“It’s not your fault, Sa’han,” Quen said, his gravelly voice carrying a softer pain. “It’s a mindset, and I need her. Because as much as it looks otherwise…I want to live.”

His face riven, Trent stood. I watched him rise out of the sunken area and walk away, pitying him. I could help Quen—he could not. The door opened and shut, letting in a sliver of life before the uncertain darkness that hid the future cocooned us again in a waiting warmth and smothering stillness. Waiting.

We were alone. I looked at Quen’s dark hand in mine and saw the strength in it. The coming battle would be fought by both the mind and the body, but it was the soul where the balance lay. “You took something,” I said, my heart pounding at the chance that he might actually talk to me. “Something Dr. Anders was working on. Was it genetic? Why?”

Quen’s eyes were bright, still seeing around corners. Taking a breath that it hurt to hear, he blinked at me, refusing to answer.

Frustrated, I took his grip more firmly. “Fine, you son of a bitch,” I swore. “I’ll hold your stupid-ass hand, but you’re not going to die.” God, give us the eleven percent. Please? Just this once? I hadn’t been able to save my dad. I hadn’t been able to save Peter. I hadn’t been able to save Kisten, and the guilt of his dying to keep me alive was enough to bring me sobbing to my knees.

Not this time. Not this man.

“It doesn’t matter if I live or die,” he rasped. “But seeing me through this is the only…way you’ll find…the truth,” he rasped, his body clenching in pain. It was getting worse. His bird-bright eyes fixed on mine, and the hurt in him was obvious. “How bad do you want to know?” he taunted as the sweat beaded on his forehead.

“Bastard,” I almost snarled as I dabbed it away, and he smiled through the pain. “You son of a bitch bastard.”

Twenty-one

My lower back hurt, and my arms. They were crossed to serve as a pillow as I lay slumped forward in my chair with my upper body draped on Quen’s bed. I was just resting my eyes while Quen had another span of time where he could breathe without my encouragement. It was late, and so very, very quiet.

Quiet? Adrenaline pulsed through me and I jerked upright. I’d fallen asleep. Damn it! I thought in panic, my gaze going to Quen. His horrible tearing breaths had ceased, and guilt twisted in me as I thought he had died while I slept—until I realized he didn’t have the waxy hue of the dead, but a soft color.