(Author's Note: Sorry! I posted chapter 41 in place of 40! I realized it 15 minutes after I posted it. This is chapter 41.)
"No!" Bernard screamed, raced over and gathered her in his arms. "Clarion!"
"Clarion!" Milori screamed from a distance.
She gave a soft smile when she heard Milori. At least a form of him was here in the afterlife. Odd, she thought to herself when she looked up through heavy lids. She was still in the cave, and it was still hard to breathe. Milori was tearing at the hole with Mountain, Sled and Gliss.
Gliss froze the stone around the opening, and Milori slammed his fist into it repeatedly as Mountain clawed. Ice rained down over her and Bernard.
"Clarion, hold on!" Milori begged, his eyes terrified.
They broke through and Milori flew down with a swarm of guards. Bernard was pulled away from her. Milori slammed down onto his knees and fumbled with a huge sack of dust tied to his belt. His hands were shaking uncontrollably, so he grabbed his knife and slashed a hole in the sac, covering her with dust. He scooped some off her chest and put it in his mouth. Then he carefully raised her in his arms and set his lips to hers. He softly blew in the dust.
She tried to breathe in, but her last breath slipped past her lips. Clarion was dimly aware of a scraping in her lungs before she was lost to blackness.
"No. Please, Clarion," Milori begged, his breathing choppy as he tried to control his sobs. He blew harder and compressed her chest, forcing air in and out as he tried to breathe life back into her.
There was soft breathing. A cool hand held hers. She was cozy in something soft-a bed. With a sigh of contentment, she opened her heavy eyelids and smiled. Milori was sitting in a chair beside her. She could live with this afterlife, even knowing it wasn't the true Milori. At least some form of him was here for the next eight hundred years until he could join her.
His face crumpled when he looked down at her, his lip quivering as he stroked her hair. "I thought I lost you," he hiccupped and then buried his face against her breast as he wept.
She blinked. Well, this wasn't a very happy afterlife, she frowned. Reaching up to stroke his hair to comfort him, she notice an intravenous line in her hand. Her eyes looked up to see a bag overhead. And hospital lights. Clarion looked around in confusion and then saw healers walking past in the hall. "Milori?"
He raised his head, brushing at his tears. "It's alright, sweetheart. You're in the hospital just to be sure you're alright. We had to take you to the Pixie Tree to get enough dust back into you." He kissed her brow and then leaned his forehead against hers.
"Where's Bernard?"
He sat back and his eyes fell down to the mattress as if she had just hurt him. His eyes were a bit red as if he had been weeping for a long time. "Under arrest in a cell we made out of stone. He swears that he was trying to rescue you, but I wanted to hear what you had to say first. Rest and we can talk about it later."
Her eyes searched him. "How are you over here?"
"Not being a full winter fairy, I can tolerate the heat for an hour at a time. Mary was here for a bit while I went back into winter." He sat back in his chair but held her hand tight. "You must rest. Either Mary or I will be here."
"Milori?" she asked softly. "What's wrong?"
He kept his eyes diverted as if it would break him to look at her. "...He said something about mating when the guards were taking him away." He swallowed hard. "Did you...? I understand if you did-you were dying and only a mate can give you dust..."
"Milori," she interrupted softly and squeezed his hand.
He swallowed hard again, his heart obviously broken.
"I didn't mate with him."
Those beautiful blue eyes flew to her. "You didn't?"
She gave a slow shake of her head. "I want to be yours."
He released a shakey breath of relief and leaned over to carefully wrap his arms around her. "Clarion," he whispered, his heart slamming against her chest. "I love you," he whispered against her hair. "I promise when you're well and we have all of this cleaned up, I will ask you. I want you to have a happy mating, not tinged with fear or betrayal or any of this." He kissed her brow.
"Hold me," she sniffled against his shoulder and wrapped her arms around him.
He pulled back and searched her eyes sadly, "Sweetheart." He climbed up in the bed with her, making sure to keep her wrapped in blankets so he wouldn't chill her. She curled up against him, tucking her head under his chin. Then he carefully wrapped his arms around her.
She shivered slightly, unable to tolerate cool temperatures yet. "Don't let go," she whispered.
He pulled another blanket up and held her tight. "Don't be scared," he whispered. "I'll protect you, sweetheart. You're safe now. You're safe."
Cool kisses were sprinkled over her cheek and brow. "Clarion?" Milori said softly.
Her eyes fluttered open to see him flushed, with a damp brow as he leaned over her. "I'm sorry to wake you. I need to go back to winter for a bit. Mary and Gary are here to stay with you. I'll be back in an hour. I didn't want you to be startled to wake up to someone else here."
She nodded and slowly let go, embarrassed that her arm and leg were draped over him.
He kissed the tip of her nose with a smile and whispered in her ear. "I will figure out how to make us a bed for our home so we can both tolerate cuddling all night."
A shy smile crossed her lips as he gently extracted himself. Then Milori leaned down and brushed a kiss over her lips.
"Thank you," she whispered. "Be careful."
"I will, my lady. You get some more sleep." Then he turned to Mary and Gary. "Keep a close eye on her-her wings quiver in her sleep sometimes. The healers said it's fine, but I've been rubbing dust on them when she seems restless and it seems to calm her down."
"We'll take care o' her," Gary promised.
Milori turned with a final smile. "I love you." Then he left.
"Clarion, you gave us all such a scare. Thank pixie dust that Milori pushed himself and did one final sweep of autumn when he found you," Mary said and took her hand.
"He looked for me?"
She nodded. "He didn't sleep for three days. He started a search party the day after he had seen you-he figured out you were missing. I daresay Pixie Hollow was shocked to see him alive."
Clarion tried to keep her eyes open, but she drifted off to sleep with a smile on her lips.
Milori was sitting in the chair with his shirt off and a bowl of ice beside him. He was running an ice cube over the back of his neck when he spotted her awake. Quickly dropping it into the bowl, he wiped his hands on his pants and leaned forward to take her hand. "How are you feeling?"
"Better. Are you alright?" she frowned.
He smiled. "I've figured out I can stay two hours if I use ice." He brought her hand to his lips for a kiss. "The healers said you can go home this morning if you feel well."
"How long have we been here?" she asked in confusion and looked out the window to see the sun rising.
"Just since yesterday morning. Are you hungry?" He got up to bring over a bowl of fruit and sugar with some flower nectar to drink.
She pushed herself up to sit against the pillow as he set the tray in her lap. "Do I have a choice?" she laughed.
He smiled and sat down again. "It's good to hear you laugh again, sweetheart. You must eat at least a little." Then a scowl marred his beautiful features. "It turns out that you weren't ill only because of the changes but also because Bernard had slipped you some kind of poison that was draining your dust. He gave a similar but less potent poison to all of your guards."
"It was Bernard then?"
His eyes narrowed and his wings rose with anger. He growled darkly, "He's going to admit it was him."
Author's Note: Thanks for all of the reviews! I didn't expect to reach 100 in the first two weeks! :) I'm glad everyone still likes the story! I wasn't sure how this was going to work being live posts-if I was going to fall flat not far into the story or create too much drama trying to keep it going. My style is to plan a handful of main events for the story and then let the story take a life of its own to weave from one main event to the other how it may.
Here's a teaser: We don't know yet if Bernard is the villian, a co-villan, or was just trying to bluff Clarion into not being stubborn but took it too far before realizing exactly how determined she is. I know at least some of you are big anti-Bernard fans. Let's see what happens when Milori has a chance to get his hands on him...