Iridescent (Ember 2) (43 page)

Draven stopped beside Candra, his shoulders rigid. He stood tall and sturdy, his jaw flexing when he swallowed. His eyes regarded Sebastian with a respect and admiration Candra hadn’t seen since the ball. She presumed it had to be because Sebastian had managed to retrieve the one thing he believed would give them an edge in this battle. He’d done it on his own.

Sebastian grimaced, his face scrunching up, and his entire body appeared to shudder. Candra wanted to reach out to him, but her body had different ideas, locking down and refusing to budge.

With great effort, Sebastian twisted the blade so he held onto the blood-encrusted end and offered it to Draven. “It didn’t go as smoothly as I’d hoped. I had to fight.”

Draven stepped forward and took the blade from Sebastian, bowing his head in a mark of respect.
That’s a first
, Candra thought.

“You will protect her,” Sebastian instructed grimly.

“I will…always,” Draven answered in a firm and regal tone.

Candra recognized a vow when she heard it, but it didn’t make sense to her because it sounded like the promise to a person departing. Sebastian had just arrived, and she was sure that, despite everything else and despite anything going on between them, he wouldn’t leave them now. They were on the verge of a battle with an army of demons.

A hollow sensation filled her chest as if the chambers of her heart had grown exponentially and beat through her entire body, forcing blood to pump.

Draven shifted the blade to his other hand and offered his free hand to Sebastian. For a moment, Sebastian looked at his hand, as though he wasn’t sure what he should do. His eyes darted to Draven’s serious face and back to his hand. Finally, Sebastian closed his eyes for a moment. He pressed his lips firmly into a straight line before he released his crutch, squared his shoulders, and straightened, taking a confident grip of Draven’s hand.

“Brother,” Draven said with a note of reverence.

“Brother,” Sebastian responded, reflecting Draven’s infliction of the word exactly.

Candra glanced worriedly between the both of them. A chill that had nothing to do with the breeze drifting in the door settled deep within her bones. He’d reached out and touched the blade. Sebastian had touched the business end of the Creation Blade, despite knowing that an accidental injury could prove deadly. Why would he do that?

Draven withdrew his hand, and with a final nod, he backed away, leaving Candra staring dumbly after him. Sebastian was once again leaning against the pew for support when she turned back, except this time, his used both his hands. Small beads of perspiration rolled down his cheek from his temple. It seemed at odds with his pallid complexion.

“What’s going on, Sebastian?” she asked nervously, her voice ready to break on each of the four words.

“I’m cold.” It was all he said, and his voice was so quiet that Candra wouldn’t have discerned it if she hadn’t been watching his lips move. Then he went down.

Chapter Thirty-Five

H
E
D
IDN’T
D
ROP
Q
UICKLY
. Instead, he collapsed with a sliding motion, as though his legs seemed to give up on holding him upright and bent, allowing him to ease to the floor. His legs straightened out, and the seat behind his back propped him up. Candra’s responses belatedly kicked into gear, and she rushed to him. She wasn’t in time to do any more than place her hands on his upper arms to settle him. She looked back beseechingly to the others standing at the altar. It was only a short distance, but distance didn’t matter. In a blur between when she reached for Sebastian and whipped her head around to plead for help, she saw Brie go to step forward. Both Gabe and Lofi held her back.

“Help him,” she demanded. Her lungs stung; every breath she inhaled was laced with pure, unadulterated dread.
This is all wrong.

When it appeared no help would be forthcoming, Candra reached into her pocket and pulled out the small black healing stone she always carried, running her thumb over the smooth surface. Sebastian’s cold hand closed around hers. Her eyes locked on his, desperate and completely unselfconscious about panting, as if she had been running miles. She couldn’t manage to fill her lungs.

“It won’t do any good,” he told her weakly.

She knew already. She understood. Sebastian was leaving her again, and she knew that this time, it was forever.

“What have you done?” Candra blinked her eyes to clear her vision because she had to see Sebastian.

