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There were a hundred different ways for that to happen, but drowning, as sick as it sounded, felt like the safest option. Of course, that was assuming she only had to be dead for a matter of seconds for the creature to make its escape. Then I could bring her back.
I’d brought her back once before, the first time she’d been in my world. It would work again.
Ithadto work.
The breath I’d pulled in before plunging us both overboard burned in my lungs. With every second that passed, the shadow’s movements grew more frantic, jerking Never’s body this way and that.
That was torture enough, but I could also feel the woman trapped in her own head with that monster. I couldn’t tell if she understood what I was doing, but she was there, fighting a battle I couldn’t help her with, no matter how badly I wanted to intervene.
Finally, her movements slowed. With a final weak spasm, her body went limp, floating against me like a dead weight.
All part of the plan,I reminded myself, though the reassurance went only so far as I kicked my legs and propelled us up. We had just breached the surface when an inky substance began oozing from her eyes and mouth.
“William!” I yelled, no longer caring if my desperation rang through in my voice.
He peered over the railing. “Aye, Captain?”
“Clear the deck!”
“Aye, Captain.”
I didn’t want an audience when I brought us both back aboard. Before I did anything, however, I needed to be sure the shadow was gone.
My heart was in my throat. Every sharp, shallow breath I drew felt like a betrayal as I watched that disgusting darkness bleed out of her. Part liquid and part smoke from the look of it. It started as a trickle but grew quickly into a truly alarming flow, turning the sea around us the color of raging storm clouds.
Then that darkness coalesced and shot through the water toward the island, leaving not even a ripple in its wake.
As quickly as I could, I returned us to the deck. I laid Never down gently, placed one hand on her forehead and the other at the center of her chest, and dug inside myself for my healing magic.
It was there, ready and willing. Maybe I should have eased into it, but a new hollowness had opened inside me when I’d felt Never go still in my arms. A yawning emptiness that demanded action. So, I closed my eyes, focused my thoughts, and sent a river of power flowing into her body.
Except that power bounced right back at me like light striking a mirror.
“No,” I whispered. Opening my eyes and studying her face for even the slightest change, I tried again.
The same result.
“What did you do?” Leo croaked, dragging himself to his feet.
I glared his way, worry and helplessness turning to anger in a snap. “I should be able to rouse her.” Shifting my attention back, I reached up and eased one of her eyelids back, but there was no movement. No sign that woman I loved still existed in that body.
My heart ground to a stop. Had I taken too long?
He let out a growl that was decidedly less impressive in his human form, but I knew what he was feeling.
Helpless.
Hopeless.
I did it again and again, each time pouring more and more power into my efforts as my frustration with the universe compounded.
In a moment of pure desperation, I focused inward, gathering my power and strength, pulling every drop of it up from the depths of my being. That celestial energy burned inside of me as I used my mind and my will to condense it into a single, pure point of magic.
Casting a final plea to the stars, the fates, and anyone else who might be listening, I drove that energy into Never’s chest. The force of it cracked bones, a sickening sensation against my palms that made my stomach twist violently. I yanked my hands back on instinct, but the damage was done.
Either it would work, or it wouldn’t.
If I’d had to remember how to breathe in that moment, I would have failed. All my thoughts and energy, the whole of my immortal heart, were suspended in time.
