Alexis sat on the floor, leaning against the cold wall, and buried his head between his folded arms.

Maybe he’d be able to simply fall asleep, he thought … Fall asleep for a hundred years, like in the human fairy tales, and only wake up again when everything was over … when her life was no more. And yet, the bitterness that invaded him at the mere possibility of a world without her was enough to steal his breath away.

This is the correct choice. The only correct choice. Because he’d promised to return her to her everyday life and if he insisted in keeping her by his side he’d probably never fulfill that promise. She’s Human. Too frail. And she’s lost so much already … She deserves a real life, with someone like her at her side, someone who’ll love her and make her happy. Things he’d never be able to give her. His was a world of shadows and darkness, his existence all too broken and shattered. He’d make sure she’d be safe, he’d keep his promise to erase all those who might even remember her, and just like he’d intended to do from the start, after everything was finished, he’d end his own life, forever empty and incomplete.

And yet …

His mind was filled with her. Her scent surrounded him, torturing him with traces of her presence. If he closed his eyes he could hear her voice, close to his ear … hear her laugh, and get angry, and question him … hear her whisper sweet nothings against his skin. He could see her smile, see her blush timidly, see her stare at him defiantly. His being was filled with her, but she wasn’t there.

Right then she was getting farther and farther away, to the point that he could no longer hear her heartbeat, and although he somehow knew she was still alive, that certainty was nothing more than a distant sensation.

He only noticed he’d forgotten to breathe when he gasped for air, and the shiver that shook his body seemed to reawaken the pain that he’d been trying to forget. Something in his chest was slowly breaking with each ticking second. Part of him was dying bit by bit and the agony was so intense that he was sure he’d never suffered anything like it, not even during his captivity.

It will go away … It will eventually go away, he assured himself, banging his head against the wall in hopes that some physical pain might help him mask the other deeper pain that was slowly eating at him from the inside out. And then Aaran’s words rang back in his mind.

What was he so afraid of …? Farran? The Law? The sudden change?

Alexis squeezed his eyes shut when the answer finally reached him.

Above all he was afraid to hurt her … afraid of being unable to protect her from himself, from all the darkness he’d accumulated throughout the years, from how badly his own being had been shattered, from the madness constantly wriggling inside his mind. Sarah had cried enough already. He didn’t want to be the cause of any more sadness.

And then he saw her wipe away her tears, and her soft voice filled his ears again, the words tumbling one after another since his mind was too tired to put his own memories in order.

I won’t take a second. And you can get back your room.

In the end he practically kicked me out …

I’m sorry … I’m just being silly …

Alexis … Please …

Let go of me! I can’t do this!

I’ll go with you.

I’m here, Alexis. And I’m yours.

His eyes shot open at the memory of those last words, and before he could even know what he was doing, his body was already on the move.

How could he have been so stupid? So presumptuous to the point of thinking he knew what was best for her? Protect her … How was he even able to say those words if he was the first one to hurt her? She’d fought him off so hard but he had still pursued her relentlessly, until she’d finally given in. And then, when she’d finally allowed him in, he’d practically driven her out of his own house, like the bastard that had hurt her in the past. Sarah wasn’t frail! He was the one who had made her like that, as he invaded her life, destroying her defenses one by one. And, instead of guarding her like the precious existence she was, he’d just thrown her back into the world under the excuse that that was the correct thing to do. Well, the correct thing be damned, he decided. And if he was wrong they may as well address their complaints to the Fates. Human or not, Sarah Wilson rightfully belonged to him, and he would never let go of what was his ever again.

Pulling the collar of the overcoat he’d put on up and pushing a pair of sunglasses into place, Alexis allowed his body to become one with the shadows surrounding him and disappeared from the material world.