“Good boy. You might survive the night after all.” Merrick stepped into the hallway and carried Adalynn toward the parlor. Danny’s boots thumped down the hall behind him.
The woman seemed so slight and frail, so delicate, so precious. Even her resonance was diminished now. Merrick struggled against the urge to hold her tighter; he feared anything more would break her. How had she survived so long in a hostile world?
It was a foolish question. He’d seen her spirit. He knew its light, its strength. That was all that had kept her going to this point, he was sure. Her spirit…and her protective little brother.
The deepening evening left the parlor gloomy. The shadows were nothing to Merrick, but he doubted Danny could see very well. Those doubts were confirmed when there was a loud bump, and the coffee table rattled. The boy muttered a curse.
“Mind your step,” Merrick said. He stopped at one of the couches—the one facing the fireplace—and carefully laid Adalynn atop it. Her resonance called to him through the discomfort in his head, and, despite everything, he was sorely tempted to make that connection with her again.
He thrust the urge aside and stepped to the fireplace. Danny set their bags down on the floor near the couch and knelt in front of his sister.
“She gonna be okay?” Danny asked, brushing a strand of hair away from Adalynn’s face.
Merrick’s fingers twitched; he wanted to brush her hair aside like that, wanted his fingertips to trail lightly over her pale, soft skin. Instead he turned his back to Danny and Adalynn and leaned down to light the fire. “How should I know?”
Once the fire was burning, Merrick stood up, bracing himself with a hand on the mantle as a rush of lightheadedness threatened to topple him. Using his magic had never affected him like this before, and it shouldn’t have now regardless of the amount of energy he’d expended—he was still far from his limit. What was this? What had he done?
He looked back over his shoulder. Danny was crouched near his sister’s feet, digging through one of their bags. The couch was cast in the soft orange firelight, which was reflected in the beads of perspiration on her skin and sparked coppery highlights in her brown hair.
Who was she?
Merrick drew in a deep breath and pushed away from the fireplace, allowing himself not even a moment’s hesitation before stepping to the couch, reaching forward, and plucking a hair from Adalynn’s head. Electric jolts coursed up his fingers and along his arm when his fingertips briefly brushed her skin, but she made no reaction.
Was the sensation the result of his magic, or something more? Perhaps Adalynn wasn’t as human as she seemed at a glance.
Danny rose with a thin, worn blanket in his hands, meeting Merrick’s gaze. The boy’s earlier bravado had vanished, leaving only concern and a lingering hint of fear.
I’m not going to sympathize with a boy who broke into my home to steal from me, who threatened me, regardless of their circumstances.
It doesn’t matter that they aren’t a real threat…
“Tend to your sister,” Merrick said, “and stay here.” He turned and walked toward the hall, keeping himself steady only through sheer willpower—and by squeezing that single hair between his fingers, clutching it like a lifeline.
Danny said nothing, but Merrick felt the boy’s gaze on him until he’d turned the corner.
Merrick didn’t know whether that should reassure him or reignite his suspicions.
He hurried up the spiral staircase, taking the steps by twos, and crossed the loft to return to his study, shutting the door behind him. Now that he was alone again, his annoyance resurged—this time directed as much at himself as the two intruders.
Humans were trouble. That had always been true and would always be true, no matter how the world changed. All they could possibly do was bring him headaches—and they had literally done so within the first few minutes of their arrival!
By the time he reached his desk, his vision was blurred from the pounding in his head. He dropped into the chair, propped an elbow atop the desk, and clamped his finger and thumb over his temples to massage them. Somehow, he’d taken a bit of whatever ailed Adalynn into himself. A touch of her darkness. He wasn’t concerned for the long term—human ailments meant nothing to him either way—but it was frustrating to feel so…weak.
He’d only experienced sensations like this after receiving horrible wounds—wounds that would have killed a mortal—and those had been fortunately few given the length of his life.
While he soothed his temples with one hand, he absently twirled Adalynn’s hair between the fingers of the other. How did she endure this pain? How had she survived like this?
The hair resonated with her mana song; he found himself focusing on it, letting it wash over him, and it brought unexpected comfort in its sweetness and familiarity.
Merrick knew there were human bloodlines carrying magic, and he had to assume those bloodlines had awoken fully with the Sundering, much like his own magic had come into its fullness. Was she the same? He’d read accounts of inherent arcane powers consuming mortals from within because they didn’t know how to vent the building power—their physical bodies could not handle the excess energies. Was that what ailed her?
Was that why he was so drawn to her? Power calling to power was a simple explanation, a neat explanation, a convenient explanation, but it wasn’t the right one. He’d felt no substantial power brimming within her apart from the impressive strength of her spirit.
He squeezed his eyes shut and increased his focus, separating his mind from his discomfort, from his other concerns, from the physical world, until only magic remained. Only magic—and Adalynn.
Her mana song reverberated through him from her hair, and as he attuned himself to it again, he suddenly understood why it was so familiar, why it was so soothing—he had sensed it before her arrival. It was there, deep within him, underscoring his own song. He’d felt it since his magic had first woken during his adolescence.
Adalynn’s resonance had been playing in Merrick’s heart, ever-present but barely noticeable, for more than a thousand years. The sound of his own heartbeat filled his ears, providing the rhythm for their mingling songs.
He dropped the hair atop his desk and severed his connection with it, with her, but he felt it still at the back of his conscious mind. Felt the call like a siren’s song, luring him down to her. Why should a human have such sway over him? Why should he be compelled to go to her side, to help her, after actively seeking solitude for so long? Why did he have so deep-seated a connection to a mortal?
A sick mortal.
A dying mortal.
Chapter Three
Adalynn returned to consciousness slowly, as though drawn out of a dream she didn’t want to wake from—a dream in which an ethereal presence had wrapped her in its comforting embrace, freeing her from pain, fear, and guilt. She wanted to stay in that embrace. Why return to a world where everything was falling apart, and only suffering awaited her?
But that wasn’t quite true—Danny was in the real world. He was waiting for her. He needed her.
She opened her eyes. Her blurry vision cleared slowly, finally focusing on the ceiling. The flickering light of a nearby fire was just strong enough for her to make out the intricate patterns on the plaster overhead—sweeping, symmetrical flourishes radiating outward in circles and squares from a central light fixture, cast in stark relief by the contrast between shadow and light.