When the golden fire dissipates form my mouth and all the emotions I built up in my chest fade. I disconnect my lips from her as I stare into her face. Her skin that was once pale and cold now looks red and flushed. Where my skin touches her I can feel a light tingle. I have no idea if it is because of the amount of power I just expended or if it really is the bond. A huge part of me hopes it's the latter.
"Do you feel anything" I ask my dragon as he paces in my mind. My body sags so that I sit on the back of my calves as my energy wanes. Everything that just happened has left me more drained than I have ever felt.
No I don't understand. It should have worked. Why didn't it work?
He screams in my head as large tears roll down his face. As gently as I can I peck her lips once more and lay her on the rocks. The light of hope that lit in my chest has now faded to a cloud of despair. I rise to my feet shakily and I can feel as Derrick catches me to stop me from falling. I can't even meet his gaze or that of Maximus. There is nothing here for me anymore. I stare at her as I recall everything that got me to this moment.
I messed up from the beginning of it all. I tried to force her to rationalize what I was. I never once made her see how much she meant to me. I've never even truly held her. As the thoughts run through my head I can feel my feet moving back ward. I can't continue to see her like this. Maximus steps forward and grabs onto my arms. I shake him off as I look at her. There is nothing that he can say to change what just happened.
"Xander you cant. You can't leave us. You are our alpha." He pleads.
My gaze finally finds his. The tears in his eyes cause nothing to rise in me. I know that this will hurt them. It will hurt them now and later. However, I don't care. The fact that he thinks I can stay after this pisses me off. My dragon rushes forward and with our combined strength we punch him so hard that he has thrown away from us as we roar.
I pace in the place where I stand as our words leave my mouth. "And you believe that we should stay. I gave up everything for the vision of HER. My parents followed me here because I wanted HER. I loved HER before I even knew what she looked like. She is who brought me the strength to be your alpha!" I scream at him when he rises to stand.
In a flash he's right in my face and shoving me back with a punch to my chest. A growl leaves my chest as we laugh at the sorry attempt. His hit didn't even send us back five feet. "You need to pull it together. We can find a way Xander. There is always another way."
I close the distance between us in a blur. My hand wraps around his throat as I pick him up off his feet. "You think your bullshit speech will be enough to stop ME. You know what it's like to lose your mate but at least she still existed. Without her, I am NOTHING. There is no love in a world without MY mate. There is no room to be your alpha. There is no other way but death. Seeing as our doctors haven't figured that one out yet, I have no option but to leave."
He is nothing to us now. I can take it from here. All you have to do is let go..
He tries to unwrap my fingers from his throat as my dragon preens at his pain. After everything this is something that makes us feel better. Pain is what we know now. It's all that we would ever know. HE gets to go home to his mate. Soon HE will have a child. I will never have that chance. HE deserves to feel what I feel so that he can understand. But I can't take that away from him. My hand releases him in a flash and he falls to the ground. I turn away from him as I start to walk away.
They should all know our pain. What they felt through our link is nothing.
"Yeah. Some mighty Alpha you are. The only thing that I see is a coward. At least when my mate left I still lived for her. I didn't just decide to give up like a little bitch because I couldn't handle my feelings" he taunts as I clench my teeth and my feet stop. He's making the thought of killing him sound better and better.
"Uh, guys" Derrick says.
"Fuck off, fish boy. The grown men are talking" Maximus yells at him. I widen my stance as I hear his footsteps coming toward me. I roll my head on my shoulders at the act. If he wants a fight so bad, he can have one. "I'm not don't with you, you pompous asshole. You fought me for that title. So, if you want to give it up, I might as well give you a reason." I whirl around just as he finishes and catch his fist before it can make a connection to my face.
With a kick to his stomach I shove him and his stupid mouth away. "I LOVED HER!! She is everything I ever wanted. You don't even know the half of what I have been through! You don't even know what I put her though!" I scream at him as he lands a punch to my face when he comes back. I may not hurt easily but that kind of smarted.
More
Moving forward I toss a right hook and watch in pleasure as his face swings to the side. "She is gone. Everything I ever wanted is gone. The only thing that I have left is how it went between us Max" As the nickname slips from my lips, all the fight leaves my body. I know that I don't really want to hurt him. This is just the madness of my dragon pushing through.
Less talking and more fighting. The pain is what we need. His and ours.
"Hey" Derrick yells once more. As I step forward to look my brother in the eyes we ignore him. I know that he is by my mate and if I look at her again I will break.
"I didn't get to tell her how I felt brother. She left this world feeling more unloved than when she got to me. She ran because of me. She is dead because of me" I tell him as tears enter my eyes again. I could barely even breathe the words as I said him. Even though I didn't want to say them, I know that it's the truth. I look away as I answer him and my feet start to move again.
Those words that I just said would get through to him more than anything I do. He knows what it's like to leave because he made a mistake. I can feel the emotions of my dragon and they are no longer stable. I may not have been able to keep my mate from pain but she wouldn't want me to cause anymore. Pain would be going back to my home to a scent that will eventually evaporate. To seeing the few items she touched and know that she will never touch them again. I'm in for an existence of the worst kind of torture. Afterall I have done I deserve the break.
"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" A piercing scream fills the air that has the hair on my arms standing tall as my gaze swings left. What I see has me falling forward as my knees hit the ground beside her. Her entire back is arched into the air as she screams. The only things keeping her on the ground are her shoulders and the tips of her feet. Her eyes still remain closed as her fingers leave claw marks into the ground.
