Empire of Storms spoilers! You have been warned!
This one-shot song fic is a deviation of the last few scenes in EoS. It is a stand-alone. There will be no sequel or prequel or ANYTHING.
All clear?
Good.
Disclaimer: All names, characters and incidents portrayed in this entry are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, places, buildings and products is entirely coincidental.
Be Advised: There is ToG-style swearing, and mentions of adult scenes, and death. Don't like blood? Can't handle the occasional curse? Don't read.
Rowan couldn't believe it. He'd failed his queen; his wife; his mate.
After the bitch from the East had left, Lorcan and Gavriel had tried to hold him in the dirt as her body had crumpled in a heap only twenty feet from the sandbank. Only a thousand thousand leagues from his arms. His magic had been exhausted, and he could feel the burnout dancing at the edges of his vision, but he'd lashed out with the dregs of his power, throwing the two warriors off him, freezing her attacker's blood in his veins and creating a shield around her. Only the pain in his battered heart had kept him on his feet, kept that shield in place, as he scrambled to reach her.
She was bleeding profusely when he reached her. Her fall had driven the arrow clean through her. Her lung was punctured. He could feel the life draining from her with every breath, but she reached for him, and he gathered her in his arms, neither of them caring how tightly he held her. He met her gaze, the tears already falling, and in her delirium, she cried:
"Kiss it all better, I'm not ready - to go."
His shoulders were shaking - he kissed her brow, her nose, her lips - and she grasped weakly for his hand. He took it and she gave a soul-broken squeeze. They were already so cold. Her fire was extinguished, even in her eyes, the embers were dying.
"Everything will be alright, Fireheart, he whispered," and the words were so broken and muddled with sobs that he only knew she understood when her eyes drifted to his face, and they cleared for a second. She touched his face with those icy hands, knowing the blame that was already circling his heart's corpse like vultures.
"It's not your fault, love. You didn't know." Her thumb arced across his cheek, and he leaned into it. "You didn't know."
He felt her heart stop, then. And in the seconds before her eyes joined his heart in Hell, she kissed him firmly on the mouth, conveying everything she had so desperately wanted to tell him in the space of one moment's eternity. Then the carranam bond faded into nothing, and he felt her soul tear from his like a physical blow. He screamed his loss and agony, watched helplessly as those moon-white flames devoured her and then -
He was being thrown in a Morath cell, bound in iron and trapped without a kiss of the wind that had betrayed him that day.
Aelin was gone.
There was no golden-haired flame in his arms, no mate to wipe away his tears and erase the creases between his brows, no carranam to talk with in this deathly silence. The only goddess who'd ever answered his prayers had abandoned him to this hell, and with Maeve in such a rage over her plan's failure, no one stood to fight the demon king Erawan. The armies of Terrasen, the Crochans, the Mycenians, the ruby-haired Queen of the Wastes - they were all doomed.
Because his Fireheart was dead, and no icy blow to her killer's frozen body, no shattered piece of that filth, could bring her back.
He promised as they sealed the iron door behind them that he would hold onto the tiny tattered pieces of her that still clung to him, tiny pieces forming her memory. The fight in Mistward, the expression on Maeve's face when she'd encircled the city with flames, the nightgown in Rifthold, stolen kisses in Terrasen, that night on the sand, her rare displays of manners. Her scent, her feel, her eyes. Those burning, raging eyes.
He could almost hear her voice, teasing, loving, begging.
"Because she is dead, and I am left with my worthless life!"
"He didn't survive."
"To whatever end."
"Buzzard."
"I was hoping you'd let me braid it one day."
"You make me want to live, Rowan. Not survive; not exist. Live."
The tears wouldn't come. There was nothing left in his husk of a heart. Not a single emotion. The rage was gone. The grief, too. He was empty, a siphon drained of all power. There was no hope for this world, and no hope for him. He would drown in his memories, with her fire.
It was then that he felt her. Through all the iron, through the numbness. Her fingers burying themselves in his hair, her lips meeting his, her body pressed to his. Trying to reassure him, to let him know that she was here, even if it wasn't forever. He whispered into the dark, then. His voice cracked and broken and so raw that he could barely hear himself.
"Stay with me, Fireheart. Stay with me, until I fall asleep. Please, stay with me."
He drifted off, those phantom hands caressing his face, those lips pressed to his temple, her fiery eyes shining behind his lids.
She would stay, as long as he was left to fight this fate alone. She would shadow him, would follow him where Mala could not, would never leave his side.
After all, she had gone and rutting died on him. It was the least she could do to make up for this unforgiveable sin.
"Kiss it Better" by He Is We
Unfortunately, I am unable to supply the lyrics directly, and posting links on here is a pain, but if you search 'kiss it better nightcore' it should be the first song, the "author" being Angelicgirl2550.
Full lyrics can be found on AZlyrics - they are reasonably accurate, and easy to follow, with no pop-up ads.
Just so you know: I was crying when I wrote this, and I am not ashamed of it.
-Laura