Alastair Von Vexx's Arc

Chapter 11 of 13

Alastair sat with Wisteria's head on his folded coat and waited for her breath to even out. The glowing list of names lay beside her knee. He watched her lashes flutter, then lift. Her eyes opened, but they did not find him. They looked past him, toward the wet stone box still dripping in the dark hall. Then she spoke. The sounds were rough and old, syllables Alastair had not heard since he was a boy at his brother's shoulder. He shoved back and braced his palm against the soaked sarcophagus to keep upright. The holy water bit his skin. Wisteria's mouth shaped his brother's tongue, pleading, naming him. The coffin would not need his blood after all. His brother was already speaking through her, and the lid behind his hand was the door he had been afraid to open.