Colin sighed.
He couldn’t stop the blade. He couldn’t move it, and there wasn’t enough room left for him to deflect it once he restored time. The blade would hit Aeren in less than a breath, less than a heartbeat.
But he could let the knife hit something else.
Straightening grimly, steadying himself, he slid between the blade and Aeren, felt the tip of the knife catch on his shirt, then dig into flesh. The height put it near the level of his heart and he grimaced, thinking back to the time he’d used this same knife in an attempt to kill himself.
It had hurt like all hells.
But it hadn’t killed him.
He drew in a deep breath, felt the tip dig a little deeper into his chest. He shifted slightly, so that the blade was centered over the right side, so that it wouldn’t hit his heart. For a moment, he considered letting it strike his arm, but he needed to make certain it stopped, that it didn’t simply tear through flesh and muscle and hit Aeren anyway.
“And I can’t die,” he whispered to himself. He looked toward the heavens, raised one hand to grip Karen’s pendant around his neck, felt the sharp edges of the vow that he’d never been able to fulfill digging into his hand. “I can’t die.”
And then he released time. No slight relaxation like before. He didn’t need to feel the knife sinking into his flesh inch by inch, didn’t need to feel it cutting through muscle, scraping across bone.
He just wanted it to be over. So he let time go.
The knife punched into his chest with enough force to throw him backward, directly into Aeren. He screamed, the sound filling the tent, blending with the cacophony of blades clashing, lost among the blur of shouts, of commands, of battle cries that had been bellowed only moments before. White-hot pain shattered through Colin’s chest, exploded outward, so intense it muffled the noise, dampened his own scream in his ears. He felt himself falling backward, felt tears streaming from the corners of his eyes, heard Aeren shout as hands scrambled at his body, caught him and lowered him to the ground. His scream died down into a low moan, punctuated by sharper cries as the hands holding him jostled the knife before he felt the prickling sensation of dead, dried grass pressing through his shirt as they lay him on the ground.
“Colin,” Aeren said, his voice calm, but urgent. “Colin, can you hear me?” Hands tugged at his shirt, jogged the knife, and Colin hissed. Blood began to bubble up into his throat, choking him, and he realized it had become difficult to breathe.
In a voice barely above a whisper, Aeren muttered, “Aielan’s Light, what happened?” Then, harshly, “Eraeth!”
Colin opened his eyes, the light in the tent, the sun that glared down on the canvas above, too bright. So bright he felt his eyes watering. A shadowy figure moved into view, and with effort he focused, recognized Aeren, the lord joined a moment later by Eraeth.
“What’s he saying?” Eraeth asked.
“It sounds like ‘I can’t die, I can’t die.’ He just keeps repeating it over and over.”
“What happened?”
“I don’t know. I told him to protect Thaedoren and he vanished, but before I could turn he fell into me, and-” Aeren broke off, then said, “Thaedoren!”
Aeren’s face slid out of view and he felt the lord moving away. The sounds of the fight intensified, the voices of everyone blurring into a senseless mess of Alvritshai, dwarren, and Andovan.
Colin swallowed the blood in his mouth, fresh pain tearing through his chest. He could feel the knife where it had lodged against his rib cage, could feel it scraping against one of his ribs. His entire right side throbbed, and he felt the blood soaking his shirt, felt it pooling beneath his back. His right side felt hollow, yet leaden with weight.
He swallowed again, his mouth strangely dry even though it continued to fill with blood, and he tried to speak.
Eraeth leaned forward, close enough Colin could feel his breath, could smell his sweat, dark and musky, like turned earth. “What, Colin? What are you trying to say?”
“Lift,” Colin gasped. He motioned feebly with one hand. “Lift.”
Eraeth’s lips pressed into a thin line, his expression one of doubt, as if he’d refuse But then he grunted, shifted to Colin’s shoulders, and with more gentleness than Colin would have expected, lifted his torso up so that Colin could see.
He sought out Thaedoren first. Walter had vanished, but he had no doubt that the Wraith would try to kill Thaedoren again if he could. But Thaedoren stood surrounded by Aeren and at least three of the Phalanx, the group already beginning to retreat from the table, one of the Phalanx members dragging the Tamaell’s body with him. Colin choked, tasted still more blood in the back of his throat, swallowed it down.
The look on the Tamaell Presumptive’s face was terrifying.
Colin waved his hand, and Eraeth set him back down on the ground. Waves of heat washed through his body, and darkness had begun to edge his vision, a darkness tinged with a deep yellow. He fought it, not wanting to pass out, knowing that it was inevitable. It was how he’d healed when he’d stabbed himself in the heart in the forest, knew that’s how he’d heal from this.
But then Aeren knelt down next to him, Thaedoren standing above, looking down, the rest of the Phalanx surrounding them on all sides.
“Colin,” Aeren said, “what happened to the Wraith?”
“Walter,” Colin breathed. The darkness had begun to converge, the heated ache in his chest throbbing outward.
Aeren frowned in confusion. “No, the Wraith, Colin. What happened to the Wraith?”
Thaedoren sank down beside Aeren in a crouch. “We don’t have time for this, Lord Aeren. The dwarren are retreating, and the Legion is pushing us hard. I don’t know how long we can hold them here. And once they reach the field…”
He trailed off, but neither Colin nor Aeren needed him to continue.
Once they reached the field, it wouldn’t be a conflict between a select group from each race. It would be an outright battle.
Just like before. Everything that Aeren had feared, everything that he’d attempted to forestall, would happen again.
“Colin,” Aeren began But a spasm rocked through Colin’s chest. He gagged on blood, his chest rising from the ground as he rolled and choked and spat the blood to the side. Hands held him in place, kept him from thrashing around as he coughed up the blood.
When he settled back, his tongue sliding over his teeth, slick and coppery tasting, he saw a flicker of shadow.
Ten steps distant, Walter blurred into view at Lord Khalaek’s back as the lord and his men pressed the Legion forces back. Walter looked as bad off as Colin felt, perhaps worse, his hand clutching at the wound in his side, beneath his armpit. But he didn’t notice Colin, didn’t even glance to the side. His face-eyes sheathed in darkness, mouth drawn down in rage-never wavered from Khalaek’s back.
With his free hand, his sword now sheathed at his waist, he reached out, grabbed Khalaek by the shoulders And then the two vanished.
Colin held his breath, eyes going wide…
Then he rolled onto his back, stared up into Aeren’s face, caught Thaedoren’s hard expression, and said, “Proof. Need proof.”
“What are you talking about?” Aeren said.
Colin’s hands reached out, caught hold of Aeren’s arm and Thaedoren’s hand in a death grip. He didn’t know if he could take them both, or how long he could hold them there, not after the great effort it had taken to save Moiran, not with the knife digging into his chest, but he had to try. “Proof,” he breathed, then squeezed his hands tight, made certain he had their attention. “Don’t move. Don’t speak.”
And then he pushed.
It felt as if someone had taken the knife in his chest and ripped it out by dragging it down and to the side, tearing through bone, through lungs and muscle and gut, opening him wide. He wanted to scream, to shriek until
