Shadow's End (Elder Races #9)

She twisted around to face him fully, some kind of extreme reaction tightening her face and body. Whatever her initial reaction was, she held it back until she calmed and looked more balanced. He respected that so much about her, how she found her own ballast and considered her words carefully.

After a moment, she said in a slow, deliberate voice, “First things first. I think you must be the bravest man I’ve ever known.”

That was the last thing he had expected her to say. Frowning, he opened his mouth to reply, but she slipped her hand over his lips to stop him.

“Graydon, you saw what you thought was your own death, and you still stepped forward without hesitation to offer to help me. You never backed down. Not once. You confronted Malphas at Wembley, you waited all this time.” Her voice wobbled until she firmed her lips and continued. “You spearheaded the investigation, you set the trap for Malphas—you drove this whole thing forward, all the while thinking it would probably kill you.”

“I had to,” he whispered. “I don’t back down. I can’t live my life that way. And besides, I wanted you so badly.”

Her eyes filled with tears. “I think I must be the luckiest woman in the world,” she breathed. “Second point. You need to put the blame for this exactly where it belongs, on Malphas.”

Breathing raggedly, he closed his eyes. She was only saying to him what he had said to other people before—don’t blame the victim. Or, in this case, victims. Yet he had such difficulty internalizing her words.

When she spoke again, her voice had turned very gentle. “Third point. Don’t take away from Constantine or Soren the power of their choices. Or Rune and Julian, either, for that matter. Maybe they didn’t have the second sight, or a vision from two hundred years ago, but they could still see pretty well. They knew how dangerous it was to fight a first generation Djinn, and they chose to do it anyway, just as you did.”

He said quickly, “I wouldn’t take anything away from them. That’s not what I meant.”

Her voice gentled even further. “Are you sure? Can you tell me that what they did was all that different from what you did?”

He ran her words over again in his mind, trying to find some fault with her logic, but he couldn’t find any.

“Graydon,” she said tenderly.

He looked up at her. There was so much love in her expression, so much compassion, a lump rose in his throat.

“I know how insidious survivor’s guilt can feel,” she told him. “Why did they die, and not me? There must have been something—anything—I could have done to stop it. Those kinds of thoughts will consume your soul, if you don’t stop them.”

While he listened, he forced himself to breathe evenly. In and out, the raw, simple effort of living. If anybody knew about survivor’s guilt, it must be Bel. What demons had she been forced to confront and exorcise over the last six months?

She pressed her lips to the corner of his mouth in a soft caress. “I’m not trying to take away your feelings. Gods, how could I? You need to feel what you feel, and grieve in your own time, and in your own way. The only thing I’m trying to say is, please, don’t carry the weight of this on your shoulders. Not this, not when it doesn’t belong there.”

Unable to speak, he nodded, and he had to cover his eyes.

As soon as darkness pressed against his eyelids, he saw it again—the spike bursting out of Constantine’s chest. Pain burned through his muscles like acid.

He also remembered something else. Con had been shouting something at him. Grabbing him, yanking him around.

Hauling him out of the path of danger.

“I didn’t change the vision,” he rasped. “Con did.”

His words shook her visibly. Even though the battle was over, terror flashed across her face, and her slender dark brows drew together. She breathed, “What did he do?”

“He pulled me out of the way, and pushed between me and Malphas.” Grief, like stones grinding together, roughened his voice. Malphas had driven that spike so hard, it had not only torn through Con’s body, it had also impaled him—just not deeply enough to puncture his heart. “He took the strike meant for me.”

“He saved your life?”

His lips formed a soundless word. “Yes.”

Her fingers tightened on his flesh, digging into his arms. She whispered, “Then I’ll always be grateful to him.”

He thought of how much strength and hatred had gone into Malphas’s massive blow, how close he had come to losing his life. He thought of that wry look in Con’s eyes at the very end. Con had known, and he had done it anyway. A wordless sound came out of him, as if he had just been struck again.

As the wave of pain passed, he grew aware of other things. Bel had gone nose-to-nose with him. Tears slipped down her cheeks, but she didn’t flinch away. Her gaze was so naked, so full of emotion. He did not make this journey alone. Where he went, she went with him, right down into the darkest place. Everything he felt, she felt too.

How could she have lost everything that she had lost, and still have the strength to remain so open and compassionate?