Shattered Souls (Guardians of the Maiden Book 3)

Cassiel landed on Dyna’s balcony in the late evening, once again, to plead with her to forgive him. After days of silent treatment, he was going mad. He knocked on the door before striding in. His mate laid in her bed, her back to him.

Dyna was awake. He could sense her awareness in the bond, as well as her shield in place. Sighing, Cassiel came to sit beside her. On her nightstand was the crumpled up piece of paper with Zev’s note.

I cannot ask you not to worry. All I can ask for is time.I need this. But whenever you need me, I will be there.

Her sadness swarmed the bond and all Cassiel wanted to do was hold her, but he felt a new wall between them right now. One that didn’t permit to come near her yet. And he hated it.

It didn’t mean he stopped trying.

“Dyna?” He called softly. She pulled the blanket over her head. He brushed against her in the bond, tugging at the door she kept closed on him. “Please speak to me. You have punished me long enough.”

Why did you let him go? Her muffled reply came through the bond, as though she spoke merely through the crack.

That little split of an opening was enough for him to latch on to. He pushed his way in because as much as she was upset, he knew she needed him, too. He heard the soft sounds of Dyna trying to hide her crying. He pulled back the blanket to see her tears.

Sighing her name, Cassiel laid down next to her over the blanket and wrapped his arms around her, holding her back to his chest. “Zev will be alright.”

“What if he does it?” came her faint response, her voice breaking. “I already mourned his death once. I cannot do it again.”

“You won’t lose him.”

“Why did you let him go?”

“Zev needs some time to figure out himself right now. We need to give him that. He took his pack with his chains. He would not have bothered if he was going to give up.” There was a pause, then Dyna rolled over. He lifted her face up to him and wiped her tears. “Zev is strong—like you. It tends to run in the Astron family, I hear. He will find his way.”

That brought a faint smile to her lips. Thank the gods. Cassiel inwardly celebrated.

Am I forgiven?

Dyna huffed and turned up her nose. Do you think I will forgive you that easily?

He smiled at her clear voice in his mind and kissed her nose. She squealed at that, trying to push him away but he clamped his arms around her.

“If you need me to beg, I will. If only to be spared the torture of your indifference.”

Dyna stilled and looked up at him with a sudden mix of shock and remorse, it took him a moment to understand what happened. Then he felt it, her sorrow at what he had gone through, ignored by his family, and that she had done the same to him.NôvelDrama.Org owns © this.

He shook his head. “It’s not the same. You were cross with me for a choice I made, and you needed space.”

She gasped and covered her mouth. “Oh gods, with everything that happened, I also forgot to celebrate your birth-date.” Her eyes welled again. “I’m sorry.”

Cassiel chuckled airily, ignoring the faint tightness building in his chest. “I am the one who is to seek pardon here. And I told you, I don’t care about celebrating that day. It’s not important to me.”

It’s important to me. She hugged him again, laying her head over his heart. If you don’t like that day, then we can pick a different date that is yours. And every year from now on, that day will be celebrated because I will be grateful that you exist. I will be grateful for this heart that beats and these lungs that breathe. For these arms that hold me.

How did she have the power to dismantle him with only a few words? To make everything in him collapse and come back together? She had no idea the power those words had for a ruined person like him. He came to comfort her, yet she was the one who continued to fill the little fissures hidden within the rotten core of his being. Like mending broken pottery with gold, and bringing light to those imperfections.

She was a wonder.

His beautiful bliss.

He would forever be grateful and amazed she existed here in this instance of a universe. Where somehow he had been given something priceless.

Cassiel held Dyna in his arms, content to simply be here with her for however long she would allow it. He didn’t need anything else. She eventually fell asleep in the blue hour of twilight. He admired her by the light of her glowing crystal necklace, creating little rainbow refractions on her face. He would stay here all night if he could, but Lucenna would return soon to toss him out.

Rising, Cassiel brushed the corner of Dyna’s mouth with his, and quietly slipped out into the hall. He made his way down the stairs to the kitchen in search of dinner. After serving himself some cold stew, he took a seat at the dining table with the others. Rawn was reading while Lucenna quietly spoke to Lucien.

Cassiel absentmindedly heated his food with a petal of flame. If Dyna wanted to celebrate, he would let her, but really, the date didn’t matter. It was the reminder of what happened after his birth-date that soured ever having one.

He looked to the head of the table where I saw the wispy image of a boy with black wings sitting in a chair. Simply waiting for something that never came.

