“Rayne? Rayne?”
It took him a couple of seconds to hear Eno calling for him. His strong voice had become reed thin and shaky. He didn’t know how long he’d been working on Eno. Could have been minutes or hours. He blinked his eyes open to see Eno’s face was now white and covered in sweat, his lips nearly blue.
“Baby, it’s okay,” Eno whispered. He raised a shaking hand and wiped a tear from Rayne’s cheek. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay. It will never be okay. I’m not letting you die. I will follow if I must, but you are not leaving me.” Rayne’s voice cracked. He was not giving up, but he also wasn’t a fool. He was losing this fight against the poison. “Cael! Please, Cael! I’m losing him!”
There was a vicious, ugly sound of a crash and what was likely breaking bones. Rayne didn’t dare look up, but a second later there was a blur of white past the corner of his eye. Caelan was there. Caelan was a god now. He could do something that could save him.
“What’s wrong?” his king demanded in a low, even voice.
“I can’t—I can’t fix him. The poison is moving too fast through his body. Everything is starting to fail.” Rayne tried to remain detached and logical, but it was impossible. Every word past his lips was broken into jagged shards. Eno was his world. He couldn’t lose him. Not yet. “Please, Cael. Please, save him.”
“It’s okay, Rayne. You can do this.”
“I can’t,” he sobbed. He couldn’t do this. He was just a man, not a god. He’d been given a sliver of godly power and asked to fight in a war between immortals. And now he was supposed to watch his heart die in front of him.
“Yes, you can, Rayne. I believe in you.”
As he spoke, Caelan placed one hand on the top of Rayne’s head. It was like a bolt of energy entered straight through his brain and sent a jolt through every nerve ending in his body. The fatigue, panic, and fear that had created a thick black mass in his chest instantly dissolved, and the waning power within him was rejuvenated.
Closing his eyes, Rayne focused on his work again. The poison seemed to retreat easier and faster this time. His concentration never wavered as he worked on Eno’s organs, getting his heart rate steady and his breathing even.
At the very end, he turned to Eno’s damaged sword arm, but it was clear within minutes that it was too late. Some things could not be reversed.
“Baby?”
Rayne opened his eyes to find Eno was still pale, but the blue tint to his lips was gone and his gaze was sharply focused.
“You saved my life,” Eno murmured, flashing a slightly crooked smile.
“If I can’t save you, I’ll happily die with you.”
“Can’t have that.” Eno sighed. His eyes fell shut and Rayne relaxed a little as his lover rested at last.
“Cael?” Drayce called out.
“Eno will be fine,” Caelan replied from behind him. The hand on Rayne’s head gently smoothed back his hair in a loving caress. “Rayne saved him.”
“Awesome! But what do you want to do with her?”
Caelan dropped his hand from Rayne’s head and stepped past him and Eno to walk to the other side of the square. Reluctantly, Rayne released his iron grip on Eno’s arm and pushed to his feet. His knees protested the movement and his muscles ached. Damn. Everything hurt. He was practically hobbling, but the pain was forgotten when he caught sight of Drayce standing over Safa with the tip of Eno’s sword pressed to her throat.
The woman was lying on the ground, all of her arms and legs snapped. She was pale and trembling, but a wide, insane smile slashed across her face. She had to be in incredible pain, but Rayne saw only madness in her eyes.
“Zyros sent her here,” Rayne stated as he came to stand beside Caelan with Drayce on the other side of the god. “Zyros studied my protective barrier as Gilea, and the goddess told Safa how to get through it. She intended to slaughter the entire village. She poisoned Eno.”
A wild, high-pitched laugh erupted from Safa. “With just a little more time, I would have killed you both and left your mangled corpses for your wanna-be god to cry over.”
There was no sword in Caelan’s hand this time, but he didn’t need it. A crackle of energy rose from Caelan along with sparks of white light as if he were causing the molecules around him to explode when they drew too close to him.
“You slaughtered countless innocent people without reason,” Caelan stated, his voice dipping low and dark.
He extended one open hand toward her and Safa started to lift from the ground as if she were being hoisted by an invisible force. She cried out as her broken limbs dragged and finally dangled free in the air.