Blood Before Sunrise (38 page)

Slowly, her fingers uncurled from around the dagger. Faolán had his back to me, but I didn’t have to see his face to know the triumph written there. He’d kill her, I had no doubt. He’d come too far, and his insanity had taken him to a place he couldn’t return from.

I no longer wobbled on my feet. My lungs rose and fell as I drew deep, steady breaths. I watched as the dagger slipped from Brakae’s hand, falling soundlessly in this place frozen in time. Faolán reached out, his hands curled into claws, and a snarl tore from his throat. I pushed at the ground, the heavy tread of my boots slipping and then catching hold of the snow.

“I’m sorry,” Faolán said as he reached for Brakae. “I will always love you.”

I jumped, arms outstretched, and shoved her out of the way before Faolán could seize her. It wasn’t a graceful maneuver by any standards as Brakae went flying, but it got the job done. I rolled in a swift, fluid motion and scooped the dagger into my grasp.

With a quick, upward stab, I aimed for the spot Faolán had laid bare for Brakae. The dagger sliced through skin, muscle, and bone as though his body were nothing more than a sheet of silk fabric. Veins of green glowed against the obsidian blade as Faolán pitched forward, knocking me backward. As he fell, the long dagger drove farther still, burying itself to the hilt.

I shimmied my legs up between us and used the leverage
to roll him off me. Blood, red and bright, stained the pristine snow and covered my hands with a slick warmth that nauseated me. I’d never had such an attack of conscience before—unless you considered Azriel’s death. The tragedy of it all hit too close to home for me to feel anything but regret. Only love could drive a person so completely into the arms of madness.

“You are a Guardian worthy of the Order,” Faolán rasped. “My Enphigmalé brothers would be proud to have you amongst their ranks.”

I knelt beside him, speechless.

“Thank you.” His breath labored in his lungs, an ugly, gurgling sound. “For protecting her.”

A scrambling noise drew my attention, and I looked up to see Brakae crawling through the snow, silent sobs catching in her throat. The dagger still protruded from Faolán’s chest, and I pulled with everything I had left, determined to provide Brakae with a slightly less gruesome image to remember her beloved by.

Taking the dagger with me, I turned my back as Brakae gently lowered herself on to his torso and wept in earnest. Had she been able to look into his eyes one last time before he faded away? I refused to intrude upon her private moment by turning back to see. Brushing away hovering snowflakes, I limped to the stone podium at the center of the ring of stones. A
pit-pat
sound accompanied every step, blood dripping from my scored and stabbed flesh to stain the snow-covered ground with shiny red tears.

I approached the hourglass with caution. It wasn’t every day I attempted to set time aright. My ring glowed white on the neck of the broken half as if waiting to be put to work. Love really was an amazing thing. It could mend hearts, break them, and bend the very fabric of time and space. It bowed to no one, and could bring you to your knees for the right person. My eyelids drooped; I was keeping my eyes open by sheer force of will. Damn, I wanted to sleep for a century or more. But my job wasn’t finished—yet.

Chapter 31

I
stared unblinkingly at the hourglass for what seemed like forever. I looked around past the ring of stones at the naked tree branches and snowflakes dotting the air.
Time to set the natural order back in balance
. I shivered, finally feeling the chill. Or was it fear that shook me? How much time had passed at home? Were my loved ones safe?

All I had to do was reach out and pluck my ring from the neck of the glass, but my brain was having a hard time getting my arm, hand, and fingers to obey the command. How could I face Tyler again? My actions had been a betrayal of our love. Shame boiled in my stomach, twisting it with regret.

“Just reach out and take it, Darian.” Moira’s voice was soft, soothing.

She stood behind me, and I didn’t turn to face her. “When did you come to?”

“Too late to be of any use.”

“Sorry about that.” I really was. “I shouldn’t have knocked you out.”

“No. And I won’t forget it either.” She sounded playful, but the moment was too somber for comic relief. “You did well.”

I choked on a sob, swallowing it down. “Yeah, well, I don’t think I’ll be counting it as a victory.”

“No,” Moira whispered. “This is indeed a tragedy.”

Understatement of the century. “Just reach out and grab it, huh?”

“The ring belongs to you.”

“It’s not going to explode or spontaneously burst into flames?”

Moira laughed without humor. “Not likely. Just take it, Darian. Trust.”

