Moments ago, Leander had been sure it was Eilidh. And yet, as he drew nearer and nearer still, his certainty faded – unbidden, he felt his footsteps falter. He sucked in a breath. The woman he had known so closely that night under the stars, standing shoulder to shoulder in the current as they poured small pieces of their souls into the glistening waters like an offering – if only to watch the river carrying them away – surely this could not be that same woman. Could it?
Please, God, don’t let it be her.
And then ––
‘Leander.’
There could be no mistaking that voice. He knew that voice – how could he forget it? And though nothing else about her now belonged, that voice still did. ‘I couldn’t find a light,’ the voice said, faint as a melody. Though sudden dread had slammed into his chest with crushing force as soon as Eilidh had murmured his name, the pity she feared seeing from him would never appear. Having recovered from the initial shock of her condition, all that his brown eyes now held was an absolute resolve.
He would not let the plague take her.
Leander knew intimately of its careening darkness – the way the fog of it descended upon the mind once the cough and the fever and the weakness had all but finished the body – and he knew that she was suffering. There it was, etched upon her like a tattoo made of cold sweat and dried blood and jutting bone, and still she had smiled for him. And while his determination served to steady him, it almost killed him to see it.
‘Did you?’
He came to stand beside her even as she looked away. “Yes,” he answered, placing the gentlest touch to skin that was drawn taut across her collarbone. “It’s right here.” And he smiled, because he knew he must – he must convince her that there was light enough left for her to live by. “I know someone who can help, Eilidh. All you have to do is come with me.” Leander made his voice as unwavering as he could while his ears twitched abruptly, his heart thundering with worry – but no, the sound hadn’t come from his chest – and when he glanced up, the dark canvas of foreboding cloud was suddenly emblazoned with a flash of electricity.
Something within him almost seemed to respond in kind – as though a bolt had gone through him, static skimming his veins. “Let me help you,” he said. This time he didn’t care if it sounded like the plea it was. Leander didn’t intend to let her out of his sight — maybe not even his life. Hadn’t it been her voice all this time, finding him through fever-dreams and moments of striking clarity alike? He knew that she was tied to the meadow and to the river, tied to the bones in a grave upon which she had readily lain – but now she was here.
“I’ll take care of you,” he promised as the rain started to fall.
Perhaps he could move mountains, too.
