She did as he asked. Davian tried to lock his gaze with hers, but she was obviously having difficulty seeing him through her tears and the harsh tremors wracking her body.
“I’m tired,” she whispered. “Tired of always fighting this ugliness.” She licked dry lips and then added, “It’s okay. I had some happy times.”
Fat drops slid down her bloodied cheeks. Davian’s heart wrenched. She was a mess. Barely breathing. Clearly in agony. And there was nothing he could do for her? He was the king, for fuck’s sake. And he couldn’t do anything to save her?
He stared at her a moment more, then a thought clicked in his brain.
“The necklace. Jade, where is it?”
A far-off look flitted in her eyes. “I had it on earlier.”
“It’s not around your neck now.” He needed it in order to make her immortal. If he invoked the gift this very moment, she might survive all the physical damage.
“I’m sorry,” she said on a broken breath. “I must’ve lost it in the woods when the wraith had me.”
His eyes squeezed shut. Damn it! There was no time to search for it. He needed to get her to the cottage where it was warm and safe. Then convince her to heal herself. But he wanted her to start with her head, so she could think more cogently.
“Just stay with me, baby. Don’t give up.”
“It’s too much.”
“You’re still alive. Still conscious. You need to focus. Think about the cut right here.” He gently brushed his finger along the edge of the wound. She winced. “It stings, doesn’t it? You can feel exactly where it hurts, right?”
“Yes. Now I can.”
He lightly touched the laceration again and this seemed to help her to register the precise spot.
“Keep at it,” he said in an encouraging voice.
“The throbbing,” she told him, “it’s as though he’s pounding my head against the wall.”
“He’s gone. It’s just you and me. Focus.”
“Why are you doing this?” she asked on a sliver of air. “He threatens your kingdom. You should be hunting him, not trying to save me.”
“You mean as much to me as my kingdom does.”
Her gaze slid away. “I’m so sorry I lost your necklace. Please search for it. By my house.”
“Don’t stop looking at me,” he demanded. “We’ll find the necklace. That’s the last thing I want you to worry about. Keep healing.”
Several tense minutes passed and then he felt the ends of her hair dry and thicken. After wiping his hand on his leg to clean it, he tested the wound again, but it was gone. So too was the blood at that particular spot.
Relief washed over him. “You did it.”
But her breathing remained haggard, and the very slow rise and fall of her chest told him her heart rate and pulse had dropped drastically. Her lips had turned purple. She was likely freezing in the snow, yet he couldn’t move her until something was done about her chest.
He wanted to yank off his sweater and press the material to her in order to stop the flow of blood, but he’d wipe too much of it away in doing so. And he’d further aggravate an already sinister injury.
Instead, he lifted her hand to his own chest, slipping it inside the opening of the sweater’s V’d neck. He flattened her cold palm against his skin, over his heart.
“Feel the beats,” he said. “They’re strong and steady. Try to match them with your own heart.”
She appeared exhausted and defeated. As though she honestly didn’t want to continue on. As if she’d merely humored him by healing the head wound.
“Jade,” he said in an insistent voice, his torment resonating—and eating away at his soul. “I want you alive and safe. I want you healthy. Happy. I’ll do whatever I must to make it happen, but you have to assist me in helping you. You have to repair your heart. Please. Do this for me. For you. For both of us. For…Michael and Lisette. Everyone in the village. Hell, even Sheena will stop speaking to me if anything happens to you.”
He heard the desperation and agony in his tone. Neither was manufactured nor exaggerated to persuade her to give into his begging. They were real, raw emotions that would have brought the Demon King to his knees, were he not already on them.