"He's all I have! Don't touch him!" I screamed, my voice rising in pitch. She gave me a disappointed look, as if I were to blame for this entire situation.

I tried to run towards Paris, who was being dragged forward by soldiers made of darkness, but found myself also restrained. The giant warrior had grabbed my arm with his rough hand, making me trash against him, nearly ripping my shoulder out of its socket with each throw. I could hear violent pops in my shoulder each time I pulled away from him.

Paris could not move. I could see as much with the dark magic of Nyx weaving around him and holding him in place, suffocating him like a snake.

"If you so fervidly disdain the act of killing, then demonstrate your devotion to healing and preservation of life. Present me your abilities to revive those that have fallen" Nyx announced, setting in a horror in me so bone-deep, that I found myself hysterical and near feral.

In an act of desperation, I turned to fight against the warrior, clawing at his hands and raking my nails over his exposed neck, trying to get away from him. Trying to get to Paris. The warrior took the animalistic attacks with his head held high, where I could not even reach it properly, and continued to ignore my screaming, heaving, thrashing presence.

"Don't touch him!" I screamed, my throat run ragged, "Don't touch him! Stop! He's all I have! PLEASE"

Nyx's eyes were filled with pity as she lifted her hands and gently told me, "I know, child. I know. That's why this must be done" before snapping her fingers. The soldiers dissipated.

Paris collapsed on the floor. The world went quiet. My restraints gave out as he hit the ground. I was silent for a moment, my eyes wide and mouth gaping in horror, before a blood curling scream ripped itself from my throat, shattering the silence around us. It was guttural, coming from somewhere dark, buried deep within me.

I threw myself at his body, scrambling to get to him as a wild animal might, crawling on the marble floor, blinded by agony. I reached his unnaturally still body, my hands running over it for any signs of wounds. For any sign on how to fix it. How to make it better. His chest wasn't moving. My lungs constricted on themselves as my jaw remained hung, tears prickling my eyes as they bulged out my skull.

"No, no, no, no" I cried to myself. I reached within me, within my magic, funneling it all. Funneling all I had. Funneling more than what was mine to take. Funelling more than I had to offer. I took all of it. Everything I could find. Everything that I could claw up from within me, and when I was empty, I began taking from around me. I began clawing all the magic, all the energy from the air, inhaling it into myself. I took it all.

I set my intent, imagining Paris gasping up, his chest rising and falling, his eyes opening. I set my intent as I placed my hands on his chest in the form of a make shift vessel. And then I gave it all I had, pumping all my magic and power into his chest, directly into his heart. I gave it all up. My soul, my being, my power, I gave it all up. I did not want it if I could not have him.

Shadows erupted from my hands, making Paris body jerk as all the raw power, as all the energy and all the life entered into his body. I stripped myself of it. I gave it all up, imagining his eyes open and his body awake. I took it all and gave it to him, clawing and grabbing at magic all around me. A vortex opened around me, as though I were a black hole, making the entire room shake and tremble in my hunger and wrath.

The shadows began climbing up my hands, my arms, charing my flesh under as I grunted in pain, keeping the magic directed to his heart. I needed to keep it beating. The pain grew stronger, fizzling and burning under my skin. The inky substance dyed my hands and forearms, snaking up like gnarled tree roots. My skin bubbled underneath, fizzing and molting like lava might. I grit my teeth, my body shaking from the extortion.

I felt it within my soul, what the stripping of power was doing to it. It was cracking, breaking, crumbling apart. I did not stop, and once my body had given all that It could give, I fully relied on my surroundings. I clawed at the air, dragging in magic that was not mine to take. Anything that my senses could grab onto, I took in for myself. Any magic around me, in the shadows, within the air, underneath the ground, everything secret and hidden and dark,  I dragged up. I dragged it to me, and used it to fuel me. I directed it to his heart, as my own groaned and creaked against the effort. I could feel it splintering as my magic pulled it apart.

And then Paris awoke, his body shooting up in a great gasp. I retracted my hands, suddenly drained. I threw myself at his body, tears brimming his eyes. He was awake, but at what cost? I refrained from thinking about it, instead appreciating the steady rise and fall of his chest.

