"Lucien."
5
HARMONY
Lucien slammed on the brakes and unbuckled his seatbelt. He threw open his door and went to the back seat, staring at Vesperin as Cyrus held her in his arms, nestled on the floorboard.
Her grey eyes were wide with fear as she placed a hand on her chest. "My—my heart. I need—help."
His own heart gave a sympathetic thump. He steeled himself. He was a doctor; he coulddothis.
As Lucien ordered Cyrus and Auren to clear the way, he realized why doctors didn’t work with patients they had a vested interest in, because his hands shook as he lifted her onto the seat, her head flopping against the back.
"Lucien," she gasped, "please?—"
He shushed her, stilling her twisting limbs with a firm hand.
A low click alerted him to Rhyden, who had exited the vehicle, standing watch, his gun trained on the dark street. His red eyes kept cutting back to the open car doors, as Lucien began to remove Vesperin’s jacket.
Cyrus paced, hands in his hair. "What are you going to do? Can I—help?"
Lucien pressed his fingers to the underside of Vesperin’s jaw, counting the erratic beats of her heart.
"Come to the other side, hold her steady for me." Lucien gave the incubus a task to occupy him. Idleness was dangerous for him.
Cyrus obeyed.
Auren stood sentinel, scythe at the ready, as he stared into the silent night.
"Vesperin, hang on for me." Lucien watched as she nodded jerkily, gasping and jerking as his bare hand snaked beneath the collar of her thin sweater. He flattened his palm against her breastbone and closed his eyes.
There was a reason most in the medical field were Earthborn. Earth Stella gave a clearer connection to the human body.
Lucien had studied an illegal practice in medical school and even applied it on Tarz. He shoved the thoughts aside. There was no margin for error right now.
The process was crude, bordering on inhumane, because of the connection it forged.
Lucien had no other option.
Green glimmers began to fill the frosty air.
Cyrus cradled her hands where he knelt at her side. A question lingered on the incubus’s lips—Lucien saw it, which was why he said sharply, "Do not distract me."
And he let his eyes fall shut and felt.
It was as easy as breathing, the way Lucien’s Stella dove inside Vesperin, threads wrapping around her heart. Everything narrowed to the feel of her beneath his hand. He felt each weak, wet thud in her chest, the way the organ stuttered and faltered.
God, there was a reason why this was illegal. If anyone found out, his medical license would be revoked…
But thepowerhe felt.
He held her heart in the palm of his hand. He could speed it up, slow it down, or stop it entirely. It bent to his will. He remembered the vague feeling from his past on Tarz, but the memory was like peering through a film; it had nothing on actually doing it,feelingit.
Lucien forced the beats of her heart to steady until its rhythm was slow and even, bordering on too slow. The connection was forged, so he opened his eyes and saw her sagging against the seat, head tipped into the crook of Cyrus’s neck. Her lids fluttered, and she looked so languid, on the verge of passing out. For just one moment, knowing no one but himself would ever know, Lucien dropped the beat just a bit more and held it there, relishing how she was alive solely because he wanted her to be. It wasn’t him—it was the power of it all. But it had gotten to his head.
He snapped out of his daze when her heart rate thinned, so faint it barely registered at all. Another few seconds, and the oxygen deprivation would begin to cause irreversible damage. He adjusted the rhythm with painstaking care. He guided the rate upward until it aligned with his own.
Harmony, it was called, when Earth Stella was used to control the beat of a heart, or any internal process of the body. And it was harmony that he felt, having their hearts synced, breaths in tandem.
