Children Of The Sky (The Scripts Of Neptune, Book 2)

Chapter 55

The whole world stopped as Jack watched Crynia fall. Her lips were red with blood when she met his eyes for a split-second before shutting them, and the stain on her chest spread downward at a frightening speed. 

No. 

The tall, pale-featured man didn't stop Jack as he shot forward--in fact, the man stepped back to give him room, still holding the knife. Jack's hands were aching so badly when he covered Crynia's that he couldn't move his fingers, and he swore past a choked, panicked sob. No, no, no. She wasn't opening her eyes again, and her breath was far too shallow and quick. There was so, so much blood. His hands were already slick with it. 

"Stay awake," he whispered frantically, taking her face in his hands. She was pale, and her skin felt like ice. The Storm surged against the boundaries of their bond, fighting him, fighting the pain he was in. Shoving it away, Jack tore Crynia's shirt where the wound was, pressing his fingers into the cut and hating that he didn't know what else to do. Her skin there was feverishly warm; so was her blood, red as wine on his hands. She was losing too much--the stain creeping across the floor was soaking into the knees of his pants. This was a dream. It had to be a dream. 

The sickening throb of blood under his fingers was growing weaker as her breath shallowed further, and he bit back a scream at the agony shooting through him as the Storm writhed. He tried to reign in his panic, tried to press harder, to stop the bleeding, something. He couldn't lose her. Not after everything.

He thought he was imagining it when Crynia's pulse stopped beating against his fingers--he prayed he was imagining it. But her chest wasn't moving, and she'd gone so eerily still. He'd seen death before. Gods, no... 

"Myriad." 

Jack shut his eyes. The Storm shrieked at the numbness that was settling over him--he didn't understand it, why he stopped feeling all of the sudden, but it seemed it was a feeling all its own. He was on fire, his bones and his muscles and his skin burning with vile agony.

"Myriad," the pale-featured man said again, oddly gentle. "She's gone." 

Jack raised his eyes and saw Crynia's blood on the knife in one of the man's hands, a grey crystal in the other. She's gone. The words sank into him and left a pit. She was gone--oh, Dreail, he'd never see her again, never hear her laugh, never watch her dark eyes dance when she looked at him. She was gone.

There was a pressure building in his whole body, a hum, a frantic pounding at the gates of his being. It blurred his vision and made his ears ring, drowning out the sound of the streets outside. Stumbling to his feet, Jack squeezed his eyes closed and put his hands over his ears, wanting the sound to stop, trying to make it stop. Moving blindly, he reached out and found the wall with his hand, the plaster powdery on his fingers. The room was twisting, and his head, his head was so loud. He couldn't breathe.

He didn't remember finding his way into the hall, but his feet were on the stairs, skipping steps as a pulse of pain went through him and he faltered. His knees hit the ground a moment later, broken glass cutting him, and he put his head in his arms and screamed. The ringing was so loud, the pressure so great, that the sound was lost to him. The pain grew nearly unbearable--he was dying, he had to be. 

And then it stopped. The room snapped into focus, the smell of rotting structures and the sunlight and the seedlings growing in the floor. Every breath was as loud as a waterfall. The force inside him shuddered in attempted restraint, the groan of a dam about to break. Jack shut his eyes and pressed his fingertips into his scalp.

The world shattered.

It was agony unlike anything he'd ever felt, the pain of every bone in his body breaking into pieces and his muscles tearing at the seams. The Storm was in every corner of his being at once, frantic as it tried to reel itself back. Lightning flashed, blinding, and the thunder from the bolt shook the building so much that the stones shifted.