"Oh Gods" I sobbed into his neck, my arms wrapped around it, "Oh Gods, you're awake"

I pulled back to look at him, scanning his body for any harm, for any signs of magical poisoning that might of shown up on his body, as it did mine. He looked fine, his eyes a bit hazy. I held his face in my hands, sobbing as I planted breathless kisses onto his cheeks and face.

"You brought me back" He whispered, his voice horrified, "I was leaving. I was slipping away, and you dragged me back"

There was simultaneously wonder and horror etched in his voice, looking at me as if he had never seen me before. I didn't know what to say to him. If he knew I stepped over the line...If he knew I did black magic... Especially if I did it for him, he would outrage. He could not know.

"You are a fool if you think you can escape me so easily, Paris Arobynn. We made a oath that we would go together. Have fun trying to get rid of me now" I gave him a smile, attempting to lighten the situation, and silmultaneously calm my beating heart. He gave me an uncertain smile back, blinking his blurry eyes. I did not know what I did. I did not know how far I stepped over the line. He said he was slipping away. My mouth felt dry, my hands clammy, as I tried to imagine what that meant. If I brought him back....if I brought him back from the dead, then I was in trouble. Huge, monumental trouble.

But he said he was slipping away. He was slipping away, not had slipped away. He had not completed the action. He was not yet dead, which means I did not violate any laws of nature. I had interfered with the laws of nature, dipping into black magic to do so, but had not violated them outright. My hands, the flesh of them now stained black, were the cost of the magic. That was it, because I had not summoned enough to maintain a deceased corpse. My hands were what reaped the consequence, the punishment only on a minor scale because he was not yet fully dead. I had not brought him back from the dead, as proved to be impossible and unmaintainable, but simply stopped him from dying. I had not broken any laws of Fate.

I gave Paris a shaky smile, my body covered in a cold sweat, as his eyes zoned out again. He grasped my hand, looking down at them. Confusion dawned on his features as he observed the color of them. They were black, all the way up to my mid forearms. Even my nails were dark and raven colored. His brows furrowed downwards.

"What did... What did you do...?" His breaths were labored as he frantically looked up at me. Panic lined his eyes. A hazy sheen washed over them like like fog as he struggled to remain focused on me, "Eulalia...what did you do..?"

I didn't reply, instead squeezing his cold hand. I looked up at him, giving a weak smile, "What I had to"

"Lia...?" He asked me uncertainly, the word raising in pitch so that it sounded out like a question. His tone was confused, fear glinting in his offset eyes. It almost seemed like he was asking me for guidance, like a lost child begging for help, attempting to understand what was going on. His chest rose and fell in frantic breaths.

"Eulalia..?" He uttered, before his eyes rolled back into his head and his body collapsed. I grabbed for him, attempting to soften the blow to the concrete. I struggled to hold his body weight up, gently lowering him to the ground, as my face pressed against his chest. He passed out. I was a fool to let him know so early, knowing that he was hurt and could not handle this information. I should have hid it from him, waited till he was more stable. Not when he was half-dead and terrified for his life.

As I gently lay him down on the cold marble, my ears picked up on an eerily unsettling sound. I couldn't figure out what it was, till I realized it was not a sound, but a lack there of. My ear, pressed against his chest, could not hear the beat of his heart. My stomach dropped as I scramble up, a horrible, sickening feeling slowly swallowing my whole body. I shook him.

No. He was awake just a minute ago. You can't go from being full of life with a steadily beating heart, to silent just like that. You can't. Life isn't so inconsequential, that it can slip between your fingers so unnoticed. No. Gods, I'm such an insensitive idiot. I made him faint, collapsing right on the floor from a panic attack. Gods, I'm so stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

"Paris, get up" I nudged, my voice firm with resolution. I shook his shoulder, shifting onto my knees for a better hold on him. His fair eyelashes brushed his cheeks as he slept tranquilly. His skin was paler than usual, and I made a mental note to take him outside into the sun when this was all over with. The gloom of the underworld did not suit my golden prince.

