Tristan heard Nate enter the den, but refused to turn around. He continued staring up at the wall of weapons, holding the arrow from Scarlet’s hiding place in his immortal hand.
“Don’t do this,” Nate said.
Tristan kept his back to him. “Did you see Scarlet’s eyes? Her bloody nose?” His voice cracked, but he didn’t care.
Once Scarlet’s nose started bleeding, she usually only lived a few more days—
if
that.
He heard Nate take a step forward. “We can still find the fountain.”
Tristan shook his head. “There’s no time. And, let’s be honest here, the fountain probably doesn’t exist. What am I supposed to do?” Tristan turned around and looked at his longtime friend. “Let her die a hundred more times because I’m too selfish to die for her? No.” He shook his head. “It has to be now.”
Nate was silent for a long time, staring at the floor.
“You and I have had many lifetimes,” Tristan said. “But Scarlet has not. She’s had a handful of partial lives, all of them lost and confusing. None of them full and happy. She deserves this, Nate.” Tristan swallowed and softly said, “You know I’m right.”
Nate looked up and slowly said, “You don’t have to do this.”
“Yes.” Tristan nodded. “I do.”
Slowly and hesitantly, Nate said, “This is forever, though. There’s no going back after this.”
Tristan turned the arrow over in his hand. “That’s the plan.”
Nate shifted uncomfortably. “What do you want me to tell Gabriel and Scarlet?”
Tristan swallowed back his emotion. “The truth.” He pulled two envelopes out of his back pocket and handed them to his oldest friend. “I’ve kept these in the safe for the last few years. They’re my final words to Gabriel and Scarlet. I don’t want…either of them to think I wanted to leave their world.”
Nate’s eyes looked pained as he took the envelopes.
Tristan took a deep breath. “Thank you, friend.”
Nate said nothing as Tristan exited the den.
For the last time.
Scarlet tripped over her flowing gray skirt as she entered the cabin without knocking and ran down the basement stairs.
“Tristan!” She hit the basement floor and plowed into his room, her strategically placed curls falling into her face and her corset top squeezing the breath out of her.
“Tristan!” she called out wildly.
She saw a rigged bow leaning against his wardrobe, and the dangerous arrow on his bathroom counter. He appeared in the bathroom archway, dressed in a solid black shirt and black pants.
Dressed to die.
Over my dead body.
“You cannot—no, you
will
not do this.” Scarlet stormed past his beautiful, big bed into the bathroom and snatched the arrow off the counter.
Tristan, looking stunned and confused said, “You need to leave, Scarlet. You’re sick.”
“No!” She faced him with the arrow in her hand. “You don’t get to push me away this time! I know what you’re planning to do and I won’t let it happen.”
His eyes widened and she
knew
she was right.
He really was planning to die.
He looked at her sternly. “Go away.”
She shook her head and pointed the arrow at him. “You cannot kill yourself, Tristan.”
A muscle flexed in his jaw. “Leave.”
She lowered the arrow and cocked her head to the side, trying to feel him.
He was…afraid…and determined.
He walked to the other side of the counter and started messing with drawers and cabinets.
“No.” Scarlet shook her head. “I won’t let you do this.”
He turned around, pressing his lips together with a look of sadness. “You can’t stop me.”
Scarlet’s mouth dropped open, her eyes heating up like never before. “
I’m
in charge of my life.
I’m
in charge of when I live or die.
Not
you! You don’t get to take your life on my behalf! I won’t let you break my heart—break
Gabriel’s
heart—like that!”
Tristan’s look of sadness morphed into one of fear as he softly said. “Look at your eyes, Scar. Look at them.”
Scar
. He’d called her Scar again and it felt…perfect.
She turned and looked at herself in his giant bathroom mirror. Her eyes were on fire. Bright blue fire. As she watched, a single drop of blood fell from her nose and she quickly wiped it away.
Tristan’s voice was hushed and thick. “You’re dying.”
She took a deep breath as she stared into the mirror.
Standing beside Tristan, looking at their bodies side-by-side, caused her heart to twitch.
They were beautiful.
The two of them, standing together, like they belonged at one another’s side, was beautiful. And he was going to take it all away.
