Amaranda licked her lips, retasting the Daimon's blood. "It's okay, baby." She laid her head down on his chest and held him while he played with her hair.
She fully expected to die like that. Closing her eyes, she waited for death to take her.
Or so she thought. But as the seconds ticked by and Cael's breathing grew more shallow, hers only grew stronger.
And stronger.
The pain of her body receded as something started to burn in the center of her chest. It wasn't overly painful, but it wasn't comfortable.
It was...
She felt her vision turning more sensitive, her hearing sharper. Gasping, she lifted herself up as she realized what was happening.
She was turning Daimon.
But how? She hadn't...
Her gaze went to the Daimon she'd killed. "Oh God," she breathed as full knowledge assailed her. She'd drunk the blood of a Daimon and in that blood was the human souls he'd taken. Now it was converting her body.
And it was saving her life...
She looked down at her chest to see the small black stain over her heart-the place where the human souls gathered so that they could nourish her Daimon's blood and keep her Apollite body from decaying. And as she watched, her body expelled the bullets out of her flesh and then healed itself.
Her heart raced. She looked to the Daimon whose blood was still pouring out of him. There were only three ways to kill a Daimon. Sunlight, piercing their Daimon mark over their heart, and tearing out their jugular.
The Daimon wasn't quite dead. Once his blood was completely expelled from his body, he would crumble into dust.
But she could save Cael...
He'll never forgive you.
Maybe, but if he died, he'd become a Shade and spend eternity suffering in perpetual hell. There would be no goddess to offer him clemency. No more bargains with Artemis to get his life back. His body would crumble to dust and he would be trapped without his soul. Forever. No way to rest. No way to regenerate or reincarnate.
Just an eternity of pain.
Most of all, he'd be alone.
"Forgive me, Cael," she whispered, laying her lips over his to kiss him gently.
Without another thought, she grabbed the Daimon's arm and pulled him to her. Grabbing a knife from the Daimon's belt, she sliced open his wrist. She hesitated. Dark-Hunter blood was poisonous to Daimons, was Daimon blood also poisonous to Dark-Hunters? By trying to save Cael would she destroy him? But what choice did she have? If she did nothing, he would certainly die. Deciding she would have to take the risk, she held the Daimon's wrist over Cael's lips.
Too weak to turn away, he had no choice but to let the blood flow into his body.
His eyes flew open as he cried out in pain. He writhed on the floor as if in utter agony.
Amaranda pulled back, dropping the Daimon's arm.
He rolled to his side, cursing and jerking as if something were trying to tear him to pieces.
"No, " she breathed, terrified that she'd only hurt him more. She pulled his head into her lap and held him close as he gripped her shirt so tightly that the bones of his knuckles protruded.
And then she saw it...
The knife was working its way out of his back. Slowly, painfully, inch by inch, it crept out until it landed on the floor with a sharp clatter.
Amaranda stared at it as she felt Cael's breathing steady itself. He loosened his grip on her.
She looked down and saw something that according to Dark-Hunter laws was not supposed to happen. Cael's eyes were now an unnatural shade of amber with black streaks running through them.