Cassiel was jolted back to awareness when Rawn jumped up from his seat and ran out of the dining hall. He and Lucenna frowned at each other. Then they heard it. A hear the faint cry in the distance. Then it got clearer.

“Dyna!” A screamed desperately outside the manor. “Dyna!”

They jumped up and ran out into the hall.

“HELP ME!” Klyde’s scream rang through the manor. “HELP ME PLEASE!”

Cassiel ran down the hallway, Lucenna right behind him. The front door was already open. Rawn ran outside to keep Klyde running up the path, carrying his unconscious sister. Rawn helped him inside and he stumbled in through the doorway. His face was distraught with panic.

Gale’s gray dress—it was soaked in blood.

A chill sank in Cassiel’s chest.

“God of Urn!” Lucenna rushed to him.

Edith ran out of the trees carrying Evin. The little boy didn’t know what was happening but he was scared and wailing loudly.

“What happened?” Rawn exclaimed.

Gale wasn’t visibly injured. The blood was coming from beneath her dress. Her face was as white as the snow, and she was hardly breathing.

“She was in the kitchen,” Edith wept. “Standing on a stool to reach something. I told her to get down, but then she fell.”

“We need to get her inside to Dyna,” Lucenna said. “Let me take her!” She casted her Essence to take a hold of Gale.

Blood was dripping everywhere. Cassiel had seen it before, but this…this left him standing there because he registered danger—but for his mate.

“Please alert Lady Dyna!” Rawn told him.

Cassiel backed up and flew up the stairs to Dyna’s bedroom. It was the last thing he wanted, his every instinct as a mate telling him this was very bad. She was already awake, sitting up groggily, probably startled by all the shouting.

“What’s wrong?” Dyna asked him, her eyes widening.

“It’s happening,” Cassiel said grimly. “Gale is losing the baby.”

It was all that was needed to fully wake her. Dyna got off the bed so fast she stumbled to her feet and ran out into the hall. She gasped sharply as Lucenna levitated Gale into the hall with everyone else running up the steps behind her.

“Bring her now!” Dyna ran across the hall to Gale and Eagon’s room.

Lucenna quickly followed her inside and released Essence once she had Gale in the bed. Klyde ran in after them.

“Please take him. He shouldn’t see this.” Edith handed a screaming Evin to Rawn before going in, too. He quickly hurried the boy out into the hall and in his room out of sight to distract him.

“Lucenna, bring my bag. Edith, boil some water,” Dyna commanded. They ran out of the room to complete their tasks. “I need privacy!” she snapped to Klyde as she began to undress Gale.

Klyde didn’t budge. He stared at his sister’s ashen face with terror.

“Captain.” Cassiel took his arm. “You shouldn’t be present for this. Allow her some modesty.”

He turned sharply out of the room and Cassiel shut the door behind them.

Klyde sunk to the floor by the door, with his knees up, head hanging low. Cassiel shifted on his feet. It would be fine. It had to be. But he kept thinking about what Dyna had said to him about Essence Healing.

“Prince Cassiel,” Rawn called to him from his bedroom door. “Someone will need to report this to Lieutenant Eagon. He is training the recruits on the west end of town.”

Cassiel shook his head. “Please do so, Lord Norrlen. I cannot leave Dyna.”

Rawn nodded and brought Evin to Klyde, then he ran down the stairs, nearly slipping on the bloody steps. He made it down and out of the house before Cassiel heard him galloping away.

Lucenna ran past them with Dyna’s satchel. Soon after her followed Edith carrying a pot of steaming water.

“Pray for her, Klyde,” she told the captain as she passed. “All we can do is pray.”

Cassiel held the door open for her before closing it.

Klyde stared blankly at nothing, his body resting limply against the wall as he cradled Evin to his chest. “Pray?” he repeated scathingly. “It’s in moments like these where I have the least amount of faith in the God of Urn…”

Cassiel didn’t argue with him. He knew that feeling well. “Dyna is a skilled Herb Master. You may place your faith in that.”

“Is that why you haven’t stopped pacing?”

Cassiel halted mid-step, not realizing he had been doing it.

Klyde lifted his head, his blue eyes simmering. “How long has your lass known something was wrong with Gale?” he asked, his tone hard. “Don’t deny it.”

He hesitated to answer.

Eagon had asked them to keep her delicate pregnancy a secret so it wouldn’t distress him, but there was no hiding it now.

“Upon our arrival.”

He sat up slowly, his expression fuming. “Why has this been kept from me?”

Cassiel didn’t answer.

“Eagon,” Klyde concluded on his own and dropped his head. “I’m a bloody fool. I suspected her immunities were failing. I should have known this is why Eagon wanted Dyna here.”

