Glass Pieces

Prologue

A shuddered breath rattled through failing lungs, blackness seeping from the young woman's pores in swirls of smokes. Her body was held upwards only by another's arms, strong and lean, yet trembling as they clutched the fading woman. Sweat clung as a sheen sheet to his skin, panting hot breaths, stormy eyes wide as they flickered from the woman's blue orbs, to the gaping hole in her chest, to the fog of darkness engulfing her figure.

"Van --" she murmured, hand struggling to rise towards his sharp jawbone, but fading before it could truly reach his skin; the darkness would burn his flesh should she meet her hand's intention. As it was, the hiss from the arms holding her frame could almost reach her ears over the sound of blood pounding in her ears.

"No," the man responded quickly, panic twisting handsome features, "Save your strength. Focus-- focus on healing yourself, don't you dare waste another moment. You can do this if you focus; you could always do this, you've always -- you've always pulled through." He tried to swallow the lump in his throat, refusing to believe otherwise even while death loomed over the young woman so plainly.

She tried to clear her throat to make way for words, but the attempt only made the blight inflaming her veins flare that much more. Her bottom lip trembled, tears filling blue hues as the slightest shake of her head silenced any thoughts of salvation. Evander choked as his chest rumbled, the smoldering pain of his arms nearly forgotten in comparison to the shattering of his composure. The woman's frame before him was encapsulated in the fight between the blackness trying to swallow her whole and the golden rays of the last of her powers, dimming slowly but surely as they waged a lost war. He had always claimed her magic was as warm and comforting as the sun itself, but now as it lost its strength, it was as cold as the stars themselves dying out, leaving only the endless darkness of night.

The soldier was at a loss for words, hot tears silently streaking down his dirtied face. He held a dying girl in his arms and there was nothing to do. She was his salvation, a beacon of hope through the fog and gray. Teeth bit down on Van's bottom lip to keep it from trembling, the attempt to harsh as the copper acid of his blood filled his mouth. "I love you," he pleaded desperately, gripping the woman's frame tighter as if it could pin her to this world a little longer, "Anemone, I love you."

To his declaration there was silence. Her chest struggled to rise at all, the last shadow of her magic lingering by her heart as if it fought just to make her heart beat one last time.

The fall of Van's tears against the woman's skin fizzled, her body nearly overcome entirely by the dark entity encroaching on the once source of light. Vision blurred by his emotions, smokey orbs nearly missed the glimmer of a reflection, the last gleam of Anemone's strength catching the edge of the hand mirror resting on her vanity. There was no time for contemplation, it was impulse that pushed the man to lay the woman down to grab the mirror's handle, the same impulse that had kept him alive all these years: the instinct to survive. His arms were marred with burned flesh, the imprints of the young healer's frame embedded into his very frame, but there was no amount of pain that could distract him from making this last act to save a piece of Anemone in the ticking seconds he had to react.

He held the mirror above the young woman, her dying features reflected in the glass before her; copper hair splayed beneath her, soft features paled and grayed, sapphire eyes long closed. Her lungs struggled, her heart clenched, and the young woman Anemone did not live to see another breath.

Evander's heart stopped as his quivering hand held the mirror, forcing himself to concentrate and hold her reflection in its depths. A moment passed-- perhaps he had been wrong and spent the last few seconds with his beloved on a fruitless endeavor than holding her to him?

His teeth dug deeper into his injured bottom lip, praying to the Gods he had long scorned to give him this, just the smallest bit of deliverance.

The hum of energy filled Evander's ears, his eyes widening at the sight of a fleck of golden light seeping from the young woman's still chest. The light flickered as it rose, a single candle in a hurricane as the remaining fog of darkness reached for the shimmer, trying to silence it once and for all. The soldier could only fight to hold his hand motionless, watching the gleam rise towards the mirror, chased by the swell of blackness. With bated breath he watched, the dark haze nearly swallowing the light -- but the shimmer managed to touch the mirror's surface just in time, the darkness curling away from the mirror's surface.

Evander immediately pulled the hand mirror to his chest, heaving needed breaths in his lungs as beads of sweat caught in his brow. Grey eyes lingered on the lifeless frame before him, the young healer's earthly form encased in darkness that he could no longer touch with the last bit of light having escaped into the mirror.

Falling forward onto his knees, the soldier shakily revealed the mirror to his own gaze, to reveal the truth of his actions.

Reflecting back to silver orbs was not his own image, but of the faintest outline of woman who lay dead on the ground. A ghostly imprint, barely beginning to take a shape in the glass.

Tucking the mirror securely into satchel strung across his broad chest, Evander took a last look at the body of the woman splayed at his feet. Swallowing roughly, he placed his hand over the bag to feel the mirror safely in his possession, before turning and disappearing into the night.