"Paris, get up" I demanded again, attempting to rouse him. I pressed my hands to his chest and shoved, as if that would startle him awake. I knew he wasn't dead. There was no blood, no wound. He was visibly fine. He was simply laying there, a peaceful look fixated upon his features. He just passed out. He'll be back into consciousness soon enough. I saved him the first time. He was fine. He just needed to regain consciousness. I had no idea how long that would take, but hopefully he would be awake in minuets, considering the monumental amount of energy I had pumped into him.

I was getting impatient with him and his unresponsiveness, refusing to acknowledge the panic that was spiking its way through my blood stream. I refused to acknowledge it, because that would mean something is wrong. There was nothing wrong, he was just recovering from his magic use. Surely I wouldn't have to drag him to his room? No. He would get up and walk there himself once he woke up.

My eyes slowly trailed down from his face to the hand I had splayed above his heart. Horror, steady and cruel, greeted me there like a stab wound to the gut. When I couldn't feel the steady rise and fall of his chest under my blackened hand, the panic in my throat became more prominent. The phantom knife twisted inside my abdomen in a long circle, radiating a steady, dull pain. I could no longer ignore it. There was still no heartbeat. There was no heartbeat.

"Paris..." My voice was now higher and more uncertain, "Get up". Pressure was building In my throat and behind my eyes as I nudged him again. My stomach was slowly descending into itself as bile rose to my throat, making my lips quiver slightly. I was going to be sick. There was no heartbeat.

"Paris" I raised my voice, shaking him by the shoulder. I tried pulling him up into a sitting position, but I couldn't manage his weight as he fell back down with a resounding thud. The sound was sickening, horror etching through me at the noise his body made upon contact with the marble. A person was not supposed to sound like that. But he was not dead. I had fixed him. I had helped him. I did what Nyx wanted. I had brought him back. He was not dead.

There was still no heartbeat.

"Paris. Get up. Now" I demanded, my voice breaking as he continued to be unresponsive. I pressed my ear to his chest again, attempting to locate the weak beat of his heart, one so weak that I had somehow missed it. Cold, empty silence greeted me in stead of the lively pitter-patter that I had spent so many nights falling asleep to. The lively beat that had been strong just moments ago.

"There's no heartbeat" I began in panic, shouting to no-one in particular. They had to know. There was no heartbeat. How could they not know? How could they not be aware of its silence. Someone like Paris could never simply stop breathing. He could never simply pass away. The sky would fall upon his death, the sun burning out and the celestials crashing to the earth. His death would be the end of everything. He could not simply die, just like that. He did not die. If he were really dead, the sky would have turned black, the world descending into chaos. Paris was not a person who could die unnoticed. He could not slip from life to death so quietly. He couldn't. He wouldn't.

But there was still no heart beat. I had given all my magic to bring him back the first time. I now had nothing left to offer. I could not do that feat of magic again. I couldn't do It again. I had nothing left to give. The air around me was dry and lifeless, with me having sucked the buzzing energy out of it only moments ago. It also had nothing left to give. Panic spiked my blood stream as I became hysterical.

"Paris, GET UP! WAKE UP! " My voice raised considerably, as I tried to pull him up again. His skin was cold under my touch. It was clammy and lacked the regular warmth that I so desperately needed to feel. His skin was not supposed to feel like this.

A gentle hand touched my arm, but I shrugged it off with a scream, "DO NOT TOUCH ME! DONT! HE'S COLD. HE'S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE SO COLD. HE'S A SUN MAGE! HE'S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE COLD!" I screamed out hysterically, clawing at Paris' body, trying to pull him closer to me. I laid myself over his body, trying to warm him up. I needed to warm him up. He was not supposed to be cold. He was not supposed to be so cold.

"He's not supposed be cold" I cried out to the room desperately, tears finally streaming down my face as I pressed myself to his chest, trying to feel his heartbeat. A chasm opened up beneath me, swallowing me whole as petrifying silence continued to greeted me.