They fell quiet and waited.

Cassiel listened to Dyna’s faint voice giving Edith and Lucenna orders while she worked to save Gale. Then silence. Time seemed to drag on. After what seemed like hours, the door opened.

Edith stepped out, smiling tiredly with relief. “She did it. Dyna stopped the bleeding.”

Klyde quickly got to his feet and rushed inside. Cassiel remained in the hall. Gale was still unconscious. Dyna held her glowing green hands above her stomach as Edith gathered the pile of bloody sheets on the floor into a metal basin. Lucenna laid a fresh white sheet over Gale and handed the bloody torn dress to Edith.

Eagon came sprinting into the house, shouting for his wife. His heavy boots beating up the stairs. His was face flushed and shone with sweat from riding nonstop. He gaped at the red pool of blood in the hallway, his face creasing with anguish.

Eagon ran past Cassiel into the bedroom as Rawn came up the stairs to join them. His chest tightened at the soft sobs coming from the Lieutenant as he sank by the bed and took Gale’s hand.

“I managed to stop the bleeding, but she needs to give birth now,” Dyna told him gently. “Any longer and the pregnancy may take her life and that of your child’s.”

He nodded shakily, laying his forehead on Gale’s shoulder. “Do it.”

Edith and Klyde chose to stay. Lucenna left the room at Rawn’s nod to give them privacy and they headed for the stairs together.

Cassiel reluctantly followed.

He tugged on the bond as he went downstairs. How are you feeling?

I’m fine. But the exhaustion couldn’t be hidden from her voice.

You used a lot Essence Healing.

I won’t use it again unless absolutely necessary.

Then the bond fell silent.

Cassiel paced back and forth in the grand hall. The others sat in the wingback chairs by the crackling fireplace. Rawn absentmindedly bounced his knee, gently rocking Evin while he slept on his lap. Lucenna played with a current of purple electricity weaving through her fingers.

Cassiel muttered a curse and stopped in place. “How much longer is this going to take?”

“Labors are quite enduring,” Rawn informed him, “The day my wife gave birth to our son, it held for twelve hours.”

Cassiel groaned in exasperation.

Lucenna smirked. “Calm down. It’s not your baby being born.”

He scowled at her. “I’m worried about Dyna using Essence Healing again after saving Gale. You know it exerts her.”

“From what I can hear, the labor is going well,” Rawn said. “I do not believe she will have cause to. It won’t be too long now.”

Cassiel rubbed the stress from his forehead and dropped into a chaise. Time seemed to drag until they heard the sound of a newborn cry. Even from the main floor, Cassiel could hear their excitement even if he couldn’t make out the words. But then there was silence that sent a trepidation down his spine.

The smile faded from Rawn’s face.

“What is it?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”

Then came the muffled voices shouting in alarm upstairs.

“Gale is hemorrhaging,” Rawn said, his expression dismayed. “They can’t stop it.”

Cassiel sprinted for the stairs and bounded up the steps with the others following behind. The baby’s crying resonated loudly in the hallway. They all heard Eagon screaming Gale’s name. Klyde and Edith’s shouting overlapped with his in a rising panic.

“Take care of the baby!” Dyna snapped at someone. “Everyone, step back now!”

A powerful green light blazed from the door frame and the magical charge in the air pressed against Cassiel’s every nerve. It was hot and electric, almost pushing them back.

He cried out and fell to his knees. His hands clutched his chest as he gasped for air. “Dyna!” He shouted anxiously. “Stop it!”

The light pulsed out of the room, a force passing over them as a sharp wave. It knocked them down against the walls of the hall. Then it faded.

He blinked repeatedly, trying to recuperate his vision. Spots of lights danced in his sight. Lucenna moaned where he had been thrown against the wall, briefly blinded.

Cassiel scrambled to his feet and stumbled in the room on feeble legs. Eagon and Klyde gawked at Dyna in shock. Edith too from where she was knelt on the floor with the crying baby in her arms. Dyna swayed where she stood by the bed. Gale laid there unconscious; the sheets soaked in blood around her legs. It pooled on the floor beneath it. Her blond hair stuck around her face and neck with sweat. She was pale but they watched the color slowly begin to return to her cheeks.

Klyde and Eagon hovered over Gale, checking her pulse. “She’s alive,” Klyde whispered.

Eagon buried his face in her neck and quiet weeping followed.

Dyna turned, smiling at Cassiel, “I did it…” she said.

Then her eyes rolled and she hit the floor.