she turned to look at him and her expression filled with sadness. “You’re crying,” she said as her hand came up and wiped his cheek.
“Am I?” he replied, blinking several times. “Must be the sea air.”
“Are you all right?”
Hadrian laughed. “Me? How are you?”
“I’m fine—tired as usual.” She grinned. “But fine.”
“He’s alive!” Mauvin shouted, stunned.
They simultaneously turned their heads just in time to see the dwarf rising groggily. Magnus looked at Arista and immediately began to weep.
“The wound,” Mauvin said, shaking his head in disbelief. “It’s healed.”
“Told you I could do it,” she whispered.
Arista woke to the gentle motion and creaking of the ship at sea. She felt physically drained again, her body weighted. Both arms shook when she lifted them, her hands quivering. She found her pack left beside the bed and reached in, feeling around for food. She pulled out a travel meal and silently thanked Ibis Thinly as if he were the god of food. Just as before, she devoured the salt pork, hard bread, and pickle. She swallowed three mouthfuls of water and leaned back against the wall for a moment. Eating exhausted her.
In the dark, she listened to the ship. It creaked and groaned—verse and chorus—riding up and down. She let the movement rock her head, feeling the food work its magic.
She thought of Alric and in the darkness saw his face. Young and yet strangely lined, with that silly beard that had never looked right on him—his kingly beard—meant to make him appear older. It had never fully filled in. She thought of her father and the hairbrushes he had brought her—his way of saying he loved her. She remembered her mother’s swan mirror, lost when the tower collapsed. It was all gone now, certainly all of Medford, perhaps all of Melengar as well. She could still hear the sound of her mother’s voice and remembered how it had come to her from out of the light.
What is that place?
She had come close to it twice now. It had been easier with Magnus; she had not seen her loved ones, only his. They spoke to him in dwarvish. She did not know the words, but the meaning was clear—kindness, forgiveness, love.