Alchemised

by SenLinYu

She could feel him watching and wondered what he’d do if she swallowed it. “Don’t swallow it.”

“Why don’t you ever stop?” He let go of her, shoving her back. Her hand, numb with pain, lost its grip. “Why don’t you die?” There was no point in being coy. She wanted to kill him; they both knew it. Blood was still flowing down the hilt of the knife, dripping scarlet across the white marble floor, spattering across the ouroboros mosaic. His lips curved into an insincere smile. “Prior commitments, I’m afraid.”

“Oh, Marino.” His thumb trailed along her neck, following the scar below her jaw. “If I’d known what pain you’d cause me, I never would have taken you.” He sighed, and she could smell the liquor on his breath as his head dipped closer. She had no idea what he meant, if she was supposed to apologise. “But at this point I suppose I deserve to burn. I wonder if you’ll burn, too.” His face was so close the words brushed against her lips, and his mouth crashed against hers.

“Swear it, then. I want to hear you say it as a vow.” She didn’t let herself pause or think, just pressed a hand over her heart. “I swear it, on the spirits of the five gods and my own soul, Kaine Ferron, I’m yours as long as I live.”

His eyes were languid again, lashes low as he met her eyes. She wondered what he saw when he looked at her. Murderers are still men, she told herself. And he was merely a boy.

“Don’t die, Kaine,” she said. The line he walked frightened her. If the array was the punishment for a failure, what would the price of betrayal be? A smirk twisted his mouth as he looked at her. “There are far worse fates than dying, Marino.” She nodded. “I know. But that one you don’t come back from.” He gave a bitter laugh. “All right, then, but only because you asked.”

“I must say, Marino, you’ve ended up being quite expensive.”

Helena didn’t know what to do. She ran her fingers through his hair and just held him. “I can’t—I can’t do this again—” he finally gasped out. “I can’t care for someone again. I can’t take it.” She blindly found his face, pressing her hand against his cheek, felt tears slide along her palm and down her wrist. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Kaine.” She said it again and again. She was apologising for everything. For the first time, Kaine Ferron was fully human to her. She’d slipped through his walls and peeled away the defensive layers of malice and cruelty, and found that there he carried a broken heart. She could use that.

“You know, I used to think the circumstances of my servitude to the High Necromancer as cruel an enslavement as anyone could conceive, but I must admit, it pales beside you.” He tilted his head. “At least before, I could console myself that it wasn’t my fault; acceptance was the best I could do to keep my mother safe. It’s different when I have no one to blame but myself.” His hand came up, his gloved fingers wrapping around her throat, pulling her forward. “After all, I did choose you.”

He gave a low bitter laugh. “I’m sure there’s something poetic in it all, but right now all I feel is a new set of manacles.” He let go and stepped away from her, heading for the door. “So forgive me if I dislike looking at you. I’m still adjusting to the ways these new ones chafe.”

“You could be a healer,” she finally said as he removed the block on her nerves. She flexed her hand, opening and closing. It was still sore, and fragile as though hairline-fractured. “You have a natural talent for it.” “That’s one of the most ironic things anyone has ever said to me,” he said quietly.

“You are not replaceable,” he said, his hands trembling against her shoulders. “You are not required to make your death convenient. You are allowed to be important to people. The reason I’m here—the reason I’m doing any of this—is to keep you alive. To keep you safe. That was the deal.” He searched her face. “They didn’t tell you.” She shook her head, giving a broken sob and—before she let herself think—she kissed him.

Kaine cradled her face in his hands as he returned her kiss, pulling her closer, his arms wrapping around her. She was half crying as she kissed him, tracing her fingers along his face and under the curve of his jaw, trying to memorise every detail: his pulse under her fingertips, his lips pressed against hers. The taste of him.

don’t want to always be alone,” she said. It was easier to be honest in the dark. “I want to love someone without feeling like if they know, it’ll end up hurting them. People who love me always die. No matter what I do, it’s never enough to save them. I have to love everyone from a distance, and I’m so lonely.” Her eyes blurred, and then the darkness fell away, revealing a large room with a roaring fire. The place was lavish. The Holdfasts’ city residence had once been like this, filled with gilded furniture that glittered in the firelight. It was elegant but impersonal. There wasn’t anything to make the place feel lived-in. She looked back; Kaine was standing behind her. His black clothes were limned by the glowing firelight, adding a flush of gold and ember red to his almost monochrome appearance. He still had that otherworldly glow about him. “You don’t have to be alone,” he said.