Trust. Like I had any idea what that was. But I reached out anyway, my fingers trembling. God, I was afraid. I wrapped my fingers around the ring—
my ring
—and the warmth pulsing from the silver put me at ease. If the ring hadn’t burned my hand to ash, then maybe that meant Tyler could forgive me. I pulled it from its perch, and as I did, the snow left its stasis and began to float in a slow waltz to the ground. A warm breeze kissed my cheeks, and the branches of the trees quivered, tiny buds of green dotting their once-bare arms.

“Holy shit,” I whispered.

“Darian…”

Brakae’s voice, tiny but somehow strong, drew my attention from the natural wonder before me. Slipping my ring back on my thumb, I left Moira to collect Reaver’s half of the hourglass and went to check on Raif’s daughter.
Raif’s. Daughter
. My God, I’d really found her. Well, more to the point, she had found me.

She left Faolán’s body in the now-melting snow and walked toward me with slow, measured steps. Like a hollow representation of her former self, she limped along, gripping her side to stem the flow of blood from one of her many wounds.

“Are you all right?” What a stupid question.

“No,” she said, and I respected her for her candor. “But I will be.”

Time heals all wounds, right? “I—Brakae—” Fuck, what the hell was I going to say?
Sorry I killed the guy you used to love.

“We are nothing more than the servants of destiny,” she said, holding her hand out to me. I took it, and, well, it didn’t even feel a little awkward. “Leave this behind like a stone on the road.”

Raif had said that to me once. I felt the sting of tears at my eyes and bit back the emotion. I missed him.
Brakae looked as tired as I felt, as emotionally raw and worked over. We’d both passed through the eye of the storm and come out on the other side. And I
knew
neither of us would ever be the same for it. Her gaze lowered to my neck, and her lips curved in a sad, wan smile. From her robes she produced a glowing green emerald suspended from a length of silver chain. “The Key,” I said, taking it from her waiting hand.

“It’s not an easy job,” Brakae said, “being the Guardian of Time.”

“Or the Keeper of it,” I added. Her gaze dropped to the ground, and sorrow consumed her expression. She had it much worse than I. She’d suffered and sacrificed. She needed a ray of sun in the dark of her life. “Can I bring your father here?” Hope swelled within me at the thought. I refused to believe Raif had died in that hotel room. Damn it, he had to be alive, and I was going to reunite him with his daughter. “So he can see you?”

I saw a trace of sunlight in her expression, maybe the beginning of a long road toward healing. “I would like that,” she said. “Very much.”

Suddenly, I felt a little sun as well.

Moira joined us, carrying Brakae’s half of the hourglass in one hand and Reaver’s half tucked in the crook of her arm. Weren’t we just the embodiment of girl power? “Brakae,” she said, “your wounds need tending.”

Her knees wobbled beneath her, and I reached out to support her. Where were those trauma nurse Sprites when you needed them?

“I can help her,” Moira said.

“You’re a Healer.” Levi had mentioned that. I was going to have to keep that guy on retainer. “Right?”

Moira nodded and made her way to Brakae. She touched her fingertips to her skin, and a soft blue light flowed from the wound, moving outward like rings on glassy water. She began to hum while she worked, a rhythmic, melodious tune that snaked around me and filled me with emotion. It struck me as strange, the way lives and events intertwined to form the knotted chain
of destiny. It made me think that, maybe, life wasn’t just a random pattern of bullshit tied to bad luck or good fortune. “Moira…”

“Do you really want to torture yourself with the truth, Darian?”

Damn mind readers
. “Can I talk to him?”

“No. It doesn’t work that way.”

“He knew. Azriel had to have known all along what would happen to me. It isn’t coincidence. I just want to know the why and how of it.”

Moira sighed. “He made you what you are.”

What was that, exactly? Damaged? Distrustful? A control freak who refused to open up to anyone?

“He made you
strong
,” Moira said. “Perhaps Azriel strayed from his path, but without him, you would have died today.”

“Raif made me strong.” No way was Az going to get the credit.

“Raif made you a fighter,” Moira corrected. “Azriel made you capable.”

I opened my mouth to argue. I didn’t want to acknowledge that Azriel had done anything but permanent damage by taking me under his wing. But Moira’s gaze locked with mine, a warning—or a suggestion.
Do not speak of it.
Her voice echoed in my mind.
Leave the past in the past
,
Darian.