She looked at her glowing blue eyes for a moment longer before finding his eyes in the mirror. She kept her voice as controlled as possible. “I don’t care if I die a thousand more times.” She turned to face him directly. “I need you to live.”
She didn’t know why she needed him to live, she just did.
Tristan turned around and they stood facing each other, just inches apart. His chest was shaking with uneven breaths and his eyes flashed hurt and pain and brokenness before her.
She could cry.
She
would
cry.
“You don’t need me, Scar. You need life. And all I do is take it from you.”
She shook her head emphatically, feeling him slip away. “But you also give me life.”
“Yes, and you are alive right now, right here,” he looked her over with love and regret and Scarlet thought she would die of a broken heart right there on the bathroom tile, “because my blood brought you back. But I won’t let it take you away ever again.”
Scarlet opened her mouth to scream and yell and kick and fight, but all that came out was a broken plea. “Please?”
A tear fell down her face—a tear she didn’t know she had.
He was going to leave her forever.
She placed her small hands on his broad chest and looked up at him desperately. “Please?”
Tristan swallowed and she closed her eyes, feeling everything he felt.
Love…
it was full and real and breaking him in half.
Fear
…filling his gut and churning his insides with guilt.
Hatred…
for the unfairness in her life and his.
And hope
…hope for what…?
“What could you possibly be hopeful for?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
A long moment of silence passed before he answered, “I want you to have a real chance at wholeness.”
“No,” Scarlet whispered, opening her eyes again. “I don’t want wholeness…not without you….”
What was she saying?
Scarlet didn’t know why she was so desperate to keep him alive, but nothing had ever been so important to her.
Tristan’s green eyes, pouring into hers with need and sorrow, lowered to her face.
His strong jaw tilted beside her head and his perfect lips hovered just in front of hers.
Was it wrong if she kissed him?
Yes
.
But she wanted to anyway.
If a kiss could keep him in her world, if a kiss could change his mind, she would kiss the hell out of him.
Because she needed him. She didn’t remember him, but she knew she couldn’t live without him.
His lips barely brushed against hers as his warm hand came up behind her neck to cradle her head.
She parted her lips and inhaled, trying to absorb as much of him as he’d let her. He smelled like leather and soap and all things wonderful as he pressed his lips to hers.
At her mouth, he whispered, “I’m so sorry.”
She felt a prick behind her ear and immediately knew she had lost.
“No…,” she croaked out as her body fell limp and numb in his arms.
The crystal. He must have pricked her with the sleeping crystal.
She heard the arrow fall from her hand and hit the tile at her feet.
He gently picked her up and she could do nothing but stare up at him in disbelief and horror.
He was going to kill himself. While she slept.
He placed her on his majestic bed and tucked her in with shaking hands and wet eyes. “I’m so, so sorry, Scar.”
He leaned down and kissed her forehead with soft lips as she laid, heavy-lidded, in a sea of blankets and sheets that smelled like him and filled her heart with love.
He was going to kill himself and she couldn’t stop him.
She was falling asleep….
Another tear fell down her cheek as her heavy eyes watched him retrieve the bow and arrow and head out of the room.
The bedroom door began to close behind him and, as her world began to fade into slumber, she saw a tear fall down his cheek as well.
He was going to destroy the most beautiful thing Scarlet couldn’t remember.
“Scarlet!” Gabriel called out in a panic as he left his car running in the driveway and opened the cabin’s front door.
He’d gone to her house to convince her not to go to the dance, only to find an agitated, blue Heather complaining about earrings and Scarlet’s erratic behavior.
When Heather mentioned how Scarlet had said Tristan’s name, Gabriel immediately headed to the cabin, terror in his veins.
Scarlet was sick and probably confused. Or worse.
“Scarlet!” he called again, racing upstairs and all around the main floor. Finally he raced into the basement and barged through Tristan’s door.
There was Scarlet, beautiful and still, on Tristan’s bed.
Her cheeks were tear-stained and soft, her breathing deep and steady. Walking over to her, he shook her gently. “Scarlet…Scarlet, honey.”
Nothing.
No movement. No response.
He shook her again, but still she didn’t wake.
Where is Tristan and why is Scarlet sleeping in his bed?