She kissed him the way she’d wanted to. The way she’d secretly wished she could. She could have this. Once. She gave a low sob. He paused, but she held on, not letting him go. “This—is the way I wanted it to be,” she admitted. “With you. I wanted it to be like this with you.”

She stared up at him as her whole world shattered into shards of silver. “Oh gods—” She sobbed the words out. Her fingernails sank into his arms. “Oh—oh—oh…” She came apart under him, and he watched every moment of it. As she lay panting, trying to catch her breath, his speed increased. Gripping her closer, tighter, his expression going tense. When he came, his mask slipped. He met her eyes for a moment before he buried his face against her shoulder, and she saw all the heartbreak in him. Afterwards he held her close, not letting go.

the moment I looked into your eyes, I should have known I would never win against you.”

Before she could bolt, he pulled her back to him and his lips found hers, and all her fears and guilt and resolution became lost to her. All she could think of was how much she wanted to be there, being touched by him. He was fire, and she was already consumed. “You’re mine,” he said against her lips, his fingers sliding along her throat, tangling in her hair, holding her fast as he dragged her nearer. It was not like the previous night. It wasn’t comfort. It was claiming. His mouth was hot on her lips, his teeth nipping possessively along her jaw and her throat, over her shoulders. She tangled her fingers in his hair, arching into his touch. She tried not to cry from how desperately she wanted him, and how grateful she was that she didn’t have to ask. He pulled her closer, arms entwined around her as he aligned himself and sank into her with a sharp thrust, his breath burning along her neck. He was exacting. Determined to prove to her that this was where she belonged, to ensure that she could never deny what he made her feel.

He pulled her close, crushing her to his chest. “You’re mine. You swore yourself to me. Now and after the war. I’m going to take care of you. I’m not going to let anyone hurt you. You don’t have to be lonely. Because you’re mine.” Helena knew she should go, but she had lost herself there. She was locked in the dangerous embrace of Kaine Ferron, and it felt like home.

“Kaine.” She pulled his hands off. “You can’t keep me here. I have to go.” His expression flickered, just enough to reveal a shard of possessiveness, something ravenous and desperate. Then it vanished and he let her stand, resignation sweeping across his face. She reached out, her fingers brushing back his hair. “Don’t worry. I’m always going to come back to you.”

She missed Kaine. Whenever she thought of him, she felt as though a piece of her was missing. The war had drilled itself into her bones, carving away at her until there was hardly anything left except what made her useful, an ideal component in an elaborate machine, but Kaine had reminded her that she was human; that not every trait and ability and quality she possessed only mattered insomuch as it was useful to someone else. That she was allowed to breathe sometimes. Now, in his absence, she felt herself suffocating.

His hands found her hips, guiding her backwards. Then his lips were on her neck as she gasped, the dip of her throat, between her clothed breasts, and he was on his knees, pushing her back on the sofa, and she was under him and she had not even put down her satchel. His hands were sliding under her clothes, lips burning a trail of desire across every inch of skin his mouth could find. She had never felt so intoxicated. His resonance hummed beneath her skin, following the pathway of her nerves and veins, mapping her. Not erotically, but in the same panicked way her own resonance sometimes flared when she was afraid someone was hurt and wanted to find the injury. It reached all the way to her toes and then vanished, but she scarcely noticed as his tongue ran up on her inner thigh, and then a haze of hot pleasure consumed her. Her shirt was undone, skirts up around her waist, when he sank into her. She wrapped her arms tight around his neck, pulling him close, burying her face against his shoulder. The world had reduced itself to a single point, Kaine, his breath and body and touch.

“I—I liked foraging. I used to go with my father, during the summers.” There was a pause. “I didn’t realise it was important to you.” She was silent for a moment. Thinking of the wetlands stretched out around her, nothing but the wilds and the mountains and the brilliant blue sky above, the only place where she could breathe without smelling blood. “Sometimes it was the closest thing to freedom I still had.” She felt him freeze. “It’ll just be until the end of the war,” he said, the words half plea and half vow. A bitter laugh caught in her chest as she looked at him. “Just till then? When’ll that be? And what end do you think will somehow go well for either of us?”

