Sapphire Spells

Chapter 30: The Wheel (reversed)

Two gunshots ring through the air, back to back, followed by a deafening silence. The moment of time stretches for what seems like an eternity as I stare at my target before the fairy I aimed at finally falls to the ground. Got you.

At my side, Ally also falls.

I dive for her, discarding my weapon beside me.

The front of her shirt turns red. Even the dim moonlight can not hide it, for there is so much of it. My mind is a jumbled mess; all I can do is act on instinct. Placing my hands over one another, I press on her chest, where the blood seems to come from. It doesn't help. Warm, thick fluid covers my hands, bubbling up from between my fingers. It is too much. She is losing too much.

I press harder, shifting, so my weight helps with applying pressure.

Icy panic settles in my bones. The kind that freezes a person, rendering them completely inept for thoughts no longer make sense. I grit my teeth and can not think clearly enough to hope for clarity or any kind of plan to form.

Ally's hand lifts to mine, capturing my attention, and for the first time, I truly look at her face. She looks weak, skin pale, forehead littered with beads of cold sweat, eyes hooded as if keeping them open is incredibly difficult.

She was just fine, only moments ago. How can someone crumble so quickly? Someone so strong, suddenly so fragile.

"Run," her voice is surprisingly steady for her condition, void of fear or uncertainty. She is directing me, giving me a plan. But it is one I refuse to follow.

I shake my head. "I am not leaving you."

How could she even ask such a thing? She is my chosen family, my sister, and my best friend. The person who shoulders the weight of my burdens without a single complaint, without me ever even asking such a thing of her.

I can not lose her.

I refuse to.

"Emma. You need to go. Run." Her hand squeezes mine three times, each weaker than the next. The silent meaning of I love you. Though she doesn't say the words, I hear them as if her voice rattles around my skull with each squeeze. 

I can not catch my breath. "No, I..." Words leave me as Ally's eyes slide shut, her chest stops moving, and her lungs no longer fill with air.

My heart stops along with hers and my ribs hurt so much that perhaps I also got shot because this feeling is not natural.

It is as if the world goes perfectly still in that single moment. I look at my hands, painted red with my best friend's blood, while I continue to apply pressure to a wound that is now hardly bleeding.

"Ally?" I say her name as tears line my eyes. "Ally?" My hands finally leave her wound and wrap around her shoulders, shaking her as if to wake her. "Ally!" I can no longer see clearly through the moisture falling from my eyes.

A sob rips through me.

This is not happening. This is not real.

"Fuck, Ally." Fallon's words somehow cut through the rapid thoughts flooding my mind. He kneels beside me, pulling on my arm, but I refuse to let her go. I have her cradled in my hands, unable to form words as tears fall from my face and onto hers. "Emma, we need to go."

I shake my head. No, this is not happening.

Fallon shifts. "Emma, seriously, you need to get up and run. Come with us." His tone is clipped.

Somehow, I manage to take my attention off of her and look up, past Fallon and at Charlie. He is standing before us, his own eyes lined with tears as he views Ally.