Page 239 of Season Warriors & Wolves

“Eren!” someone shouted in the distance, and I jolted awake. Not exactly awake. I was locked tightly between a pile of bodies, crushing between the weight of them, not even able to shuffle any of my limbs for space.

The sounds had stopped.

Eerie quiet had fallen through the battlefield.

And I couldn’t feel Aurora’s presence in the air anymore. But I also couldn’t feel my sister’s. Not even a whisper. Nothing. Nothing at all.

“Eren!” the voice called again; this time panicked. “Gods, please, Eren, answer me!”

Body after body was piled on top of me and I struggled to push them off, even air was hard to get past my lips and to my lungs. Every part of me fought the sliver of will and magic that was pounding for me to stay awake. So I did. Not only stay awake.

I opened a small gate of magic, letting it usher through my veins and fuel my lungs with air, my body with strength. Magic I so little had tapped out of fear. Magic that had scared little Snow so much so she’d stayed away from me for days. Magic I’d sworn to never show her again. Yet I had. To protect her. Only to fail again.

“Eren!” The voice had come closer—he’d come closer.

Slowly, I reached my hand through the layer of the dead until I could grasp nothing but wind and smoke between my fist. Once I'd freed my hand, the rest of me followed easily.

Blood and bile filled my mouth once the pressure was off my body and I heaved a wet cough, the sting of blood crawling up my throat. When the fog cleared out of my sight and my eyes focused on the field of bodies laying for miles, I searched for him. “Cai,” I called. “I’m here.”

“Eren?”

I still couldn’t see him, but his voice grew closer. Was I imagining it all?

I had not.

He rushed toward me, sliding to a stop until his hands were on me, on my face, on my body. There were tears on his face, streaking lines down his smoke covered cheeks. More fell silently while he searched my body for wounds. “Gods,” he breathed, almost stunned. “Good gods.” He pressed me to his body, tightly—his body that shook from exhaustion and…cries.

“Hey,” I said, holding him like he was holding me. “It’s fine. I’m fine.”

He fell back to the ground, his fingers tugging onto his long hair while rocking back and forth, refusing to look at me.

Forcing my body up, I kneeled before him and cupped his face. “Cai, what is it? Did something happen to Snow or Rora? Cai, please.”

“No.” He shook his head, eyes tightly pressed together, refusing to look at me. “I can’t do this. I can’t do this.”

“Cai.”

“I can’t do this, Eren. I just can’t.”

“Do what?”

He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand and stood, backing away from me. “I can’t do this.”

All I did was watch him slip away from me, disappearing in the distance of the quiet battlefield. All I did was…nothing.

I’d come out alive, just not entirely.

Somewhere in this battlefield, I’d lost my heart.

I had lost despite what we had won.

Tristin landed before me, bloodied, but not injured. “We need help. Are you alright to help?”

“Is…is Aurora gone?”

She nodded.

“And my sister?”