He smiled, revealing his perfect white teeth, whiter than ever against the dirt smudged on his face. “I didn’t sleep with Ananchel.”

“I know,” Candra sobbed, unable to stem the flow of tears. “You were trying to protect me.”

His tongue darted out to skim his top lip, and Sebastian closed his eyes before shifting to sit up straight. Candra heard crying and shushing words but refused to take her eyes off Sebastian to see the source.

“What did you do?” she asked again.

Sebastian didn’t answer. His hand released hers and gently skimmed over her heated flesh, tracing a line up the entire length of her arm and over her shoulder. His fingers trembled and left goose bumps in their wake before cupping the back of her neck and tugging her toward him. Candra didn’t resist, even though there was no strength behind his hold on her.

She scooted nearer and placed her palm on his neck, smoothing her thumb over his stubbled jawline. His pulse was weak, hardly causing any stir at all in his artery. Her own thundered, as if attempting to beat for both of them. Sebastian closed his eyes again as Candra’s lips drew near, his breath in stark contrast to the temperature of his skin. His spicy scent enveloped her, making her want to crawl into his lap, but she didn’t. Sebastian seemed so breakable, she wasn’t sure he would be able to hold her weight.

“Please let me heal you.” She breathed against his bloodied lips, and tears spilled from her eyes over her flushed cheeks.

“Kiss me,” he said in a whisper.

Candra closed the space between them, firmly pressing her mouth to his. His lips parted a little and deepened the kiss, swallowing hard and tightening his grip on her neck. Nails scraped across her skin beneath the disheveled braid that was beginning to unravel. Candra’s body responded to him as it always did, with fire in her belly and a raging heart. She took everything he gave, took every ounce of passion Sebastian poured into that one kiss. The world disappeared. They could have been anywhere—it didn’t matter. Time didn’t matter.

Candra tasted the salt of her tears mingled with the metallic sweetness of blood in her mouth. She devoured the taste of him. His fingers dragged down the length of her spine, roughly pulling her closer when he reached where her shirt ended. His cold skin caused her to quiver, and his strength appeared to increase with each velvety stroke of his tongue against hers. A dull ache throbbed through her body as her fingers splayed flat over Sebastian’s chest and hard stomach.

She sat awkwardly, leaning across him, her legs curled under her and her torso partially touching his. She could feel his strained breathing and his heart working overtime, despite his weakened pulse. Candra hands moved without conscious thought, exploring his body, overwhelmed with an unquenchable thirst for him. Sebastian’s fingers clawed into her skin to the point of pain, but it was such sweet agony because his desperation proved his yearning for her rivaled hers for him.

The tingling began gradually under her skin and spread as melted butter over a warm knife through every inch of her. Then the tingling became a vibration and awoke those few last sleeping nerves. It brought her body to a heightened state of awareness, but nothing like the sensation of the Arch trying to break through. That part of her remained sleeping. Electricity raced through her, shooting jolts over her skin, and surging power made her heart pound. Her hand slid below Sebastian’s arm to his back and bunched into his sticky shirt. Not sticky in the way sweat made fabric damp so it clung to skin. It was more a syrupy type of stickiness, heavy and thick.

With a guttural noise that reminded Candra of a wounded animal, Sebastian suddenly shoved her back. She licked her lips, tainted with the fresh blood spilling from his lip. His breathing grew harsh as he held her away, fixing his wild eyes on her. The world came abruptly into focus, the dank smell of old water and moss, dead flowers and smoke from recently blown out candles. The cold flavor of stone and marble hit the back of her tongue. Wind whispered past the door and blew in, scattering trash across the central aisle.

Tears still streaked down her face, and her head pounded. The pungent perfume of incense made her gag. Candra swallowed the nausea in her throat. Her eyes widened. Sebastian’s skin was as pale and icy as the marble that made up the pillars around them, and every hard breath seemed to lance a swift pain through him.

