Page 77 of Ruthless Moon

And I refuse to die, to leave Gen—not while that thin, ethereal thread linking our souls remains intact. It pulses within me, an echo of her spirit and strength that persists even through the blinding pain.

Aiden didn’t marry her—Oliver’s words reverberate in my mind, a glimmer of hope in overbearing darkness. Aiden stopped the wedding.

I won’t let go.

Even though I know deep in my soul Oliver will never let me leave this basement alive.

I won’t let go.

I won’t let my little brother’s death be in vain.

He would be pissed if I gave up now. I can hear his cocky little voice in my head asking why I’m not sneaking out of this damn basement.

“Have your man bring the blue trunk from my room. I need things.” Her words ring with a sense of urgency. Meredith steps closer and I feel the heat from her fingers where they hover near my face, but she doesn’t touch me. “I’m so sorry, Liam.”

Orders are given. Retreating footsteps climb the stairs.

“I need his body to be relaxed or this won’t work. Take him down from the beam.”

“Fine. Stretch him across the floor.”

Meredith makes a noise of dismay on my behalf but doesn’t argue.

Within a few moments, my body transitions from hanging to being stretched across the frigid concrete floor, arranged like an offering on a sacrificial altar already bathed in my blood.

Still, the pain is less. But now breathing becomes an uphill battle. The blood pooling in my lungs spreads with each ragged inhale, triggering bouts of coughing.

I’m drowning.

Then Meredith begins to chant in old Welsh. The words are unfamiliar, but the cadence and sound of it is not. It rings with an ancient power that seeps into the room, displacing the chill with a supernatural warmth.

The heat from the magick originates from my core, radiating outward, its touch gentle, yet potent. As it spreads, my pain dissipates, my coughing slows, and my consciousness slowly drifts away from my present reality into a foggy realm I don’t recognize.

It’s not dark.

It’s not light.

I simply exist, caught in a purgatory between agony and relief.

I have no idea how much time has passed when consciousness slowly creeps back in, a gentle tide lapping at the shores of my mind. The first sensation to register through the fog is the cold, sticky concrete against my back. Then comes the muffled hum of Meredith’s voice.

With great effort, I open one eye, surprised when it’s able to follow my command.

The room is dimly lit; shadows cling to the corners like ghosts. I’m alone, save for the two guards stationed at the bottom of the stairs. One of them is Noah. I can smell him.

And then there’s her—Meredith, hunched over an open blue trunk with packets and vials of different herbs and potions stacked on the floor all around her.

I turn my head farther and a groan escapes my lips, capturing her attention. She puts down the book she’s flipping through and our gazes meet.

“Meredith,” I rasp, struggling to string together the syllables.

“Shh...conserve your energy, Liam.” She scoots across the floor on her knees, closing the slight gap between us. There’s an undercurrent of sadness in her eyes, a strange mix of guilt and determination. “I heard about Jackson. I’m so sorry.”

My heart stutters when she says his name. It sounds so wrong to think about him being gone.

She speaks in Welsh again, her hands moving over me in sweeping tender motions. There’s an ethereal glow radiating from her palms, pooling even more warmth into my body. The pain recedes like a wave pulled back by the tide, leaving behind a tingling numbness.

I try to talk a little each time I wake, but our conversations, if you can call them that, are stilted and fragmented, with long silences due to me drifting in and out of consciousness.