Silence answered.
She turned to the side and found the bed vacant. It was odd that he would abandon her on this morning of all mornings, but perhaps he had gone to fetch breakfast from the staff. He knew how she enjoyed her first meal in bed, and he was always eager to please her. Though, she supposed her meals might look different, especially in these early days.
She could still sense that innate spark deep within her core flickering in idle wait. Another oddity, given she had tendered her power to Malachi in exchange for this new, immortal form. She tried to call it forth now, but she was too weak, and the magic remained where it was, out of reach. Or perhaps it was now simply a phantom from her past life, a missing limb that tricked its owner by feeling whole.
The burn in her throat was unbearable. Elijah had said she would need to feed quickly to quell the discomfort and build her strength, and that he would be here to guide her through it. So where was he?
She heaved herself out of bed.
The sight of Elijah’s naked body in a heap on the rug stole her breath.
She dove for him to give his shoulder a waking shake. “Elijah!” she called out in vain, her dread rising. His skin was chilled beneath her fingertips. Something was not right. His kind did not collapse like this.
Using whatever strength she could muster, she rolled him over.
She gasped at what stared back. “No, no, no …” She cupped his cheeks within her shaky palms. Gone were the soulful brown eyes that reminded her of lush soil after a heavy rainfall. In their place was a vacuous gray haze. “Elijah!” She shook his limp body violently, even though she already suspected it was useless.
On instinct, she closed her eyes and called to her powers again. This time they rose to the surface, uninhibited. Malachi had not taken them after all. She couldn’t worry about what that meant at the moment, though, as she sent probing tendrils into Elijah’s still form, searching for answers.
Her heart stirred with hope at the image that materialized. He was alive, wandering through a thick, endless fog. “Elijah!”
“Sofie?” His voice echoed in the void, her name laced with fear.
“I see you!” she cried, willing him to hear her.
With a gut-wrenching scream of pain, he crumpled to the misty ground. The image vanished from her mind, slicing off their connection.
“No!” she wheezed, flowing her magic through him once more. This time it recoiled the instant it touched him, fizzling to ash. Again and again, she tried to reach him, until no more would rise to her call, her powers exhausted.
She let her forehead fall against his chest as she wailed in despair. Her time with the guild had taught her of this horror. The oldest texts spoke of a place between the folds of time and dimensions, where the fates would banish souls to wander an eternity alone, a hollow nothingness that was neither Za’hala nor Azo’dem but worse. Most cast it off as more ramblings of the seers. But Sofie knew now that the Nulling was real, and Elijah was trapped in it, far beyond her reach.
This was not supposed to happen. This was not what Malachi had promised! Was he watching? Did they relish her pain? “I do not understand! I am a chosen one!” she cried out, hoping he was listening. Did she not deserve this happiness? She’d been nothing but devoted. Had she not praised him enough? Had she somehow wounded his brittle ego?
Perhaps this was merely a lesson. Perhaps Malachi would free Elijah from this curse yet. She clung to that scant thread of hope as she wept, ignoring her hunger as sorrow overwhelmed her and she longed for yesterday’s return.
By nightfall, she shook from weakness and ached from loss. But more than anything else, she burned from regret. It was a mistake to trust Malachi. She saw that now. And yet he had not stripped her of the immense power she had tendered to him. That could only mean one thing—he was not finished with her.
“I will fix this,” she promised Elijah’s still form, her voice barely a whisper, hoping her words could reach him where her magic could not. “I will never stop.” She would feel the warmth of his touch and the tenderness of his kiss once again.
Or she would die trying.
2020
Under the dim glow of lanterns, Sofie’s slender figure remained as still as the body in the stone casket, her powers focused in prayer. She spent many hours here each day, on her knees in the crumbling vault beneath the chapel, until the stones cut into her flesh and her blood seeped into the ground.
Nearly three centuries of pleading.
Nearly three centuries of empty promises.
The years had been long, plagued with war and famine, with loneliness as she learned to survive, hiding in the shadows while she embraced her new immortal nature. She’d had to reinvent herself countless times to avoid unwelcome attention—changing identities, fleeing homes in the night, erasing any trails that might suggest to the guild and her other enemies that Sofie Girard had not long since perished.
In all of this, she had remained unwavering in her appeal to Malachi for mercy. The others would never acknowledge her, even though she’d tried to reach them. It was to the Fate of Fire that she was forever bound.
But Sofie had reached the brink.
She rose to her feet, ignoring the trickles of blood that ran down her shins from wounds that would heal within hours as if they’d never existed. With numbing calm, she climbed into the spacious sarcophagus to take her place next to her beloved.
In the early years, she had kept Elijah with her in the bedchamber of her various homes. It was not without difficulty, especially when disobedient servants stumbled upon what appeared to be a fresh human corpse in her bed. Rumors of wickedness and witchcraft followed her wherever she went, and she began to worry that she would not be able to protect him.