Demetri II

Chapter nine

Demetri II

“Xana!”

Her dark blue hair falls in a straight line down her back. The crown of icicles juts out of her hair like they’re growing out of her skull. Her mechanical arm is scattered across the floor in pieces and wires stick out of the plate on her shoulder. Her head is bent, positive she’s staring at her feet. She stands in a pool of blood with the body of Queen Titania at her feet. Blood seeps out of Titania’s mouth, nose, ears and even her eyes. Her glassy Technicolor eyes bug and her mouth is held open in a silent scream of agony. “Xana?” I ask wearily.

At the sound of her name she looks over her shoulder. The left side of her face is smudged in blood. My stomach flops. Oh Nix that better not be her blood.

She makes eye contact with me for a moment and I hear myself gasp. Her eyes are no longer glowing; they’re the color of steel. Her eyes drift away from mine lazily and look back down at the Queen. “It is done,” she says in a dull voice. “I have done my duty. I’ve lived the life of a true ice faerie.”

She slowly turns around, her arm pressed to her middle. She looks down at her middle as she lifts her arm away. Blood drips off her elbow and fingers. Even more blood flows from a long slice down her middle. Blood creeps across her dress and dribbles down her legs. My stomach drops. Her sisters shriek in horror. “NO!” I bellow.

I drop my spear and run to her. She moves towards me, but doubles over in pain as blood splatters onto the marble floor. She pitches forwards and I catch her. She hangs off me; heavier than I anticipated. We sink to the floor, my knees absorbing the shock. I hold Xana close; cradling her in my arms.

This can’t be happening. How could the universe do such an ungodly thing? Finally giving me the only thing I’ve ever wanted in my life and then feeling like it should just rip her out of my arms almost as soon as I get my hands on her. There has never been a single moment in my life that I haven’t considered Xana as the woman I wanted to spend the rest of my life with, but now… now she’s dying in my arms; a death coming much too premature; a death coming to the only woman I have ever loved and will ever love. It’s not fair. It’s not fair! “I can’t lose you,” I hear myself sob.

Tears streak down Xana’s eyes as well. She tries to smile for me, to comfort me, but it fails miserably. “Don’t cry, love.” She reaches up and touches my face with her trembling hand. Tears spread across her palm and my cheek as she smashes them between the two. “It was part of the curse. I was meant to die; to die the death of an ice faerie, of a warrior. It’s much better than suicide, I think.”

“But she’s dead. Isn’t the curse supposed to break after the Queens dies?”

She hums sadly. “But she got me first.”

“I don’t care! You promised you’d be ok Xana! You promised you’d lived!”

“But Demetri,” she says with a fractured voice as tears stream down her face even faster, “don’t you remember… that I lied?”

Any control I sustained was cut loose. I bury my face into her cold, perfectly curved throat and tears start to solidify as they roll down her neck. She runs her fingers through my hair and grabs it with the little strength she has left. I can hear her sobbing loudly. “I’m so sorry,” she wails. “I’m so sorry.”

We stay like that for a while as she bleeds out, nothing for any of us to do about it. She gradually grows heavier in my arms; I have to hold her head up with my hand. “I guess this has the original ending,” she says roughly. “The Little Mermaid dies at the end and leaves her beloved Eric. No happy ending for me.”

“What are you talking about?”

She looks up at me with her steel eyes even duller. “How special… am I?” she breathes weakly. Then she takes a rattled breath as her last. She falls completely slack in my arms. I can barely see out of my tear filled eyes. I tilt my head back and scream. I scream in frustration, in loss, in agony, in anything that fills my heart; the heart I wish to rip out. My bellow is cut short by relentless, silently sobs. I snap my head back down and let it all go.

Xana is my life, my love. How will people expect me to go on without her? As being just eighteen, just barely an adult, I can see how they’ll think that overtime I’ll find someone new, but they couldn’t be more wrong. They don’t understand. This was no crush. This was no little fling. No. This was love. This is still love. I won’t ever let her go, no matter what.

I reach into my pocket and pull out a small metal circle. I made it myself, from titanium, the strongest metal known, because that’s what Xana is; titanium. The diamond was my mother’s. It sat on her engagement ring once, but I took it off at my parents’ funeral. I slip the ring onto Xana’s ring finger with shaky fingers. I press my lips to her hand, feeling the cold diamond on the corner of my lips.

I sit up and look down at her. Left over tears fall onto Xana’s beautiful face and roll off. “You are much too special for just this,” I whisper. I kiss her lightly on the forehead. “I love you Xana Jacqueline Frost, and I always will.” I gently peck her ice cold lips. “Forever.”

Suddenly her body jerks. A strange sound, a sound I’ve never heard before, comes from her. Her torso erupts and a waft of what looks like dense black fog bursts from her wound. I watch in both horror and amazement as it roars into the air and just separates, leaving the atmosphere. It’s a beautiful and haunting scene.

It ends so abruptly; the fog stops flowing from her wound. A fleck of hope pierces me and I carefully separate the rip in her dress at her stomach. I stare down at her in bewilderment. There’s no wound there any longer, not even a scar. But how?

I freeze. She gasps and twitches. I look at her face just in time to see her eyes fly open, glowing brighter than I’ve ever seen before. She gulps in air like there’s not enough. She starts coughing as she breathes too fast. Stunned I only watch her for a moment before yanking her up and crushing her into an embrace so tight I think I might crack one of my own ribs. “Demetri?” she rasps. I ignore her and hold her closer. “You broke the curse,” she whispers in amazement. “Until the day you are truly loved,” she recites, “will the curse be broken.”

I ignore her. “You’re alive.”

“Yes,” she says quietly. “It seems that I am.”

I look back at her face. New tears stream down her perfect cheekbones, her skin sparkling even more than I remember. Her eyes are no longer crackled, but big, whole, almond shaped eyes glowing white like the lights shone from heaven. Her red lips turned blue from the iciness seeping from her core are full and perfectly round. Her cute little nose and cheeks are slightly rosy like a human child playing out in the snow. Her small chin quivers as she tries to keep herself from crying. I shake my head. “So beautiful.” She lets out a little weep and hides it with a smile. “I love you.”

“Forever.” I follow her eyes. Her hand is above my head. She wiggles her fingers as the diamond on the ring plays with the sunlight. She hums. “Yes, forever sounds good.”

I look back down at her. She tries not to smile too widely, but she’s failing. “Forever sounds perfect.” Her eyes drift to mine and her smile brightens her entire face. I’ve never, ever seen Xana so happy. And she’s happy because of me. It almost seems unreal. I kiss her. I kiss her the way I did last night. I kiss her like the world depends on it. I kiss her because the universe changed its mind. I kiss her because I love her. “I love you.”

“I love you more.”