She didn’t know how long she was trapped in a world where all she had were her thoughts, none of which were entirely pleasant at the moment. She wanted to cry, wanted to do anything other than just lie here like this. Braith sat with her, his arms around her, his hands on her face, and in her hair. The look on his face, the fright in his eyes was almost as awful as this endless uncertainty.

Then a warming sensation started in the tips of her toes, and gradually began to spread upward. At first it wasn’t unpleasant, and she welcomed anything over the nothingness that had encompassed her. The tingling reminded her of holding her frozen hands over a fire and heating them too quickly as it began to prick at her skin. It quickly became unpleasant, but if she could grit her teeth she could get through it. Unfortunately her mouth wasn’t unfrozen yet.

The tingling worked its way through her arms, up to her shoulders, across her neck, and into her chest. She tried to fist her hands against the pain, they wouldn’t move. Frustration filled her, she tried to scream, she tried to cry; she tried to do anything other than lay here like a useless lump.

A plea began inside of her; the only problem was she didn’t know what she was pleading for at the moment… a true death to free her from this relentless pain, or eternal life.

The heat pierced her heart; her non-beating heart. She’d never experienced anything like this, never expected to hear the silence of the vital organ that had once pulsated so fluidly within her. She hadn’t realized how much of a constant part of her it had been until she was blanketed by the heavy cloak of silence that followed its cessation.

Tendrils of heat brushed against the organ as gentle and quiet as a butterfly’s wings. The heat retreated for a moment before surging into it once more. It slipped inside and began to sluggishly spread throughout. She didn’t know what the heat was, but she pictured Braith’s blood flowing in to fill the spaces that her blood had left behind. Pictured it filling her cells, rehydrating them with his power; his life. She tried to keep that image in her mind; it was far more pleasant than the uncertainty threatening to consume her.

The heat filled her deadened heart again; her fingers flickered as she felt a heaving inside her chest before it seeped out again. Hope swelled within her. She had moved, she’d moved! It was only a small bit of progress but at least it was something different, it was something more than this hideous nothing.

The heat began to increase; her body was on fire as it prickled through her extremities. She lurched, her body jerked as warmth slammed into her heart once more, but it didn’t beat again and she knew that it would remain still forever. The tingling, prickling sensation in her fingers and toes started to worsen as it spread into her torso. A scream welled inside of her, but her mouth wouldn’t open to release the agony that was consuming her from the inside out.

Braith’s fingers brushed her face as he leaned over her. Her skin felt as if it had been scrubbed away to expose her nerve endings. His silky touch was more than she could stand. She couldn’t cringe away from the contact though, couldn’t pull away, as her body still wasn’t hers. It was this fleshy shell that had become her coffin.

“Aria?”

Just when she thought she couldn’t take anymore, her body broke free of its paralysis. Braith leaned over her as she opened her mouth and the scream she had been unable to release for so long, ripped free of her in an unending echo that left her throat ravaged and her body drained as she fell lifelessly back to the bed.

Braith reached for her but she moved away from him, unable to bear his touch on her brutalized skin. She curled into the fetal position, but even that was almost too much to bear. Her body shook and shivered, she was hot, she was cold, she was dying, she was living, and she was doing it all too fast. Braith’s hand fell back to his side; hopelessness filled his gaze as her teeth began to chatter.

She yearned to tell him that she would be alright, but she wasn’t going to lie, she wasn’t alright, and the mere idea of moving was more than she could handle right now. Every muscle in her body screamed, her bones felt as if they were being shattered into a million little pieces. Everything inside of her felt as if it were changing, and somehow rearranging.

What had she done?

The thought was fleeting. It didn’t matter, it was done. There was no turning back, and no matter how badly this hurt, she wouldn’t have changed it. She forced herself to open her hand toward him. Seeming to sense that she couldn’t stand much of his touch, he simply placed two of his fingers lightly into her palm. The small connection helped to ease her slightly. She kept her eyes focused on him as she struggled to simply survive her own death.

***

“You look like shit.”

Braith could barely lift his head to look at Jack. He felt beaten and drained in ways he hadn’t thought possible. He hated himself, he hated this whole awful mess, and he wished he’d never agreed to this. She’d told him it was his decision to make, and though he’d been terrified she would die, petrified of losing her, there had been another part so entirely enthralled with the prospect of having her by his side forever that he’d talked himself into believing that this would be ok, that they could get through this.

Now, he knew that he’d been completely wrong. He’d do anything to take this from her, but there was nothing he could do. He couldn’t even touch her without causing her to moan or scream. He’d seen a lot of wretchedness and death in his extensive life, but he’d never experienced anything like this. Even the one attempt at the change he’d witnessed was nothing compared to this, but then that person hadn’t been Aria, and he hadn’t cared about what they’d endured, or whether they would survive.

Aria was the strongest person he knew, and she was falling apart before him, swamped within the nightmare he’d created for her. He’d never hated himself more, he didn’t have a clue how to make it better, and at the moment he would have willingly offered up his own life to go back in time and decide against doing this. What had he been thinking?

He hadn’t, and now she was the one paying for his lack of good judgment. Ashby had once said that eventually he would end up changing her no matter what, that he wouldn’t be able to resist. He didn’t believe that was true, he believed he could have refrained from doing so. However, he couldn’t deny the fact that when she’d agreed to this, a part of him, the darkest and most primeval part had thrilled at the prospect and wouldn’t have been stopped by anything, or anyone.