"What is this?" I scream at the others. I've never seen anything like this. When I touch her arm I have to quickly snatch away my hand at how cold it is. Her skin is like ice. Her scream is nonstop and a part of me wonders how she even has all the breath to release it.
"Oh, God baby. Hold on please. Just hold on to me" I plead with her as I try to push her body back to the ground. Tears fill my eyes when the tingles from our touch are no longer present. My voice seems to do something to her because her head flips in my direction. Her back slowly lowers to the ground and I lean forward as I wait for her eyes to open.
You must give me control when I ask. If you do not I will take it.
I lean closer to her as I wait for her eyes to open or for her to speak. When her eyes fly open I fall on my ass away from her. As I look at the eerie black orbs that have taken over her brown ones I can feel nothing but fear.
"What the fuck is wrong with her?" Maximus yells behind me. My head starts to shake as I get trapped in the black depths of her gaze. My stomach churns and I start to feel sick. I turn over ready to spill my guts when the first crack hits me. My back bows as my spine breaks. I have to grit my teeth against the pain because of how excruciating it is.
Control Xander. Let it go. NOW!
With his roar I quickly relinquish my body to him. I scream inside our head as he slows the transformation of us turning into a dragon. He makes it even slower than the first time we transformed.
"Stay away from her. If you touch her, you will ruin our bond!" My dragon yells as I watch Maximus and Derrick step closer to her. She must sense the danger of having them near too because her aura explodes. Where it was once bright and beautiful, it is now oily and tainted. "Come on my pretty. Come to Me" My dragon says to her. The evilest smile spreads across her lips as she starts to get up. The way that she moves it is almost like she is possessed. One could easily believe that she has no joints as she starts to make her way toward us. That evil little smile stays plastered to her face as she slowly makes her way to us. Her eyes have yet to change and they have a vacant look. When I see her now, I no longer see my mate. I want to trust in my dragon but I have no idea what this is.
"What is this Ceron. Why does she look like that?" I scream at him. The way that she is acting is doing nothing but freaking me out. It's like the Exorcism of Emily Rose all over again. The only thing that she hasn't done is vomit. However, Derrick covered that aspect for us. As soon as he stepped out of her aura he appeared to be fine.
This is not our mate but her shell. The body is just that a body. It doesn't make a person. The black you see in her eyes is her hatred. She died with it still inside of her because of her bond to us. You won't like what comes next Xander. I'm sorry.
Before I can ask him what comes next or try to stop him, he rushes the last of our transformation. Through his eyes she looks much smaller on the ground from this height. Her creepy eyes still hold our gaze as she falls back to the ground at our dragon feet. Ceron moves his left paw and picks her up gently in it. Once she is secure he starts to flap his wings immediately as he picks her up from the ground.
"We can't fly with her like that. It's too dangerous!" I yell at him as I step forward. He shoves my presence back and throws up a barrier between us. I beat against it angrily. How dare he break his promise to me. He hasn't put me behind a barrier since were children. This has gone too far. Using all my strength I beat against the barrier.
The height of this flight is getting higher and higher as I fight to take over. Even using all my strength the barrier doesn't even crack on the surface. I sag to the ground in my mind as I tire. My face is leaned against the glass like barrier in my mind as I watch him helplessly as he takes our mate into the cloud bank. He flaps his wings to keep us afloat.
Forgive me. It's the only way to get her back.
He uses our talons to turn her over in his hands. Her body splays over the palm of it like a starfish. The way that the bottom of her robe fits is nearly indecent. He brings over our other claw and uses one of his talons to pull open the front of her robe so that her breast are revealed.
Seeing what he is doing causes me to go ballistic as I start to hit the barrier all over again. He can't possibly think that he can mate with her in this form and force the bond. I won't let him do this. The barrier refuses to crack as I run myself into it over and over, trying to get to my mate. I would rather she died than to watch her be violated by my other half.
When the barrier cracks I roar at him in anger. His talon goes forth once more and he cuts into her chest. I hear her sternum crack beneath the weight of his talon and it makes me sick. "No, stop it. You're killing her" I scream at him as tears pour down my face. I ram into the barrier again as it cracks even more. I watch in despair as he removes her heart. The fucker tosses it into his mouth like it's an everyday action and I truly do get sick.
Vomit leaves my lips in my head as my vision doubles from the force of it. My gaze has to leave what he is doing as I fall to the ground with my back against the barrier. That makes three times that I couldn't save her. This world is hell bent on taking her from me. I have to close my eyes because I know that the pain is coming.
When the pain hits it steals my breath. I have to hold it as I grit my teeth and try to bear through it. It drags from my color bone all the way down the middle of my chest. I don't even hold in the scream as the pain hits me. My insides feel as if someone is twisting them with a firm grip. My dragon roars loudly as he feels it to. It feels like we are dying. My heart pounds in my chest as I feel something rip.
Tears run down my face at the pain. I turn my head to the side to see what's going on. My talons are covered in the mystical glow of our luminous blood. He holds a glowing gold orb in his palm as he roars once more. I watch as he pushes the golden orb into her chest. Her oily black eyes close as he does it and her body jerks in our talons. It jerks so hard that he nearly loses his grip on her.
Whatever pain we just went through has depleted the last of our energy and I can no longer move. I watch helplessly as a light flame is released from his snout and aimed at the center of her chest. He takes a deep breath once the flames start and the sky ad clouds around us start to blur. I can sense that we are falling but I have no power to stop it. As the ground comes closer and closer I close my eyes and pray. I pray for death to rid us of the pain. I pray for death because without her, there is no life.