Page 115 of Cursed Shadows 5

“He is gone. The powder cannot save him.”

Again, I just shake my head.

I reach out and gently stroke a strand of his hair from his face. It tugs on a splattered spot of blood, but I peel it away and smooth it into place.

My watery smile wobbles as I drink in his vacant beauty. I am so consumed by him in the moment, fixated on only him, that I almost don’t understand the movement around me, others coming up from the parade to follow the scent of blood, Niamh lunging for Daxeel, the one still alive, and pouring the black powder into his wound.

I slump onto Eamon’s hard chest.

It doesn’t move beneath me, no rise and fall of breath. My face twists against his shirt—

And the scream that rips out of me splits the lane.

My hands are fisted into his blouse.

But Eamon doesn’t wake up.

Eamon doesn’t breathe.

He is dead.

†

My lashes are shut on the blood.

I rest on his unmoving chest, my cheek smooshed against the bloody blouse. But I don’t move; I don’t leave him.

I stay with Eamon.

Behind me, the movement is rustling, changing.

Niamh tends to Daxeel’s wound and apparently made progress enough to start carting him with the help of other fae. They move in my peripherals, carrying Daxeel’s limp body.

I lift my cheek from Eamon’s chest.

I watch through burning, dazed eyes.

One fae for each of Daxeel’s limbs; and he sags in the hold of those fae.

His head is lolled back, lifeless, his face slack, lashes shut—and that hole in his throat is packed with black powder.

Doesn’t matter. If he bled out before Niamh got to him with the powder, then he is dead.

I think he might be dead…

My fingers curl, nails scarping over Eamon’s blouse. My glare darkens on the fading outline of Daxeel’s limp body—and a breath cuts through me, serrated, as his lashes flutter over cerulean eyes.

Daxeel is alive.

But Eamon is not.

I am drowning in the anguish, no more can build through me, there is no space for it. So at the sight of him, my breath comes out as a moan, a grated sound—then I fold over myself.

Legs folded under me, in the puddles of rainwater and filth and blood, I drop onto myself, almost unaware of the boots moving around me.

I care not for the other fae who came to help, those who try to reach out for Eamon and earn a scratch and bite from me.

I speak to Mother all the same, as if they weren’t here at all, and I blubber the same words over and over.

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