Wicked (Eternal Guardians #9) - Elisabeth Naughton Page 0,60

on fire, which only confused her more.

Nysa went to work cleaning Talisa’s arm. Another nymph rushed in with a pan of steaming water and a stack of cloth. The scent of lavender filled the room. The two spoke quietly but Talisa barely noticed. She was too busy trying to slow her racing pulse. Too frantic to figure out what the hell was going on.

“There.” Something tightened around Talisa’s arm. “That should fix that one. I need you to stand so I can see where else you were injured.”

She pulled Talisa to her feet, helped her turn, and made quick work of the zipper at her spine. As the ruined gown fell to her feet, Talisa realized she was in some kind of giant bathroom.

Everything was marble. A massive sunken tub took up the center space. She spotted a large, walk-in shower with no door, a long vanity and tall mirror, a chandelier sparkling light over everything, but that was as much as she could take in.

She turned when Nysa tugged gently on her arm, then clutched the towel Nysa handed her to her chest. “I need you to stop what you’re doing and talk to me.”

Nysa lifted her gaze from checking Talisa’s body for more wounds. But one look at the nymph’s somber eyes was all Talisa needed to know it was bad.

“His wounds aren’t healing,” Nysa said softly. “They should be mostly closed by now, but they’re not.”

Talisa’s conversation with Rhen near the waterfall rushed through her mind. Slowly, she sank to the padded bench, still clutching the towel against her chest.

“He’s stable,” Nysa went on. “For now. The lavender isn’t helping to heal much, but it has a soothing property that should ease some of his pain, though at this point I don’t think he’s feeling much. The best we can do is make him comfortable.”

Oh gods…

“Wh-what about magick? The nymphs who helped me with the border could—”

“Magick isn’t going to help him.” When Talisa looked up, Nysa sighed. “He’s a god. If he wanted to heal himself, he could.”

Oh… gods… He really was dying.

“I-I don’t understand.” Talisa looked back down at the floor. It was some kind of swirled marble but the tiles all blurred in front of her. “Why now? If I’m”—she swallowed hard, still unable to say the words—“who he thinks I am, and he’s been looking for me as long as Rhen said, then why is he giving up now?”

“I don’t know.” Nysa crouched in front of her and laid a gentle hand on Talisa’s knee. One that was solid and warm. The only warmth Talisa could feel at the moment. “Maybe it was too long. Five hundred years is the longest you’ve ever been apart. Maybe the darkness is too strong in him now. Maybe he sensed you were too different. Or maybe, when you ran, he realized that this was his chance to break the cycle. To let you finally live and for him to be the one to die.”

Finally live…

She didn’t want him dying for her. She didn’t want anyone dying for her. She was a warrior, not a hapless victim. And they’d won that fight. They’d beaten those satyrs… together. There was no reason for him to give up and die now.

Her thoughts spun all over again—with things Nysa had told her, with things Rhen had mentioned. And mixed with all of it was Ana’s voice, announcing that Talisa had returned from the dead.

She looked through the open door toward the bed, where she could just see Zagreus lying still against the mattress.

Reincarnation was possible. Orpheus, one of the Argonauts, had been reincarnated. The Fates had given him a second chance at life because Zeus’s Sirens had interfered with his destiny. Talisa had always felt older than her age. Her parents and aunts and uncles had always teased her about being an “old soul.” She knew it was possible her soul had lived in the past. But… with Zagreus? That was the part she couldn’t comprehend.

He was the Prince of Darkness. Hades’s son. A monster in every sense of the word, one who enjoyed torture and pain as much as his father. Why would the Fates ever pair her with him? And why in the name of all the gods would they ever send her back to him?

But even as the thoughts rushed through her mind, she remembered he was also the god who’d freed Cynna so she could be with Nick, even knowing it would infuriate his father. He’d