Page 177 of A Soul to Embrace

Had I just thought to learn healing magic that benefited others, I could have done this myself.Years of self-centredness were currently coming around to bite him in the arse with sharp, mean fangs.

Those fucking Elysians have healing magic that can aid her.He sneered in disgust, doubting it would matter that she was different to them. Their spells would likely work alongside her natural regenerative abilities.

His damn stepfather had been a doctor; he bet that fucker would have been able to do it. Hell, his mother would have justlovedto poke and prod this female like a scientific experiment until she made Zylah better.

He thought this, his disgust and disdain stronger than ever, and yet... the hook in his chest let up a bit as he thought of them. Of his parents, the people who abandoned him, the damn hospital he’d sat in for much of his childhood.

“Don’t,” he pleaded to Zylah, clenching his eyes shut as his grip on her tightened. “Please. Don’t make me do it.”

His body quaked as he resisted his thoughts, his heart pounding in quick succession. His mind refused to find a different solution when there was one present before him – because he doubted any other could trump it.

He grasped onto a more pathetic route instead.Maybe if I take her back through the portal, she’ll heal,he thought, standing as he lifted her into a safe cradle in his arms.

His arms shook at the dense weight of her, his body tired after not sleeping for so long and wasting so much mana.

He teleported back to the specific portal that would take him back to Austrális, rather than one of the many others that would have taken him to other Earth countries, and immediately walked through it. What he’d been hoping for didn’t happen. Zylah didn’t regenerate, not even when the sunlight touched her. The dawn of a new day proved he’d been right – a full Earth day had passed.

Jabez let out a hiss through his fangs, having forgotten to ward his body against the sun. His skin tingled like it was moments from burning, and he reactivated the spell to protect himself.

For a few minutes, he waited as he stared down at her.

“Heal, Zylah,” he pleaded, his brows narrowing at her limp form when she didn’t.

He really had been hoping that bringing her back would instigate it, but he was left with only crumbling defeat. Why did he always fail? Why did this feel like the worst failure yet?

His lips pulled back and he stared at her, baring his fangs as a growl bubbled up his throat. Hostility and hate squinted his eyes into a glare, and the strength of it was near crushing for his soul.

Fuck! Fine! You win!He couldn’t take this anymore, and the uncertainty ofherfuture was killing him.

Clutching Zylah protectively, he stepped backwards through the portal and knelt down once they were shrouded in the darkness of Nyl’theria. He placed his hand against the side of her temple, and a new ring marking – with a dash above and below it – on the first knuckle of his middle finger glowed white.

She flinched, then her body curled inwards as she let out a sharp whine. The sound of it gouged at his chest worse than ever.

“Zylah,” he called, propping her up so she would sit.

She answered him with a weak moan before her orbs opened to a pale blue. They highlighted her pain and sadness.

“Where are we?” She shifted slightly and turned her head. Then a loud, distinct whimper burst from her when she noticed the portal. “No! Please! I don’t want to go back without you.”

Despite her injuries and how much they had to hurt, she frantically gripped onto his biceps, clinging to him until the sharp points of her claws latched deep. He winced but gave no other reaction.

“Hey, it’s fine,” he reassured, wishing his stomach didn’t twist unbearably further. “We’re not going through the portal. I already did to check something.”

“Promise?” she croaked, refusing to let him go as the bottoms of her orbs wavered.

The fact she could be made to cry so easily didn’t bode well for Jabez. He usually laughed in people’s tearful faces, finding the manipulation of them sickening, but he found Zylah’s glowing, ethereal, floating droplets difficult to stomach for entirely selfless reasons.

He didn’t like being the cause of them.

“Promise,” he answered thickly, because he didn’t think she’d like what he planned to do either. While crouching, he stepped back a little to give her room. “Can you stand on your own?”

The moment she even tried to get her feet under her to stand, she yelped. He settled her back down to the ground and hooked his arms under her legs and around her back. He lifted her off the ground once more and took her heavy weight.

“Don’t worry. I’ll just carry you.”

A light gust of balmy wind wrapped around him, yet it didn’t feel nice – not with how he was feeling right then. More than anything, he wished for an escape from what he was about to do, but he didn’t know of any other way besides Lindiwe.

And he refused to go to someone like her for help, no matter that she was likely the best choice.She’s probably healed herother children.But if I take Zylah back to Earth...He’d have to leave her there permanently.

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