It was a piece of himself he didn’t like, but over the past few months he’d come to accept that there was no denying it, or the fact that the person that brought it out, and kept it under control the most, was Aria.

“How bad is it Braith?”

He tiredly ran a hand through his sweaty, tangled hair. His muscles were twisted from being tensed at her side all night, he was exhausted from lack of sleep, and yet it should be worse, he should be even more miserable. It was nothing compared to what she was going through. He was barely able to hold Jack’s gaze for more than a moment. “Bad, real bad.”

Xavier stood behind Jack, his head bowed and his hands enfolded in his voluminous cloak. Jack placed a jug of blood on the kitchen table. “Did you get any sleep?”

Braith shook his head. “No.”

“Did she?”

“She’s sleeping now, but not well.”

“You should take a break. Why don’t you let us watch over her while you take a shower, maybe a nap?”

“No.”

“Braith…”

He shook his head as he glanced over his shoulder at the shadowed bedroom. He tried to pick up on some clue that she had awakened and needed him. He wasn’t doing her any good, but he was going to do everything he could for her, especially since any second might be her last. His teeth clenched, his hands tensed around the doorframe, he had to fight the urge to rip something to shreds; he wanted to rip himself to shreds.

“If she dies…” he broke off as he strained to get the words out. “I would have been the one to kill her.”

Jack and Xavier exchanged a glance. “You said you could handle this Braith,” Jack said worriedly.

He shook his head, fighting the urge to start screaming, to destroy everything around him. He’d lost it when she’d left him, but she’d still been alive then. Now he was certain she was dying, that she wouldn’t survive whatever was happening to her body. She was strong, his blood was powerful, but so few made it through and now she was barely clinging to what little fight she had left in her.

How had he ever believed that he could endure the consequences of this?

Because he had to, he reminded himself. He simply had to. There were so many lives hanging in the balance now. So much that still needed to be done, so much that he meant to accomplish, and he had promised her that he would survive. So he would somehow, but he would never be the same if she died, never be whole again. She’d entered his life and turned it upside down. He’d had everything he’d ever required since birth, and he had been completely empty until he’d seen her standing on that stage, proud and defiant, even while facing her death. He’d had it all, but he’d had nothing until that moment.

He would survive without her, but he would never live again. Ashby had been right after all, he realized dully, bloodlinks couldn’t live without each other. They simply existed.

“I can handle this,” Braith told him.

Jack folded his arms over his chest and leaned back. “You must feed.”

“I’ve fed more than well enough,” he muttered.

He’d more than sated himself on her, and for the first time in months he didn’t feel the clawing thirst for blood in his chest and gut. He’d rather be starving. “You have to keep up your strength.”

His gaze slid back to his brother. Jack’s eyes were shadowed and dark, his hair tussled and disordered. “Believe me Jack, I’ve had plenty, and I’ve never felt stronger.”

It was true, she was at her weakest, shattered and tormented, and he was suffused with the power of her blood.

There was a moment when Jack didn’t seem to comprehend what he was saying, and then his eyes closed and his shoulders slumped. “Yeah, I suppose so. I’ll leave this here for you anyway.”

A whimper, so soft that he knew Jack and Xavier wouldn’t pick up on it, caught his attention. Braith turned, he was immobile as he waited to see if anything more would follow, but she became quiet once more. “How are things at the palace?” he inquired.

Jack pulled out a chair and dropped into it. “There are still quarrels but that’s to be expected for awhile.”

“Yes,” Braith agreed but he was barely paying attention.

This time the whimper had been louder. He left his brother and Xavier as he made his way to the bedroom. Even though she was incoherent, he’d left the bathroom lantern lit and the door cracked just in case she did wake up. He went to her, knowing better than to touch her as he moved around the bed and knelt before her. She was curled into a ball, her eyes closed and her lips compressed into a thin line. Her hair was lank and damp with sweat as it fell around her unnaturally pale face. He brushed back a piece of her hair and tucked it behind her ear.

Her eyes flew open, for a moment he was frozen as he gazed at her. His body no longer felt like his own as her normally bright blue eyes shone a vibrant shade of red. “Aria,” he breathed.

She gazed unseeingly up at him, he had a feeling that she didn’t even know he was there. She turned her face into his wrist, her mouth pressed against it. She moved with startling speed as she opened her mouth and bit down. Braith jerked in surprise as her fangs sank into his vein. He almost instinctively pulled back, but then her deep pulls on his blood sparked something primal and possessive inside of him. This had never happened to him before, he had shared his blood with her, but he’d never actually had another vampire feeding from him, inside of him, draining him. His heart swelled, pleasure and love swamped him, but they were swiftly doused.

Her torment engulfed him as her mind flowed forward to blend with his. She was new, she had no idea what she was doing to him, but he was ensnared within the agony consuming her, and he allowed himself to be drawn into it. He couldn’t stand the thought of her facing this alone, bearing it all herself.

He pushed her hair back and nuzzled her temple as tears burned his eyes. “Aria,” he breathed in her ear.

Movement caught his attention. Jack hovered in the doorway, his eyes troubled and apprehensive. A surge of protection washed over Braith, a low growl escaped him as he waved Jack back. This was their moment alone, and for all he knew it may very well be one of his last with her. He wasn’t going to share it with anyone, especially not his brother. Jack slipped into the shadows, disappearing from view as Aria abruptly released her hold on him.