“I don’t understand. This sounds crazy. I mean, what if I miss? What’ll that do to you? And what if I don’t miss? We have no guarantee that it’ll work, that it won’t just kill you on the spot. Besides, why now? We’re supposed to be having fun. We were having fun,” I insisted, feeling panicked now. “This can wait.”
“You saw what happened the other night.” He shook his head, looking grimly determined. “I’m not risking that again. Don’t you see? I want you, Vi. I’m not going to stop wanting you. And to have you, I have to bite you. I can’t help but bite you. And God only knows what’ll happen when I do.”
“Well,” I floundered, “what about Mrs. Girard? You’re supposed to be . . . I don’t know, doing stuff with the Tribunal or something.”
“I won’t continue to be her pawn.”
“You’re not her pawn,” I argued, desperate to convince him not to do this—not now. “You’re the Dauphin; you’re their king. She answers to you, not the other way around.”
He rose from his chair, moving around the table to kneel before me, taking both of my hands in his. “But that’s not what I want. Don’t you see? I don’t want to be their king. I want to be a boy—a mortal boy. Someone stole my life from me a century ago, and I want it back. Not next month, not next year or the year you finish university. I want it now.
“And if it doesn’t work—or worse, if it kills me, well . . . what better place than here, where I was born? All your friends are here, Vi. If I don’t make it, they’ll take care of you, comfort you. And that business I had to see to—my assets, my belongings, I’ve left them to you. The apartment in Paris, everything. You’ll be fine. We’ve got to do this. Today. Right now.”
I reached a trembling hand up to my temple. My head was pounding, a dull, throbbing ache. “I can’t,” I said, tears gathering in my eyes.
“You can,” he insisted. “I have faith that you can, that you love me enough to set me free.”
Downstairs in the grand hall, the clock chimed the hour with a single booming note. Aidan stood, reaching for the syringe and vial.
I watched wordlessly as he uncapped the glass vial, inserting the needle in and pulling up the plunger to fill the syringe with the serum. “We don’t have much time—I expect them back within the hour.” He pulled me to my feet, holding the syringe out to me. My hand trembling, I took it.
I started to cry then, deep, gulping sobs that racked my entire body. “I can’t do it,” I choked out.
“You have to do it, Vi,” Aidan pleaded.
“No.” I shook my head, the tears blurring my vision as I backed toward the bed.
“Please, I beg of you. It has to go into my heart. You can do it; I’ve taught you how. Don’t let me down, not now.”
“No,” I blubbered, wanting it to stop. “Please, no. Don’t make me, Aidan. I can’t.”
“Yes, love. You can. Right here.” He tapped his chest. “There’s no time to waste—you must do it now. Now,” he repeated, his tone urgent.
“Why me?” I asked miserably.
“Because I love you with all my heart. It has to be you—don’t you see?”
Taking a deep, ragged breath, I raised my gaze to his.
This is for us, he said in my head. It’s the only way. The only chance we’ve got.
I knew then that he was right. That he loved me enough to risk it, that I loved him enough to try.
“Okay,” I said at last.
“Thank you,” Aidan answered.
“Now?”
He nodded. “Now, love.”
I could do this—I had to. I took a deep, calming breath, finding my center. Once, twice, three times. When my mind was clear and focused, I raised my arm, my fingers clutched tightly around the syringe’s smooth barrel. I took one step back and then lunged forward, my arm swinging in an arc that led directly to Aidan’s heart.
A scream escaped my lips as the needle pierced his flesh. Aidan’s eyes widened, his mouth forming an O of surprise. Quickly, I pressed the plunger all the way down with my thumb before releasing my grip on the syringe.
And then I watched in horror as Aidan crumpled to the floor, the needle still protruding from his chest. His blue-gray eyes were open wide, staring unseeing at the ceiling—all hint of life gone from them, just like that.
“No!” I shrieked, my voice echoing around the room, bouncing off the walls. Frantic now, I dropped to my hands and knees beside his body and laid an ear against his chest, desperately hoping to hear or feel something, anything.
Oh my God. Oh my God. There was nothing. Not a sound, not a heartbeat, not a single movement. A jagged sob tore from my throat, and I clapped a hand over my mouth, silencing it, swallowing back the bile that had risen in my throat.
The cure hadn’t worked. It hadn’t worked! He’d said that it would, but it didn’t. It hadn’t. I’d killed him—destroyed him, just like the rest of them, with a single strike to the heart!
What have I done?
I knelt over him, my hands shaking as I touched his face, my fingers skimming lightly from his cheek to his jaw, his lips. His skin was so soft, as pale and perfect as always. If it weren’t for his eyes, he could be sleeping. But he wasn’t—I knew that he wasn’t.
I’d killed him.
Entirely numb now, I somehow managed to pull the needle from his chest and toss it aside. I raised a trembling hand to my mouth and kissed my fingers, then pressed them to his lips. “Please forgive me,” I whispered, unwilling to say those other, far more permanent words. And then I reached up and closed his eyes.
This was what he’d wanted—to be set free. He’d wanted the monster inside him gone, no matter the cost. He’d been willing to take that risk, but what about me? Was I supposed to be happy for him? Happy that he’d won?
How could I be happy when it felt as if my own heart had stopped beating along with his? How could I go on, knowing that he was permanently erased from my future now?
With nothing left to do, I laid my head against his chest and cried, my tears soaking his shirt as I clutched his lifeless body to mine.
I have no idea how much time passed before I felt it—a subtle movement beneath my cheek. A pulse, a twitch. Something.
I imagined it. I had to have imagined it. But . . . there it was again. I held my breath, straining to listen more closely now.
And then I heard it—a faint but distinct thump.
I let out my breath with a gasp and then held it again. Listening, waiting. Hoping, praying. Please, God. Please, please . . .
Thump.
Followed by silence. Maybe I had imagined it—or just heard my own heartbeat echoing in my ears.
But then there it was again, loud and strong against my ear: Thump.
Please! Oh, please, oh, please, oh, please.
Thump . . . thump . . . thump.
Thump-thump . . . thump-thump . . . thump-thump . . . thump-thump.
It was rhythmic now, continuing on uninterrupted. Holy hell and God in heaven!
“Aidan!” I scrambled to my knees, my gaze snapping up to his face . . .
. . . just as his blue-gray eyes opened.
“Violet?” he asked dazedly, struggling to sit.
I threw my arms around his neck, laughing and crying all at once as relief washed over me in coursing waves.
“You okay?” he asked me.
“Are you kidding? Am I okay? Oh my God, Aidan! You were dead; I swear you were. And then—”