It was the most sickening thing I had ever heard in my life- that silence in his chest. My eyes strained and blurred as they filled with hot tears. A sob tore itself from my throat, so harrowing that it racked my entire body in a shudder, as I held my ear to his heart. His shirt underneath me was becoming damp with my tears.

"HE'S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE COLD!" I screamed out. Why were they just standing there? They had to help him. I had to do something to fix him. He was- there was no- I couldn't feel his heart. I couldn't feel it. I tried summoning my magic to warm him, but was met with silence. I had no more magic left to give. I had nothing left. I was alone.

"HELP HIM! I CANT HEAR HIS HEART! SOMEBODY HELP HIM BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE!" I began openly sobbing and heaving, my desolate stomach trying empty itself onto the floor. I didn't care. I just wanted him back. I just wanted him back. I wanted his warmth back. I wanted him back.

"Please. I just want him back" My voice sounded so small, my words near incomprehensiblel. The world was still with my grief. It's presence was pressing down on my chest. I couldn't breathe as something splintered inside at the weight. I could hear great big cracks coming from it.

"Wake up. Please. Paris. Please" I begged onto his cold chest. It wasn't supposed to be cold. I couldn't feel him. I couldn't feel anything besides his absence. He wasn't here, an emptiness readily replacing his spot in the world. No. No.

His absence was so deafening that I had trouble being aware of anything other than that. I faintly registered that I was screaming as I clung to his chest, the pain so debilitating that I couldn't move. I couldn't remove myself from his cold body. His cold body. Oh Gods. Oh Gods.

"Please come back" I wailed, my voice raw and desperate. My entire world was tilting, and I was falling and falling and falling, farther away from the light above. I was falling. I would never see that light again. That light was Paris, and he was slipping away from me. Oh Gods. I was falling from Paris. I was loosing him.

I couldn't lift my head. I couldn't do anything but cling onto his body. His corpse. Oh God. I was cradling a corpse. I was cradling Paris' corpse.

Oh Gods.

I was cradling his corpse. I continued screaming, the sound guttural as I held his hands to my chest- to my heart. He wasn't supposed to die. He wasn't supposed to leave me here alone, clinging onto his corpse. He wasn't supposed to die. It was supposed to be me. He didn't didn't deserve this fate.

I was screaming. I knew it. But I couldn't bring myself to stop. I would never stop. I would never stop screaming. I would never stop screaming for Paris. For what they ruined. For the goodness they they killed. He was dead.

They ruined him. He was dead. I would never stop screaming because of it. I would never stop. Paris was dead. There was no coming back from this. There was nothing- nothing that could bring me back from this. Nothing. Paris was dead, and I had died alongside him. He was dead. He was dead. He was dead. He was dead. He was dead. He was dead.

⚭

The witch lay twitching over his corpse, wailing his name over and over again, sobbing violently. She looked small, broken even, as she cradled his dead body.  I had nearly forgotten how truly frail she was, with her violent personality generously compensating for her tiny frame. The ruthless witch that came barreling into this realm was no more, in her place laying a dejected, mortal girl on the brink of ruination. She clung to him so aggressively, I knew I would have to pry her away from his corpse. The queen would make me do so.

She held the boys cold hands, pressing them to her lips whilst sobbing, her face contorted into agony. She looked as if she were in physical pain, her breathing strained and transpiring in sharp, choking gasps.

"HE DID NOTHING! HE WAS INNOCENT" she screamed suddenly, at no one in particular, but we all knew it was targeted towards Nyx. I stiffened. The girl had truly lost her mind and any sense of self-preservation, to be openly shouting at a divine Goddess in such a manner.

"What have you done?" She sobbed out, her voice rising and falling, breaking on every word, "What have you done? You promised you wouldn't hurt him! You promised!"

I stiffened at her hysterical, shrill words, openly directed towards me. I did not break my oath. The boy did not die from my hand. He died by the will of the queen. The witch should have known he would have never been permitted to leave alive, after learning the deepest secret of the realm. He should have never been permitted to enter the realm of night.

