Page 126 of The Girl Who Fell Through Time
This is the moment she’s been dreading, the moment she’s prayed against, and all she can do is watch it happen.
It can’t behappening. It can’t.
Dorian lets out a broken, awful sound, his fingers clawing at his chest. His lips are bloodless, his face pale beneath the sheen of sweat.
Selene grips his face between her hands, pressing her forehead to his. “No,” she whispers, her voice raw. “You do not get to leave me.”
But she is no goddess. She can’t command him to stay. It didn’t matter about the totems. It didn’t matter that she was given a second chance. It doesn’t even matter that she loved him.
She’s going to lose him anyway.
This is her punishment. This is what she deserves.
But why him?Why do this to someone so good and wonderful and perfect andhers?
Footsteps sound outside the room. Heavy, desperate, pounding.
Selene barely has time to lift her head before the door bursts open.
Soren stands there, wild-eyed and breathless, a satchel slung over his shoulder.
For a second, there is silence.
Then—
“Move!” Soren barks, already shoving past them, yanking supplies from his bag.
Selene scrambles back just enough to let him work.
“Is it the cure?” Rookwood demands.
“Yes,” Soren says, pulling free a vial of dark, shimmering liquid. His hands are steady, but his face is grim.
Selene nods, already reaching for Dorian’s arm. She fights through the tremors racking his body, pressing down to hold him still as Soren takes out a syringe.
“Selene,” Soren says sharply. “Hold him steady.”
She grips Dorian’s arm with both hands, heart hammering as Soren finds a vein and pushes the antidote in.
The seconds stretch unbearably.
Then—a breath.
A deep, shuddering breath.
Dorian’s body slackens against the sheets, his muscles no longer rigid with strain. His chest stills, then rises, the first steady inhale he’s taken in days.
It’s not much. His fever still rages, his skin is still pallid, but—
He’s still breathing.
Selene presses a hand to her mouth, a sob breaking free as she sinks to the floor.
The room is quiet now, save for the slow, steady rhythm of Dorian’s breathing. The fever has broken. His skin is no longer slick with sweat, no longer burning beneath Selene’s touch. He lies still beneath the covers, his chest rising and falling with each measured breath.
Selene watches him, unwilling to close her eyes. She knows she should rest, but she cannot bring herself to move from his side. Not yet.
Across the room, Soren slouches on the settee, half-asleep. His chin is tilted forward, his arms crossed over his chest, but every so often, his head jerks up slightly as though some part of him refuses toslip fully into sleep.