His back
, Candra thought, not sparing a moment to glance up to the hushed whispers coming from near the altar.

“What did you do?” she demanded. “What did you do?” A panic as acute and cutting as a razor blade tore her heart open.

Sebastian flinched and then fought to hold her at bay when she pulled him forward, intent on inspecting his back.

“Please, don’t look.” Sebastian disapprovingly hissed out through clenched teeth, but he was no match for her in his weakened state.

Candra gasped for breath, the sound echoing around the hollow chapel. A coating of thick, dark blood almost entirely covered Sebastian’s back. It congealed on the torn fabric around the short stumps of pearl white bone and shredded muscle protruding from where his wings should have been.

“You fell,” Candra whispered, her voice eerily calm as the smooth glass-like surface of a lake with a storm brewing in the distance.

“No. I planned to. I’ve thought of nothing else for weeks. What I told you that day we flew; I swear I meant it. I wanted to walk away from it all for you.”

Candra tugged his shirt upward, wanting a closer look. If she could see the damage, maybe she could heal it. Sebastian shifted about, although his movement had no force. She froze. A deep puncture wound about an inch in length poured blood in a steady flow. He’d been stabbed.

Candra brushed tears from her eyes and fingered the stone in her hand. It weighed so much more than it should, made heavier by its innate uselessness. It was already too late. “But you couldn’t really give up.”

“No,” he agreed with a sad smile. His eyes tightened in pain, but he made no other physical display, although Candra knew he must have been in agony. “I’m not a man. I never will be.”

“No one’s perfect,” Candra tried to joke, but the words caught in her throat, threatening to choke her.

Sebastian smiled, and his eyes closed, almost like he didn’t possess the energy to smile and hold his eyelids open at the same time. Candra brushed his hair away from his face and tucked it behind his ear. It had grown long again.

“We’ll be okay. All of this will be over soon.”

“I had to give you a chance.” Sebastian’s mouth barely moved with the utterance, and a small trickle of blood spilled over his chin. His head lolled to the side slightly, and Candra scrambled to her knees in desperation, shaking him harder than was probably wise, given his injuries.

“No. No,” she screeched, not daring to take her eyes from him to see the others. “Open your eyes, please.”

Candra imagined a great fissure inside her chest splitting. She wished she could fall into it and disappear. Then his eyes opened. There was no gold. His irises were a flat brown, the color of mud.

“I love you,” she told him, battling against the bleak certainty settling around her. A seething rage slithered into her heart and soul, blackening everything it touched, like a disease spreading through her, like the blackness that corrupted the city and beyond was slipping inside her and taking root. What did any of it mean to her without him? How could she protect everyone if she couldn’t protect just one person? “I will always love you—always.”

Sebastian tensed. “Don’t do that.”

Candra pressed her lips together to hold back the scream crawling up from her lungs.

“You can’t give up. Make my death worth something.”

A sob she couldn’t restrain burst forward. Sebastian’s fingers combed up into her hair, tightening and forcing Candra to look at him. He’d said it: he was dying, and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it. The blood on the blade was his. He’d been beaten…tortured, his wings hacked away, and stabbed by the Creation Blade. A wound even a curleax couldn’t heal. He was bleeding to death right in front of her.

“After they took my wings, I still thought I was clear. I fought, but there were too many, a giant ball of limbs and pain. One of them found
it
on me. He was a crazed kid; he didn’t even get a look at it—just a weapon to him. He got me in the back before I wrestled the blade off him again. I killed him, and none of the others saw. I switched them, you see. It worked.”

Candra shook her head, biting down on the raw skin inside her cheek until the sweet tang of her blood mingled with Sebastian’s.

“I will find you again,” he whispered. “I swear. Even if I have to cross time and space, if I must claw my way from the bowels of hell or endure a thousand lifetimes of nothingness. It’s no more than I deserve. I have committed despicable atrocities, the worst of which was denying my heart.” He paused and closed his eyes a moment to suck in a gurgled breath.