Free Noah by Jacquelyn Frank Page B

unthinking of those he guarded.
    But it was too late.
    That strange distortion of sight suddenly overwhelmed the Demon King once more. Everything faded and twisted, and that rending sensation of being picked apart one cell at a time bolted through him. In all the times he’d adjusted his form on a molecular level, he had never experienced such agony and such a lack of control. He tried to breathe, but had no lungs with which to do so. Not in that moment.
    The next instant he could, and the deep reflexive breath that followed carried the overwhelming scent of burning herbs and candles. He lost track of those he held for a moment, but soon was aware of all three of them crashing down hard onto the velvety pillows that covered the floor of Corrine’s sanctum.
    Corrine was coughing harshly, and then he felt her grasping at the sleeve of his shirt, clearly just as blind as he was once more.
    “What the hell just happened?” she managed to say hoarsely.
    That told Noah that this was far from the response Corrine had been expecting, though he’d already assumed as much. He finally found Leah, cradling her close to his chest again as her little body was racked with coughing. He rubbed violently at his eyes, trying to force himself to see. It did little good, so he was compelled to take a seat, with Leah on his lap and Corrine leaning heavily against him, and wait his eyesight out.
    Just then a sharp distortion of air blew into them, followed by the unmistakable odor of sulfur and smoke that cut through the aroma of burning herbs.
    “Kane!” Corrine cried out her husband’s name, recognizing his arrival even though she couldn’t see him.
    “Corr! Noah! What the hell happened?”
    Noah felt Corrine’s presence and warmth being drawn away from him. He blinked in the direction of her energy signature and the copper red of her hair suddenly came into blurry focus. He immediately turned his attention to Leah, continuing to blink away the weakness of his eyes as he tried to examine the child for injury.
    “Kane, are they injured?” he demanded of the younger Demon.
    “No,” Kane assured him as he kneeled to inspect Leah. “Covered in soot, but otherwise no worse for the wear. Are you okay?”
    Noah had no idea how he could possibly answer that question. Relieved of his urgent worry over Leah and Corrine, the full implication of what had happened, of what he had just witnessed, weighed on him with a sudden and bright devastation he could remember feeling only at the worst moments in his long life. And yet this was somehow much keener. It sliced through flesh and bone and straight into the depths of his soul.
    He let Kane draw Leah from his hold, and then stumbled through the blur of pillows and candlelight until he could touch a wall. He pressed his fingers into the lush velvet covering the wood paneling. The thick pile crushed beneath the onslaught of his clenching fist.
    “Noah.”
    He felt Corrine’s hands on his back, her empathy all too apparent in the tenderness of her touch. Noah couldn’t bear the comfort. He didn’t want to be comforted. He shrugged her off hard enough to make her stumble backward away from him.
    “She is dead,” he said, his voice far rougher with emotion than he would have liked. He ran cold fingers down his soiled face, focusing straight ahead until the detail of the fabric before him came into clarity. The truth of his words was devastating to him, and on so many levels. He laughed mirthlessly at the capricious nature of fate. “Now I know why I have not dreamed of her in a week. Those dreams are…” He swallowed hard, trying to tamp down emotion far too violent to express in front of gentle friends. “They were a connection that needed both sides to be completed. And now I just stood here and let it happen again!” He turned sharply to look down at the redheaded Druid. “You were right. I was so stupid. I wasted six months. If I had come to you when this started, she would have been