After a moment, Moira stood. “Brakae, Reaver’s glass must be returned. Things are still too volatile here for my peace of mind.”

“I agree,” Brakae said, and I suddenly felt like an outsider in a private conversation. “Go with my blessings.”

Moira handed over Brakae’s half of the glass and bowed her head before looking to me. “See you on the other side.”

She held out her hand, and I clasped it. “Count on it.”

“Brakae,” Moira said, turning to leave, “I shall see you soon.”

She nodded and raised her hand to gesture her off. “Good-bye, Moira.”

A ripple of energy stirred the air, sending the snowflakes swirling, and then Moira was gone. “Will it always be like this?” I asked, feeling centuries old. “Constant threats and me here fighting while time flies by at home?”

“No.” Was it my imagination that she actually sounded disappointed? “You won’t be often called upon. So few know of the hourglass, of me, of
O Anel
. It is nothing but legend now, and besides Moira, you have the only other key. That is what you’re meant to protect.”

She was lonely. Bitter. I knew that tone well. I’d been alone for almost a century, hiding away at Azriel’s command. I could only imagine how bad it was for her, here in this place where her deep connection to time aged her at a whim and in any direction. “I’ll come visit when I can. And I’ll bring Raif too.”

She pulled me into her arms and squeezed me—hard. My ribs wanted to crack under her fierce display of affection, but I totally didn’t mind. I put my arms around her as well, to let her know she wouldn’t feel so separated from the world she’d once known now that I had something to say about it.

“Now, you go home,” Brakae said. Was it my imagination that her voice sounded younger, more childlike?

“Just click my heels together?”

Brakae pulled away, gave me a strange, innocent look. “No, just use the Key. Why would you click your heels together?”

Wouldn’t she get a dose of culture shock if she came home with me. “Right, use the Key. Honestly, I’m not sure how.”

“Just concentrate. The Key will do the rest.”

My heart pounded a staccato against my ribs, and my stomach twisted like a pretzel. Christ, was returning to the mortal world so hard to face? I wanted to go home. I
needed
to see Tyler, but I was so afraid to face him, I didn’t know if I could bring myself to leave.

“Go with my blessings, Guardian.” Brakae’s voice calmed me, slowing my racing heart. “And I will see you soon.”

My gaze swept past Raif’s long-lost daughter one more time to the place where Faolán’s body lay. Hourglass in hand, she turned away from me, toward her dead lover, and left me where I stood.

“I’ll be back sooner than you think.” She didn’t acknowledge me, but I knew she’d heard. I left her to grieve and dangled the emerald pendulum before me. Just concentrate. Okay. I pushed my fear and anxiety aside and stared into the glowing green depths of the gem as I had so many times before, allowing infinite green to consume me.
I want to go home,
I thought, Tyler’s face looming in my mind.
Time to go
.

A chill breeze blew my hair back from my face, stealing my breath. And a dark, cold, cloudless sky welcomed me, stars blinking in the inky blackness of a new moon.

Ruins.

In the mortal world this place was nothing but weathered granite with stones leaning and pieces missing, but the feeling of power was no less strong for its decrepit age. My body hummed with power, my bones singing under my skin. The energy here was unmistakable, but somehow I didn’t feel the magnetic pull of the stones the way I had in
O Anel
. Time once again ticked within my soul, seconds passing like a dual heartbeat, and I welcomed it. I was finally home, where I belonged. My knees buckled from sheer exhaustion, and I sank down on one of the toppled slabs of cold stone, rested my head in the crook of my arm, and allowed my eyes to close for the first time in what felt like forever. God, I was so…fucking…tired….

Chapter 32

“O
i! What do you think you’re doin’ out there?”

My head scraped against stone as I cracked my eyes open. Shards of sunlight pierced my vision like a thousand daggers digging their way into my brain. Turning my head toward the sound of shouting, I shielded my face with my hand. Two security guards ran across the expanse of short-clipped green grass, nightsticks drawn and at the ready. Not what I needed, considering I didn’t have a passport or ID, not to mention that I wasn’t exactly human. The faint glow of my eyes would raise more than just suspicion if they got a good look at me. I couldn’t lie here like a dazed disaster victim any longer.