Noc seemed to consider each word before relenting. His shoulders loosened a touch. “Good. But not here.” Noc gestured to the wood. “The transformation is jarring enough. He should be somewhere comfortable when it happens. Let’s get him back to Cruor.”
Calem, still in his beast form, sauntered toward Oz and knelt before him. With a belabored look, he nudged Oz’s battered limbs. Oz grumbled, but didn’t deny Calem’s help. Instead, he climbed onto his back, extracted his bronze key to send Jax back to the beast realm, and collapsed in an exhausted heap. Yazmin had struck first and won. Both she and Darrien had escaped, and we were left a bloody mess. Opening the beast realm door, I sent Dominus and Kels home and moved to Noc’s side.
“Thank you.” Kost swallowed back his emotions, keeping his voice low and even, and then summoned a bed of shadows to lift Gaige off the ground. Okean stood and rubbed against Kost’s leg, gaze still locked on his master. Something deep and painful flared in my chest, and I had to look away. Okean would remain in this world, unable to return to the beast realm, unless a Charmer took him in like I had for Dominus. And I would do it without question, if that’s what Gaige wanted. But a Charmer had never been raised before. Maybe, just maybe, Gaige would still be able to open the door when he woke and send Okean home.
But as we hurried toward Cruor, a sinking feeling settled in the pit of my stomach. I feared the shadows would take over Gaige’s life completely, barring the beast realm door shut for eternity. Countless beasts, simply…gone. He’d never be able to call on them again, or feel the warm bond that tethered them together. Or even enter the realm, the very world Celeste created solely for us and our beasts, without the aid of a Charmer. If I were faced with such an existence… I’d let the shadows swallow me whole, with no desire to ever claw my way back out.
Seven
Noc
We made it to Cruor’s doorstep within an hour of the attack, just as the sun crested over the forest line and ushered in the morning. Wasting no time, we brought Gaige’s body into the first available room and placed him on the bed. Calem had shifted back to his human form and snagged some clothes before helping Ozias to the infirmary. Which left Leena, Kost, and me to stare at Gaige’s lifeless body. Even with the morning light slanting through the open curtains, his skin looked gray. Cold.
Leena gripped the hemline of her blouse and cast a glance at Okean. He paced along the far wall, never settling. Occasionally a soft, pained yowl would slip from his throat. Leena’s face fell. “Kost, are you sure about this? Are you prepared if he says no?”
“No.” He’d never stopped looking at Gaige. “But I need to hear it from him. I need him to decide that it’s over. Not Yazmin. Not anyone else.”
I flexed my fingers, but didn’t move. When I’d first been raised, I felt like I’d been robbed of my choice. And if what Leena said was true, that the beast realm door wasn’t accessible to her when she was in the shadow realm, then I doubted this was a life he’d want to lead. He’d likely choose death. And Kost… My gaze flickered to him. I wasn’t sure he could live with that. He’d always cared more about people than he ever admitted. If Gaige held a place in his heart, no matter how small, losing him would destroy Kost.
There was no other choice I could make.
I moved to the bedside and ripped open Gaige’s shirt. Honing to fine points, my fingernails cut into his rib cage and exposed his quiet heart. Okean stilled, but he didn’t move to defend his master. Instead, he pinned me with a stare so full of agony that I winced. Dominus had been lost after Wynn died. Okean would be the same.
Slitting open my palm, I drizzled blood over Gaige’s wound. My cut healed swiftly—Gaige didn’t. A few miserable minutes passed with nothing happening, and a flicker of fear sparked in me. What if the beast’s magic prevented me from raising him? What if I couldn’t give Kost what he wanted? What if my brother blamed me for this horrendous outcome? I glanced at Leena, and she edged closer, Okean by her side. Tension filled the air as we all waited for Gaige to react. Maybe it wasn’t the beast, buthim. Could Charmers evenberaised?
Something unreadable flashed in Leena’s hazel eyes. Concern? Despair? How conflicted she must have felt, both wanting Gaige to be okay and knowing he’d resent a life without his beasts. Or… I studied the way she worried her lip and gripped her bestiary. Maybe it was something more. Proof that, if she ever changed her mind, decided she wanted to stay by my side forever, she couldn’t.
My breath stilled.
Please.
I needed to know if this would work. If Icouldraise Leena, if it came to it.
Kost kneeled at Gaige’s side and gripped his limp hand. “Gaige.”
It was too much. Too many unspoken emotions were wrapped up in that name. Something broke inside of Kost, that much I knew. I had to fix this.
Reopening my palm, I poured more blood over Gaige’s heart.Please, Zane. Don’t fail me.I needed his power, my power, to restore life to the fallen now more than ever before. Again, my wound healed. And again, I tore it open. Blood spilled outward until it filled Gaige’s chest cavity completely. The room around me spun and darkened as my body tried to regenerate. I was depleting it faster than it had the chance to heal. Sweat broke out along my forehead and down the back of my neck, and my knees turned weak.
Leena cupped her hands around mine, ignoring the blood that ran between our fingers. “Noc.”
Words raspy, I barely found my voice. “I can keep trying.”
“No,” Kost whispered. He gripped Gaige’s hand tighter. “If this is how it has to be, then…”
Suddenly, Gaige’s heart thumped. Not the slow, shuddering beat I’d always seen when raising the dead, but a resounding thud full of power and life. The heady cadence started in earnest, and I pressed my palm flat against his chest. As the last few droplets of my blood spilled out, I willed his wound to heal. And it did. Faster than I’d ever witnessed. Tendons, muscle and flesh all knitted back together until there was nothing but smooth skin.
Kost’s brows creased. Clearly, he’d never seen such a reaction, either. “Perhaps it has something to do with the mix of Charmer and assassin magic?”
“Is everything okay?” Leena asked. She wrapped her arm around my waist, offering support, and I slumped into her. Fatigue was normal post raising, but never had I felt so drained. Breathing sparked pain in my chest, and my stomach roiled.
“Rise,” I commanded, ignoring the way my voice wavered.
Gaige’s eyes flew open. Steel-blue and so…alive. Color returned to his body, and he blinked several times before glancing down at the hand Kost had clutched in his fingers. An uncertain smile claimed his lips, and then he went completely still. He rounded his gaze on me.
“I can hear your heartbeat.” His words were measured, cautious. As if he knew what that meant but wasn’t ready to admit it.
My shoulders tensed. “Yes.”
