Alchemised

by SenLinYu

“Call me, and I will come.”

Kaine was like her. He obsessed over what he didn’t know more than anything else.

“You can tell me. I’ll help you carry it.”

Helena tested it, locking one around her own wrist,

you put a thin tube of it right through the wrist here”—she pressed her fingers against the space between the radius and ulna—“the cuff could slot around a suppression spike and alchemically lock in place. I bet there wouldn’t be any resonance then.”

On the long nights, Amaris would curl up behind Helena, nuzzling at Kaine’s limp hands. Helena would sit, tracing her fingers along Kaine’s face, following his every heartbeat and promising, “I’m going to take care of you. I promise, I’m always going to take care of you.”

It made her wonder. If Morrough could trap living souls inside bone, and the first Necromancer placed an entire town of living souls into a Stone, what would happen if someone captured the other form of energy? Had anyone ever done it?

“You’re a vivimancer,” Helena said.

wish I’d never become a healer.” She’d never admitted it to anyone before. That she hated it.

“What are you doing here? Get back to Headquarters before Ferron finds out about this.”

“Because I have warned you, if something happens to you, I will personally raze the entire Order of the Eternal Flame. That isn’t a threat, it’s a promise.

“What exactly is it that you think I do with all my time? I kill people. I order other people to kill people. I train people to kill people. I sabotage and undermine people so that they will be killed, and I do it all because of you. Every word. Every life. Because of you.”

“I think your scars are prettier than mine,” she finally said. “I have a better healer.”

Do you really think that if Morrough wanted him dead, he couldn’t have found a way to kill him by now?”

“Well.” He met her eyes. “I don’t see you that way, either. You’re mine.” He let go of her wrist and lifted his hand, the fingertips tracing the scarring until it was covered by his palm, warm against her bare skin, then sliding up to curve around her neck. “You are. It doesn’t matter what happens to you, you will still be mine.”

She told him in the way she let go of herself and held on to him instead. With every beat of her heart. I love you. I will always love you. I will always take care of you.

was covered in vining roses which crept all the way up the front, nearly covering it.

“Helena, please—” His voice broke, stopping her in her tracks. She turned back, and he gripped her shoulders. She knew what he wanted to ask her, could see it in his eyes. Run away and don’t come back. But he knew she wouldn’t. He swallowed, not meeting her eyes. “Don’t get hurt again,” he said instead. “Don’t—” She rose up on her toes and cut him off with a kiss. “Be careful,” she whispered. “Don’t die.”

“You’re overestimating your value, Marino.” Helena’s mouth twisted in a bitter smile. “I’m not, though, am I? You said it yourself: I am an exceptional asset. Why else would you and Ilva spend so much time manipulating me? Always been so quick to take advantage of what I can do while treating it like it’s of no use to anyone. By all means, replace me if you can.”

“Seems you’ve found a weapon to kill us,” he finally said.

Every line she’d once believed herself incapable of crossing, she passed over without hesitation now.

The space between them was ice-cold, as though all their ghosts surrounded them. They were both drenched in the dead.

“You’re always in danger, and I can never ask you to stop.” He ran his thumb across her knuckles. “You know I would if I could. I’d run with you and never look back.” “I know—” Her voice broke. “Don’t die, Kaine. You can’t leave me behind.”

“Mine. You’re mine,” he said as he kissed her. “Always.”

Someday, she promised herself, someday I am going to love him in a moment that isn’t stolen.

“You’re mine,” he said almost against her lips. “Mine. You swore it. Your Resistance sold you to me. I’m not going anywhere without you. And if anyone touches you, immortal or not, I will kill them.” He didn’t wait for a reply; he kissed her as though his lips were a brand on hers.

“I am Morrough.”

“You’ve always done the worst things because of me.”

Everyone was dead because the High Reeve had killed them. He was the High Reeve.

It couldn’t be him. Ferron had hurt her. He’d raped her. And he killed everyone. Kaine wouldn’t. He’d promised he’d always—

“I don’t believe you.” Her jaw trembled uncontrollably. “I know.”

His throat dipped. “What—do you remember of me?”

“You looked for me?” Her voice cracked. A look of anguish flashed across his eyes. “Of course I looked for you. I looked everywhere for you. Did you think I left you there?”

She wanted to sleep, to sink back into the abyss, but she was afraid that her memories might slip away again. That Kaine would vanish, and when she woke it would be Ferron again, ice-cold and cruel.

Kaine, she knew. But Ferron was a monster.

“Will you—will you go back to being the way you were, if I forget?”

She tried to stop thinking about it. To remember herself from before, to reconcile who she was with the person she’d forgotten. In the process of forgetting, she’d flattened herself, forgotten all her anger. Her capacity to be monstrous. That was the person Kaine wanted. Who he’d done all this for. But that Helena didn’t exist anymore. All that was left now was a shadow.

“When you were asleep, I used to promise I’d take care of you,” she said. “No.” He said it harshly. “That was me. I was the one who used to say that.” She opened her eyes. “I used to say it back. I guess you didn’t know.”

It was the array, she realised with slow horror. He was more than distilled. It had transmuted him until there was nothing left but the qualities it permitted. In his search for her, he’d let it consume him.

What must it be like to be stuck with this version of her when she used to be so much more? She couldn’t even fully remember and still found it intolerable.

She forced a tight smile. “Be careful. Don’t die.” He stood unmoving for a moment, staring at her, and then turned away. “Right.”

“Do you have a better solution for us this time, too?” he asked quietly. “After all, not every single horror that I’ve ever imagined has happened to you yet. Losing you and spending fourteen months trying and failing to find you. Finally getting you back, tortured and broken. Keeping you prisoner—the transference—raping you—” His voice was growing raw with grief and rage. He had gone white, that scalding gleaming white. “Is this not enough? There are, undoubtedly, still unexplored depths to the potential misery between us. Shall we endeavour to achieve all of it?”

He looked up at her, his face hardening. “You always said you wouldn’t choose me over everyone else. I am chained to a sinking ship. I will not take you with me.” “I was lying!” The words came out a scream. “I didn’t—I couldn’t—I wasn’t g-g—”

“You shouldn’t have assumed I’d be willing to lose you,” she said. “Did you think I cared less because I had other obligations? That I don’t feel things as much as you? I did everything I could to keep you safe. You don’t know all the things I did.” “I just meant—” “Every time you asked, I promised I was yours. Always. There aren’t any exemptions or expiration dates on always.”

He’d had to choose, and he’d set her free. She didn’t want him to regret that.

“Be careful,” she said. “Don’t—” The word caught in her throat. She squeezed his hand. “Come back to me, all right?” “I will.”

This was his attempt at giving her what she wanted. For him, acknowledging that he would have a child, a daughter, meant acknowledging that he wouldn’t live to meet her. He was telling the stories so Helena could tell their daughter about him, about what he’d been like, before the Institute and the war.

“Tell me to stop,” he said, his mouth over her throat. “Tell me to stop.” She pulled him closer. “Don’t stop. I don’t want you to stop.”

She brought his face back to hers. “I love you,” she said, kissing him. “I wish I’d told you a thousand times.”

“Tell me to stop, and I’ll stop,” he said, his voice ragged. “Don’t stop,” she said,