On the sheets next to Scarlet’s head was the tiny white crystal from the Head Ghost.
Tristan had drugged her.
Rage fueled Gabriel’s curse words and his hands as he checked her pulse and looked all over her body to make sure she was all right.
Why would Tristan do such a thing?
Gabriel frantically ran to Tristan’s medicine cabinet to search for the antidote.
After finding it, he ran back to bed and gently tipped Scarlet’s head back. He pricked the back of her ear with the black crystal, waking her body up with the serum.
Scarlet came to and immediately started to hyperventilate, new tears springing from her eyes as she breathed out, “Tristan’s…going…to kill…himself….”
Gabriel was confused. “What?”
“He’s going…to kill himself…with the arrow…to break the curse. We have…to stop him!”
For a moment, Gabriel dismissed Scarlet’s words. She was sick. She was confused.
“Scarlet, are you sure...?”
“Yes! The arrow...can kill...immorals...that’s why...I hid it...we have to hurry!” Scarlet’s eyes lit up the room.
Gabriel was about to argue when suddenly, everything made sense. Tristan’s secrecy about who his murder victim was…Scarlet’s fear of the arrow…everything.
Gabriel’s eyes burned with fear and anger.
How could he be so selfish?
Scarlet sat up and started shaking out her limbs. “We have to go. Now!”
“No way,” Gabriel said. “You’re not going anywhere. That bastard just drugged you. You are staying here.”
Her neon eyes lit up the room. “Like hell I am!” Scarlet scrambled off the bed, her dark hair falling in a mess around her face. “We need to stop him!”
Gabriel started to argue with her but was afraid the fight might be too emotionally draining for her and cause her heart to break even faster.
“Fine. Come on.” He led her out of the cabin and to his parked car, the engine still running. “Do you know where he went?”
Scarlet shook her head. “No idea.”
“Then we’ll start looking downtown.” Gabriel started to get in the car when he saw Scarlet pause at the edge of the driveway.
He watched her close her eyes and tilt her head to side.
He waited.
Then she took off running into the woods.
What the hell?
Gabriel hurriedly turned off his engine and chased after her into the darkness.
Scarlet was running, blind and hopeless, through a thicket of trees that were the only thing between her and Tristan’s precious life.
She didn’t know where he was. But she could feel him. And she followed the feeling without question.
Through bushes and mud puddles and broken leaves she ran, the icy winter wind whipping at her foiled hair and releasing her curls. She felt the silver ring come loose and grasped at it so she wouldn’t lose it.
Running and running, she dried her tears and kept her head high.
Now was not the time to fall apart, now was the time to focus.
She was getting closer, she could feel his anxiety…his fear…his love for her pouring out of his soul in mourning and regret.
Oh, Tristan, what are you doing?
Please don’t die.
Her feet pounded the earth as she traveled as quickly as her high-heels would allow.
Screw it
, she thought, kicking of her heels and flying barefoot through the trees.
Terrified and freezing, she ran towards the only person stupid enough to die for her.
Tristan Archer.
Tristan finished positioning the auto-rigged bow and set the arrow toward the outlined target in the distance. Tristan double-checked his calculations until he was satisfied the arrow would pierce his heart straight-through, slicing it in two.
After checking the wind, he left the bow and went to stand with his back against the bull’s-eye. It seemed like a million miles separated him from the tree he would die against, but he walked them anyway.
Once there, he placed his back against the target and faced the arrow pointed at him from afar. He took a few deep breaths, closed his eyes, and waited for his life to come to an end. The auto timer gave him only 90 seconds and, with those seconds, he chose to think back on the beautiful life he’d had.
Scarlet, her voice, her laughter, her love, her forgiveness, her hope…. He was more blessed than any other being to ever live.
And he had lived.
Now it was time for him to close his eyes and give Scarlet the chance to do the same.
With shaking hands and a nervous heart, he stood up tall.
His eyes were still closed as he envisioned Scarlet’s sweet face.
He could almost hear her calling out to him. He could almost feel her nearness and the peace that came with it.
A final feeling of serenity before his life went black.
He heard the arrow latch pull back, about to release, and took a final breath.
With his last thought, he prayed Scarlet would find it in her heart to someday forgive him for saving her life.