She drew up a dose of the preparation with shaking hands, and set it aside. “Let’s do this intravenously,” she said. “That should have the fastest effect.”
He nodded and took the tourniquet she handed him, tying it deftly above her elbow and taking her wrist in his off hand, tilting her arm, before flicking the cap off the syringe. “Are you very certain?”
Jennifer took a deep breath. This was the most dangerous part, she reminded herself. If they’d built the retrovirus wrong, she could die right here, and Guide couldn’t save her. So if she got through this, the actual feeding part shouldn’t be so bad.
“I have a video for my dad,” she said, as clearly as she could. “In my top desk drawer. If anything happens…”
Teyla nodded. “Of course.”
“Tell Rodney… tell him I never stopped trying, okay?” She swallowed hard against the knot in her throat.
Teyla met her eyes, her gaze steadying. “I will tell those who love you of your death. I will be your witness, if it comes to that,” she said. “But it will not.”
Jennifer tried to smile. “I hope you’re right,” she said, and looked up at Guide, watching her with his unfathomable golden eyes. She closed hers and took a breath, steeling herself. “Do it.”
The needle pinched going in, and worse as he pushed the plunger. Jennifer hissed when he withdrew the needle and clapped her other hand to her forearm as he tugged the tourniquet free. Pain seared through her veins, every beat of her heart like a knife in her chest.
“Jennifer!” Teyla’s voice was sharp with fear, but Jennifer’s teeth were gritted too tightly to reply.
And then, as abruptly as it had begun, the pain stopped, leaving only a vague tingle in its wake. Still panting slightly, Jennifer straightened, one hand splayed on the edge of the workbench for support.
“Are you all right?” Teyla asked. “What happened?”
“That just…ahh, really hurt,” Jennifer said, trying to breathe. “We’ll have to see if we can do something about that little side effect.” She looked up at Guide with a sudden unexpected feeling of power. If this had worked, he couldn’t harm her.
“Come,” he said, stepping back into the center of the room, beneath the place where the ribs of the ship met and tangled, like branches in the woods. She was going to have to cross the room to him, she realized. He wouldn’t come to her.
“I will be here, watching,” Teyla said, and Jennifer couldn’t tell if that was threat for Guide or reassurance for her.
“I know.” Jennifer drew in a breath and made herself look at Guide as she walked toward him. He was standing rigid, his eyes on her, his feeding hand tensed at his side. “I trust him.”
He reached out as she approached, and she flinched before she realized he was reaching for her with his off hand. He traced a finger along the curve of her cheek. “You should not trust so easily, Fair One,” he said, very quietly.
“I don’t,” she said. She found herself studying his face. Even this close, he really did look like some older gentleman. Someone’s father. She could imagine Rodney like this, with amber eyes and green-pale skin. Surely his exasperated look would still be the same. “But I trust you.”
He shook his head, and then bowed it as he had to Teyla, silver hair falling over his shoulders. When he straightened, his eyes found hers. “Your faith is not misplaced. I promise it.” He lifted his feeding hand, unbearably slowly.
“You can’t hold back,” she said. “You have to really feed on me, like any other human, or this will all be for nothing.” Guide’s jaw tensed, his hand arched with the effort of holding it still. Her knees were trembling, her heart fluttering like a trapped bird. “You know that, right?”
“I do,” he said finally, his voice rough as stone. His hand inched closer to her chest. “Are you prepared?”
Jennifer took a deep breath and nodded, unable to speak.
“Know that I would not do this if it were not necessary,” Guide murmured. He gripped her shoulder with his off hand, holding her in place, and pressed his feeding hand to her chest.
His sharp nails bit deep, and a gasp at the shock turned to an involuntary shriek. She’d thought she was ready, thought she understood what was coming, but nothing could have prepared her for this.
Fire. Fire worse than the drug, worse than boiling oil, seared through her veins, blooming out from her chest in a burst of pain so intense she couldn’t even draw breath to scream again, tears flooding her eyes. It built unbearably, and then blossomed into even more intense agony.
Then the pulling started. It spread from her solar plexus to her toes, to her fingers, her face, her back, ripping something out of her, tearing it from her no matter how hard she fought, and now she could hear herself screaming again, every muscle in her body cramped and rigid, fighting the endless pain.
Her knees gave out, and only Guide’s hand on her shoulder was keeping her upright, his claws digging into her skin. Her throat was raw, and the world was reduced to ripping and burning and wave after wave of pain. There was a heartbeat pounding in her ears, a frenzied drum, and she could hear a high-pitched, keening wail like something dying.
There were knives in her veins, razor blades, shredding her from the inside, and the world was only pain. There was nothing else, would never be anything else —
The screaming grew strangled; weak. Trailed off.
The drum was slowing. One heartbeat, and then another, her chest clenching, and then nothing but silence.
Oh, God. Help me, she thought, quiet and startlingly clear.
The pain stopped.
Then there was nothing at all.
*Stop!* Steelflower’s shout echoed through Guide’s mind, compelling and insistent. Almost, almost he would have stopped. The draw was slowing to a trickle, life flowing into him faint and pure, the rattle in her chest telling him that the end was close. *Stop!* she shouted again, and this time there was her knife at his throat, claws against his wrist.
Guide lifted his head, his eyes opening, and he felt her blade then against his hand, ready to plunge into the wrist of his feeding hand to make his claws open. *I must not,* he said.
*It is not working. You are killing her!* The point digging in, her mind voice harsh.
*I know,* he said.
The woman beneath his hand looked ninety, her hair pale as milk, her eyes rolled up in their sockets, agony beginning to leave her face for slackness, her pulse slowing to twenty beats a minute.
The point of the knife dug in, drawing blood.
*If I withdraw now it will kill her,* Guide said, and his eyes met the Queen’s. *She cannot take the shock again. She is not as strong as Sheppard.* He saw him in his mind’s eye, Sheppard shriveled like this, lying helpless on the grass, borrowed life to heal. Borrowed, and then returned.
Steelflower recoiled in horror, and in that moment he showed her what he would do, let her feel as he felt, the draw, the intimacy of it. What it was to feed, what it was to feel life flowing into his hand. Slower. Her heartbeat slowing. And now the reverse. It was not pain to return life. It was ecstasy.
To feel it wash from him, pure and sweet and true, flowing into the Fair One like light… No, nothing so simple as light. Life was not so fragile. It was darker and messier, emerald and a thousand other shades, rich and complex, to take and to give, salt and dark. The knife in the back of his wrist was a spur, and he put his head back, feeling the Fair One’s body arch as she took a shuddering breath. Air rushed into her lungs, and her face flushed, wrinkles smoothing as Sheppard’s had, as though years erased themselves, as though time ran backwards.