There had to be a way. There had to be a means by which he could overcome the inadequacies of his magic, a means by which he could cure her.
He left his bedroom after he’d dried and dressed himself. He paused outside her door as he passed it, stilling to listen, letting even the sound of his own heartbeat fade from his perception.
Adalynn’s soft breathing was barely audible through the door, and hearing it only provided a sliver of the comfort he’d hoped to garner. Merrick continued down the hallway in quick strides. Her presence tingled at his back, growing fainter but more insistent with each step he took away from her. And that feeling in his chest, that anxiety, that dread, deepened.
Though he’d intended to enter his study, he found himself walking downstairs and along the southern hallway, not stopping until he was in the ballroom. The curtains were closed, allowing only hints of the diffused late evening light to flow in around the edges of the windows, but his eyes were little affected by the gloom. He couldn’t recall the last time he’d used this room—the last time he’d even entered it—before Adalynn had come. She’d breathed life into it.
She’d breathed life into him.
The weight and pressure in his chest intensified as he absently retraced the path of their much too brief dance, as he mounted the stage and ran his fingers along the graceful curve of the piano.
Though the music of magic had flowed through his blood for his entire life—even while he was too young to feel it—he’d never quite deemed his talents adequate when it came to mundane instruments. He was competent enough, knew the notes and the keys, could even play many complex songs, but there had always been something missing—the passion, the feeling. For whatever reason, he’d never been able to capture those emotional cores. Everything he played sounded flat. All his focus, all his passion, had gone into power.
But he knew, without having heard her play, that Adalynn could instill her music with any emotion she chose, with immense, overwhelming passion. He knew music was as effortless to her as magic was to him.
He wanted to hear her play. More than that, he wanted to hear her play for him. And that want filled him with…sorrow.
Why, after a thousand years, had he found the one woman he desired above all others, the one person he longed to be with, the one person whose soul seemed to speak to his, only for it to come with the knowledge that she would be gone soon? Why was the greatest beauty—both inside and out—always so terribly fleeting?
Merrick stepped to the piano’s front, lifted the fallboard, and settled his hand over the keys. He pressed one down gently. The soft note it played was jarringly out of tune. How had he kept the rest of his house in immaculate condition but neglected this? Had it been some subconscious reflection of the discordance within him?
Closing his eyes, he willed his power into the instrument slowly, feeling out the resonance of each individual string through its mana song. Even with magic, it was a delicate process, a time-consuming process, but it felt like the right thing to do. The piano deserved better than he’d given it.
And Adalynn deserved only the best.
Even when he was done tuning the piano, he didn’t step away from it. His mind wandered toward her, always her, forever her. He wasn’t sure how long he stood there, lost in thought, but the room was noticeably dimmer when the sound of a cabinet slamming in the kitchen caught his attention. He drew in a steadying breath, turned around, and walked toward the sound. The dread in him continued to build, making his throat and chest tight.
Something is wrong, but what? What am I feeling?
He entered the kitchen to find Danny standing at the sink, sipping from a glass of water. The anxiousness thrumming within Merrick, as powerful and consuming as his magic, only grew.
“Is your sister still resting?” Merrick asked.
She’s fine. She just needed some rest. She’s fine.
Danny jumped, nearly sloshing water over the rim of his glass. “Damn, man, do you always have to sneak up on people like that?”
Merrick narrowed his eyes and lowered his brows.
“I mean, darn, sir…you, uh…startled me?” Danny set his glass down on the counter and muttered, “I bet you cussed when you were a kid.”
Cussing had been markedly different in Merrick’s youth, but he had no intention of dating himself by bringing that up—especially because the English he’d grown up with was classified as a different language by modern speakers. “Your sister looked quite unwell. I know she’s suffered such spells before…was the way she looked and behaved earlier normal, in your experience?”
Danny frowned and looked down at his feet. “It’s different every time, but she has headaches most days. Seizures sometimes, too, like you already saw.” He raised a hand and ran it through his shaggy hair, pulling it back. “Sometimes she gets really tired, or her speech might slur like she’s drunk, but Addy doesn’t drink.” He looked back up at Merrick. “She said she worked too much today, but do you think it’s her cancer?”
Merrick couldn’t share his true fear with the boy—that yes, it was her cancer, and it was doing this now because of what Merrick had done to her. That it was potentially worse because of what he’d done. He told himself that he couldn’t know for certain, that this was all wild speculation based on the dread growing inside him, that this was merely the reality of Adalynn’s situation, but none of it eased him.
“I don’t know,” Merrick finally said. “I think—”
Something thumped heavily on the floor upstairs. Merrick snapped his mouth shut, and everything within him stilled. The sound had come from the direction of Adalynn’s bedroom.
“You think what?” Danny asked.
Had the boy not heard the thump? It had sounded too much like a body hitting the floor.
Merrick raced out of the kitchen and down the hallway, ignoring Danny’s confused calls. He was at the top of the spiral staircase within a few long strides and continued into the hallway without pause.
He burst into Adalynn’s room to find her on the floor beside the bed, in the throes of another seizure with a pool of vomit on the floor in front of her; there was blood mixed in with it. Her jerking movements were more violent than last time, more intense, and her bluish veins were more visible than ever.
The dread that had been gathering within Merrick mutated into a toothy, primal beast that ripped his insides to shreds. In a thousand years, he’d never been more frightened than he was in that moment. He’d never stood to lose more than he did here and now.
He thrust that fear aside and crossed the room, dropping to his knees beside her. His magic roared to life within him as he reached forward and placed his hands on either side of her head. He couldn’t dwell on speculation right now; she was in distress, she was in trouble, she was in danger, and he needed to help her, to save her.
Danny ran into the room and skidded to a stop at his sister’s side. “Addy! Oh, no, no, no. Please don’t die.”
“She will not die,” Merrick growled. He forced the connection between them open.
This time, he expected the darkness within her, the cancer; Merrick blasted into it with full force, roaring in his mind as his magic swelled to beat back the taint. Her illness would not take her. He would not allow it. Even if he didn’t understand his relationship with Adalynn, even if she had not yet truly reciprocated his feelings—feelings of which he wasn’t entirely certain—he knew without a doubt that she was his, and no one, nothing, would take her.