“The offer stands. Say the word, and I’ll get you out.” She reached up, combing a strand of pale hair back from his eyes. “What about you?” she asked. He grimaced. “If I could run, I would have vanished while my mother was alive.” “Would you go now, if you could?” His eyes seemed to ripple with heat. “With you, I would.”

“I thought you said if I ever burned you—” He captured her hand and pulled her close. His other hand slid possessively up her throat, fingers

tilting her head back, and he kissed her, long and deep, before he drew away to meet her eyes. “Call me, and I will come.”

“You’re mine. You’re mine.” He’d repeat the words over and over. “Say it. Say you’re mine.” He’d entwine their fingers, press their foreheads together, and sometimes his whole body would tremble. She’d wrap her arms around him, trying to reassure him. “I promise, Kaine. I’m always going to be yours.”

“Be careful.” It was always the last thing she said to him before he left her on some rooftop. She would hold his face in her hands, staring into his eyes. “Don’t die.” He’d dip his head forward, kissing her inner wrist or the palm of her hand, his silver eyes locked on her face. “You’re mine. I’ll always come for you.” He always did.

Guilt caught in Helena’s throat like a stone. “I don’t want you to kill people because of me.” He gave a barking laugh. “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.”

“You are so much more than what the war has done to you.” Her voice shook with conviction, but he still wouldn’t look at her. “You are,” she said desperately. “Just—just like I am. 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.” He made no answer, but she dimly felt his fingers grip hers tighter.

“What are you doing?” she asked after watching for a little while. His eyes flicked up. “Studying human anatomy for my future career as a healer,” he said in a dry voice. She knew that the real answer was that he would have to be her healer once the nullium was cleared from her system, but she played along. “We can open a practice together, like my parents did. Up on a cliff. We’ll be able to look out the windows and see the tides.” He raised an eyebrow. “Do I get any say about this future life of ours, or are you making all the decisions?”

She could feel Kaine watching her and forced herself to speak. “I think your scars are prettier than mine,” she finally said. “I have a better healer.”

“Do you see my scars that way?” he finally said. “When you look at me, are they all you see?” She flinched. “No.” “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.”

I love you. It was right at the tip of her tongue, but she hesitated, biting the words back. There was a part of her that felt she might doom them if she said it. If there were important things left unspoken, tomorrow would come. She kissed him instead.

I love you. She told him in the way she held him close; in the way her mouth met his; in how her hands trailed across his skin, mapping him, memorising every detail of what it was to be with him, his scars under her fingers. I love you. I love you. 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.

“I do,” she said more firmly, her voice shaking with intensity. “I love you. And I always will. Always.” She rose up on her toes, pulling him closer, and kissed him.

He kissed her like he was starving. As though he were trying to pour himself into her or consume her. He’s mine. He is all mine, was all she could think. She wrapped her arms around his neck, meeting every caress of his lips on hers. He drew back just enough to speak, his palm curved around the nape of her neck, his forehead resting on hers. “I’m sorry—I’m sorry—I’m so sorry for everything I did to you,” he said, his voice hoarse and broken. “I love you. You left, and I’d never told you.”

There was a garbled wail as Lila lifted a wet, squirming bundle and thrust her into Helena’s arms. Helena gave a startled gasp as her daughter’s tiny, scrunched-up face nuzzled against her. The baby’s head was matted with dark wet curls. All her exhaustion was forgotten. Helena’s hands shook as she cradled the baby close. The tiny head lifted, looking towards Helena, and a little mouth opened to utter an angry, protesting cry. Lila was saying something, but Helena could only stare as the baby furrowed her featherlight eyebrows, eyes widening briefly. They were as bright silver as a lightning storm. Helena gave a sob and held her tighter. “Kaine—she has your eyes.”

Kaine was frozen as he stared at her. He’d stopped breathing, and his fingers spasmed, trembling as he finally reached out. He barely brushed the baby’s palm, as if he thought his touch might poison or break her. The tiny hand instantly closed around his finger, gripping it. Helena watched him and recognised the expression that slowly filled his eyes as he stared at the tiny person tenaciously clinging to him: possessive adoration.

“Love isn’t as pretty or pure as people like to think. There’s a darkness in it sometimes. Kaine and I go hand in hand. I made him who he is. I knew what that array meant when I saved him. If he’s a monster, then I’m his creator.”

When he looked down at her, the world around them faded away. Her stomach flipped. “So, what do we do now?” The corner of his mouth curved into a smile that had only ever been for her. “Anything. Whatever you want.”