Alchemised

by SenLinYu

“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. Consider your survival as much a necessity to the Resistance as Holdfast’s. If you die, I will kill every single one of them. Given that the risk to their lives is the only way to make you value your own.” Helena stared at him, dumb with shock that slowly twisted into rage.

“Just live, Helena.” His voice was shaking. “That’s all I’m asking you to do for me.”

“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.”

“If you die, Helena, I’m done. I won’t continue this. I’m tired.”

mean it. I won’t kill them—but I will be done. You are my terms of service. The contract is void if you die.” She managed to turn her head a little. “There is a life for you on the other side of this war. You have the Stone. If Morrough dies, you might be fine, and you’d be free. You could do—all sorts of things. Don’t reduce your world to me.”

“You could—become a healer,” she finally said, straining to feel the sensation of his hand against hers. A smile ghosted at the corner of his mouth. “I hadn’t considered that.” “You should. You have a talent for it—although your bedside manner is terrible.”

“You are so much more than what the war has done to you.”

There’s more to both of us—it’s just waiting to get out. Someday, we’ll leave all this behind. Go far away, and you’ll see. The two of us—I think we could.”

“Do I get any say about this future life of ours, or are you making all the decisions?” “Do you have ideas?” There was a pause. “Can’t say I do.”

“I don’t think he wants him dead. The orders have always been to take him alive. I used to think it was because Morrough feared usurpation from whoever made the killing blow, but now, after that capture, I think it’s something else. Holdfast has been at the front lines for six years. Do you really think that if Morrough wanted him dead, he couldn’t have found a way to kill him by now?”

“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.”

“It’ll be fine if we’re careful,” she said, not letting go. “Please. I want you before I go.”

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.

“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.”

The obsidian was effective not only on necrothralls but liches as well. When one soldier managed a blow through the chest, the lich died, all his necrothralls collapsing with him.

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

“If the obsidian does what we think, the Eternal Flame will be a real threat to Morrough now. He’s sure to respond accordingly,” he finally said. “You should prepare for that.”

“Don’t die.”

“I do something like that to myself sometimes. Use my resonance to alter how I think, where my mind goes.”

Is protection exclusively your right? Am I supposed to sit around while you win the war for me? Is that how you see this?” She gestured furiously between them.

“All I do is worry about what will happen to you if I fail to meet all requirements. If you get captured, you have no idea what they’ll—”

“I was afraid you’d die. You said you couldn’t leave without special arrangements, and you were gone so suddenly, I thought—you might not come back.” Her voice was thick. “You’re always in danger, and I can never ask you to stop.”

“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...

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

“I found you after a bombing. I had to watch them cut you open, trying to get the shrapnel out. You nearly died so many times on the operating table, I lost count. If you’d been an inch closer to the blast, that shrapnel would have gone through your heart. You want me to set a bomb, I will do it, but you will not touch it. Do you understand?”

They were always running out of time. Someday, she promised herself, someday I am going to love him in a moment that isn’t stolen.

For now. For this moment. But not really. Not ever.

Don’t let this be the last time.

“Go south, towards the sea. When I can, I’ll come, I’ll look for you, and it’ll be just like we said—we’ll disappear.”

“Once, long ago, my brother called me Cetus.”

“You were the Necromancer,” Helena said, realising. “The one who built the cult in Rivertide. After you made that Stone, you called Orion here, but when he saw what you’d done, he tried to kill you.”

“I am Morrough.”

“You’re dying,” she said. “Your original body, wherever it is. You came to Paladia because all the power in the world isn’t enough to keep regenerating forever. There’s a limit and you’ve reached it and you can’t push beyond that no matter how much vitality and how many souls you harvest. When you had Apollo killed, you took his heart, and when you had Luc, we couldn’t heal his organ damage because those organs were yours. You’re harvesting Orion’s descendants for parts. And—” It dawned on her slowly. “—that’s—that’s why Lila’s pregnant. You’re making yourself another descendant. That’s why you wouldn’t let her go to Novis: because you’ll need that baby next.”

“The Holdfasts had no idea what they’d found when they imported you. An indentured animancer. Perhaps Apollo was more cunning than I realised. I knew what you were the moment you reached in with your resonance—if I hadn’t thrown you across the room, you would have found me. Pity really.

“You’re talented. If you joined me, your abilities would be valued.”

“The war is over,” he said. “The Undying have taken the city, including your Headquarters. The remaining Resistance factions are cornered; if they don’t surrender, they’ll be buried in rubble by the day’s end.”

“Because if you do, I’ll stop—everything,” she said. “I’ll leave, and I won’t come back. Just like you want, if you’ll help me get Lila Bayard. Whatever you want. Anything you ask. I’ll do it, I swear.”

You can’t save everyone. You never could.

“I blew my cover getting the Bayard girl for you.”

He would have hurt her less if he’d reached in and ripped her heart out.

“We had a good run, but we were never going to last.” His fingers slipped a loose curl behind her ear before his hand drifted down to rest briefly at the base of her throat. “You knew that.”

“I’m never going to forgive you for this,”

Kaine’s lips tightened into a flat line, but then he nodded. “I know you won’t, but you’ll be alive and away from the war. Those were always my terms.”

“If you force me to leave without speaking to Shiseo, the last thing you will ever do is betray me and everyone I love. A traitor is all you’ll be to me, but if you let me do this, maybe—someday I’ll be able to forgive you.”

“Your brother is the Emperor?” Shiseo waved the question off and seemed very focused

“Never mind. I imagine he knows.”

The smile on Ivy’s face vanished. “The Necromancer has Sofia. He said he’d give her back to me if I gave him the Headquarters and Crowther. They wanted him alive, but they said it was all right if I had to kill him. So I did.”

She could feel her mind scrabbling to break free from the agony. Just break. Just break. “I’m not fragile. I am not going to break. Please believe that about me.” She’d promised.

Mandl combed her fingers through Helena’s hair. “While you’re waiting, I want you to think about all the things I’m going to do to you when I come back.” Mandl turned away. “All done here. Put her under with the rest.”