Gritting my teeth, I force myself forward inch by inch, half crawling across the floor toward him. It is like crawling into the midday sun. Sweat pours down my spine, slicks down my neck. The heat on my face is an unrelenting scorch. Any trace of the tears glossing my eyes evaporates in an instant. They are dry as desert sand, each blink of my lids an unpleasant scrape. My lashes feel like tinder, ripe for catching.
I wonder at what temperature my tunic will ignite as I drag myself across the blistering floor. The petrified lava is so hot beneath my fingertips, I think it might turn molten as it was a millennium ago, the last time this volcano erupted. I push past the pain, forcing myself to continue forward. Closing the gap between us, one excruciating sliver at a time.
It is not only physical pain that thwarts my progress. My very soul seems to sear, fueled by the Remnant bond that links me irrevocably to Penn. Usually I find our connection calming. Comforting. An unconscious tether in the back of my mind, letting me know where he is and, in rarer times of great emotion, what he is feeling. Like the scent of burning leaves on an autumn wind, I can sense him from afar and find my way to him if necessary.
There is nothing calming about our bond in this moment. Nothing remotely comforting. It is a charred current of unadulterated energy that scorches a path from his heart to mine. Within my own reserves of maegic, deep within the wild storm that swirls inside, I feel the placid waters of my power beginning to simmer beneath Penn’s heat. All that is cold and controlled at the core of my being seems suddenly in danger of sparking. By the time I reach him at the center of the chamber, I am struggling to keep my own destructive abilities in check.
“Penn, you have to stop this.” I lift a hand toward him but jerk it back from the flame as pain bites at me, a stinging lash across my fingers. Blisters bloom on my skin. “Please, Penn. Please listen to me.”
The fire is so bright, so hot, it is hard to see and even harder to breathe. I try three more times to reach him through the ball of flame that surrounds his body, telling myself it is only pain, that any burns I receive will heal quickly, but I never manage to touch him before snatching my hand back, my singed flesh smarting in agony.
More blood is pouring from his ears, dripping down his chest in rivulets. Within the ball of fire, his skin is stark white. Corpse white.
Please,a small voice cries out from somewhere deep within me.Please, Pendefyre. Hear me. Stop this.
But he does not.
I cannot use my power to help him any more than I can use my hands. In desperation, I reach within to the bond that burns between us. I grab hold of that invisible tether that connects my heart to his, connects fire to air, and begin to tug on it, a spool of yarn without end, unraveling his psyche into mine.
I am not certain it will work. Not until I see the flames consuming Penn starting to disperse, weakening as I absorb some ofthe damage he is inflicting upon himself. I nearly bite through my lip as my nerve endings bake, as the marrow in my bones crackles with heat.
Skies, how much pain he is in, if this is but a shade of his power.
I cannot handle much more without doing myself serious harm. But there is no choice. Blood pours from his eyes as well as his ears now, trickling down his cheeks, dripping off his sharp jawline. And so, I take more. I pull his fire toward me, into me, until I think the blood will boil in my veins, until I feel my limbs turn to kindling, until each breath burns like my lungs are full of embers.
I channel every bit of heat and flame into the deepest recesses of my own power, where the air currents within me blow hard enough to extinguish them. Candles in the wind, no match for my storm. The flames around Penn weaken further, growing faint and translucent as they lick across his flesh.
More.
The heat is unbearable. I think my body will crack apart, think my mind will cleave beneath the force of it. The world fades around me, blackness closing in at my peripherals. I am losing the battle against unconsciousness. Just before my final shred of strength falters, my inner voice cries out one last time—a pained and broken prayer to the man crouched beside me.
If you die here, you take me with you.
He hears me. Somehow, someway, he hears me. The flames splutter out with a whooshing sound that echoes off the walls. The relentless wave of heat subsides so fast, I am certain I must be hallucinating. In a blink, I can breathe again. Ragged, desperate gulps of superheated air—but at least I am breathing. I stare down at the veined lava floor of the chamber where my hands and knees are planted. My arms and legs tremble with the effortto keep from collapsing entirely. The sleeves of the plain uniform I wear to treat patients at the infirmary are scorched beyond repair, the skin beneath flushed the angry scarlet shade of a fresh burn. My fingers are a mess of char, the tips blackened. I stare at the damage for a moment before my arms and legs do finally give out and, in an exhausted heap, I fall.
I never hit the floor. Two strong arms close around me before I make impact. Within the space of a breath, I am cradled against a broad chest, staring up into the King of Dyved’s scowling face.
“What the bloody hell were you thinking?” he growls, fury staining every word.
“That’s an odd way to thank me for saving your life,” I snap hoarsely, shoving against his hold—a move I regret instantly, as it sets off a fresh wave of pain that racks me head to toe.
“Thank you? I’d like to shake some sense into you.” His touch is utterly gentle, belying his enraged declarations. He holds me like I am made of glass, his large hands careful not to put undue pressure on my ravaged skin. “What you just did was beyond risky. I could have killed you.”
“And, if I had not taken that risk, you would have killedyourself, you ungrateful lug!”
“Better me than you.”
“Don’t say that.”
His eyes are still smoldering with maegic. They lock on mine, two embers, burning, burning, burning. There are deep, bruise-like shadows of exhaustion beneath them. Traces of blood still trail down his cheeks, drip onto his chest.
“I know you were trying to help,” he murmurs after a long pause. “But you put yourself in harm’s way unnecessarily.”
“How was it unnecessary, Penn? You were lost in the maegic. The fire was consuming you.”
“I had it under control.”
“That’s not what it looked like. Not to me, not to your men, not to anyone with eyes.”