Without warning, the witch lifted her head up towards the ceiling, her eyes screwed shut as if begging to an unseen God. A primal scream erupted from her throat, tears still trickling down her red cheeks. The sound was hysterical and deranged, so savage and desperate that I found myself unnerved by it. It was a scream of the mouth and lungs, a scream of the soul, one that was ravaged and shredded apart beyond resoration. Had I not been observed the scene before me, I could never have guessed  that such a horrifying sound could come from such a young girl. It was the wail of a beast, of a wounded monster, that of a mourning mother, that of being with nothing left to loose.

As the primal, animalistic scream attacked the holy space around us, the ground shuddered in a great heave. The walls began shaking in on us, the ancient columns shifting and raining debris down on us. I looked at Nyx, but was startled to find confusion in her pale eyes. She was not responsible for the trembling of temple. The grandiose ceiling began crumbling, entire chunks of stone crashing down before us. I realized, with horror, that this was the doing of the witch. She was destroying the ancient temple of the Mother, one that had stood here before the first dawn, before the first magic, in an act of her grief.

⚭

He was dead. Paris was dead. The ceiling began crumbling above us, great pillars crashing but a few feet away from us. I did not care. Let them bury us. Let this be our tomb. Let this be where we lay to rest forever. Him and I. It was always supposed to be just him and I. And now only I was left.

A great stone crashed near my feet, the spray of debris slicing through my clothes and skin. I did not care. I felt nothing. I felt nothing but the cold of Paris' body. I felt nothing but him. The lack of him.

The marble pillar before us groaned. I watched as it shattered, spiderwebs of cracks running over the ceiling. The piller finally broke free, falling right for Paris and I. I did not move. Instead,  I tightened my grip on his body, burying my face into the crook of his neck, covering his body with mine. I held him tight, holding him and waiting. Waiting for it to hit us. Waiting to get back to Paris. I waited, holding on to him, my eyes screwed shut as the pillar toppled down, the temple around us crumbling into a tomb.

And then I was alone. I couldn't feel Paris as my body was ripped away from his corpse. It was the warrior. He was dragging me away.

"LET GO. IM SUPPOSED TO GO WITH PARIS. LET GO" I screamed at him, thrashing, clawing, fighting the rough hands that were holding me from him. Blood covered my hands as I continued clawing at him, wailing to be let go.

The piller was groaning, falling, falling, and falling. I was loosing my chance to be with him.

"LET GO! I NEED TO BE WITH HIM! We need to lay to rest together!" I sobbed, beating at him. I looked up sharply, at the crashing piller that the warrior had dragged me out from under. I looked up, just in time to see it topple to the floor, crashing over Paris' body, ash and dust blinding the entire room in a cloud of debris. I stared wide eyed, mouth contorted in horror, chest seizing in frantic gasps. Debris hit my gaping eyes. My hand covered my mouth, a sound short of a whimper erupting from my throat.

It crushed him. It crushed him. Oh Gods.  It crushed him. And I wasn't there. I wasn't there. I heard muffled shouting around me, as I sunk to my knees. The warrior had let go of me as I stared at the spot his body was just laying in. It crushed him. It crushed him. And I was still here.

He was dead. Paris Arobynn was dead, and I remained in the world of living.

⚭

The witch remained on the floor, crumpled over her knees, kneeling before the rubble that had buried her mate. The queen had dissipated into the air the second the first column had collapsed, whisking herself to safety quickly. Rowena remained, her crow-black hair disheveled, eyes wild, but having regained some semblance of herself.

A great crack echoed throughout the chamber. Fires had broken out from the torches that used to line the walls. The entire structure was collapsing. The ancient magic that once maintained this great temple, was no more. It seemed as though it had fled with the soul of the boy, dying with him. The air was dry and solemn, as though smothered by the girls grief.

Hesitantly, I moved towards the witch, who had gone comatose, and lifted her off the ground. It would take all my strenuous efforts to mold her into the image the queen expected of her. It would be no easy feat making an immortal out of this wild girl. Accompanied by Rowena, we carried her out of the collapsing structure, as the world fell apart around us.