Her limbs grew cold and stiff, her mind dangerously distant from her body.
I won’t lose him. I can’t.
She chanted the words in her mind, too weak to say the phrase aloud.
With a final mental roar, the rope melded with the bound threads of her and Njáll.
An agonizing spasm seared through Elara’s body, snapping her from her trance.
She gasped, choking on air as her hands fell into the dirt. Strangled coughs caught in her throat, the scent of decay invading her senses.
She still knelt on the wet grass, her physical body seemingly unharmed.
Half a dozen draugar surrounded Njáll. Dirt streaked his sweat-stained face, his braids wild and flying behind him as he fended off the corpses with a feral snarl.
Njáll’s back was pressed against the longhouse, his toned body strained. He fought with a surge of strength, the kind that only came when faced with the inevitable.
The grim cloud suffocating her thinned when her gaze landed on the creature beside her.
Alruna.
A disbelieving laugh rattled her ribs. Something solid, immense, and impossibly real stood next to her.
She did it.
The panther was not the shimmering, wispy shadow Elara remembered.
No, this creature was a magnificent, massive obsidian beast whose dark fur twinkled with flecks of gold. Her eyes hummed with the same liquid gold hue, the air around her cracking like shattering ice.
“Njáll! Jarl!” she shouted, still shaking on the ground.
Wide, dim eyes found hers.
An exhausted smile pushed against his cheeks. Color swirled back into his eyes, his arms shaking. When he saw Alruna, a relieved breath expanded his ribs.
The undead turned their attention to her.
At the sight of Alruna, the draugar recoiled, a shrill, screeching sound staining the night sky. Everyone covered their ears.
“Alruna,” Elara breathed, the name a command and a plea.
The panther moved with deadly elegance. With the first step, a surge of untamed seiðr simmered in her veins.
Every move of Alruna, every flex of her claws, taxed Elara.
Clarity settled into her soul, truly understanding what Alruna was and what having her here meant.
Elara’s spirit fueled Alruna’s movements.
Digging her nails into the dirt, Elara held on, channeling her will into the panther, pointing her toward the creatures who circled Njáll.
Alruna bounded, the ground shaking under her. Her black fur sparkled as she moved, circling the draugar. The closest corpse reached out an icy, gnarled hand.
Alruna tore through the creature with ease. Long claws swiped through the bloated corpse, golden dust glittering on the sharp claws.
The decayed flesh caught fire, incinerating in a plume of crimson smoke. It swirled higher, making the moon appear as though it dripped blood. The corpse buckled, falling in on itself, collapsing into a pile of smoldering ash.
No warmth remained in her body, but Elara pushed through, ignoring the protest in her muscles.
