The Faire (Harrow Faire #5) - Kathryn Ann Kingsley Page 0,27
upended. Gravity shifted.
The dream shattered.
He was hanging by his ankles once more.
He was alone. And he couldn’t even wipe his tears from his cheeks as they dripped into the darkness beneath him. He wondered if they might reach Cora.
He hoped they did.
Cora screamed.
The noise she made was quiet, drowning in liquid, burbling and weak, but it was a noise all the same.
She felt like knives were slicing through her body. Tearing at flesh, pulling at tendons, stretching things that should not be stretched. She felt veins and tendons pop. Felt them pull apart and rip.
Her vision went white, then black.
And for a long time, there was nothing.
Then, bit by bit, things started to come back to her. It was weird how things came back in strange ways. Not where she was, or what had happened. No. The first thing that she realized was that her fingers were woven through a metal grated floor beneath her. She felt the ridges of the cast iron, the pointed sections, and the slight grit beneath her fingers of the rusty sections. She was lying on her side again. But this time, it wasn’t in soft, cool grass. It wasn’t on a sunny day in a field in the lap of the man she loved.
It was at the bottom of a pit.
At the “top” of an Inverted tower that stretched deep into the ground.
But someone was still tenderly stroking her hair.
She tried to speak and coughed. She rolled farther onto her side and wheezed, trying to clear her throat. She spit up blood that was old and gooey. It was disgusting. Some of it dripped into the darkness beneath her through the floor. She groaned in pain but was happy to discover that she could breathe. She could make noise. She wheezed for a second, pulling in a shuddering breath.
Slowly, bit by bit, things began to clear. She pressed a hand to her neck and felt no giant wound there. There was blood, warm and thick, but no gash. No giant spear of metal sticking out of her.
It took until that moment to realize she was free.
A hand—a large hand—gently pressed to her back, stroking her. It was warm and soft, but the fingers felt too long to be human. She would be afraid if it didn’t seem so tender and careful in the way it helped her sit up. She turned and jolted in surprise.
She didn’t know what she was expecting.
But that wasn’t it.
It was Simon’s shadow. But not up against the wall. Not along the floor, or any nearby object. It was floating in space in front of her. That…wasn’t possible. Was it?
He was smiling at her with sadness in those swirly, jagged eyes of his. With one large, disembodied hand, it stroked her hair again. The other curled at her hip, and he scooted closer to her. He felt like warm velvet. Soft, and a little fuzzy, but not unpleasant. She wasn’t sure what to expect, but had never touched a shadow before, to be fair.
“How did you…” She coughed. “Did you free me?”
He nodded.
She threw her arms around his neck and hugged him. He felt squishy, a little bit like a water balloon. But real. “Thank you. Oh, god, thank you, Simon…” She almost cried in relief. “I don’t know how—I didn’t think you could touch the real world. Thank you—thank you—I love you.”
“I love you, Cora.” It was a whispering voice. Not the one she was used to hearing in her dreams. He sounded soft and faraway, but still loud enough to be heard. “I never thought I’d ever get to play the hero. Look at me. I get to do something right.”
“Thank you—thank you so much…” She kissed his shadowy cheek. His smile turned just a little brighter.
“I’m glad I got the chance to save you. Even if it was only the one time.”
“One chance…?” She pulled away from him just enough to look in those ghastly and swirled eyes. “What do you mean?”
“I love you, Cora. I would do anything to save you. I would pay any price…you know that.” A large, shadowy claw traced her cheek.
And then she realized what the sadness in his eyes was. That wasn’t just mourning over the pain she’d been dealt.
That was grief.
That was goodbye.
“N—no. Please.”
Simon’s shadow leaned in and rested his large head against hers. “It’s all right. I have meaning now. I have purpose. I get to die for the woman I love. That’s more than I’ve ever deserved.”