The Sacrifice: Fallen | Loki | Book 2

Chapter 16: Frostbite

(Caroline's P.O.V.)

Heat.

My sky, crumbling upon me. A heavy, thick smoke engulfing me. A plan gone so horribly wrong. I felt it in my bones, in every cell, that he was there. I knew it for sure when my head started hurting, unlike any headache I knew. It was not only pain, it was damping, decelerating and it had happened to me once before. 

I gripped my head, rubbed my eyes, tried to fight it. I wasn't that strong. In an attempt to stay upright, I held to the wall behind me. My blood pressure dropped, my heart quickened in compensation. No, not again.

Fire cracked, stone fell to the ground above and around me. It didn't matter, he was so silent, I wouldn't have heard him anyway. In one instant, he was in front of me. His face, so frightening and unearthly, so terribly beautiful and unsettling.

I screamed, or tried to, but my voice was weak. My lungs felt full of water. Was he waiting? No, he came closer I believed. I took a confronting step forward, wanted to push against him, but before I could even make contact, my knees failed me. His hands caught me. 

"No..."  But a whisper. "Please - "

The last thing I sensed was his palm on my forehead. Wonderfully chilling. 

---

I hadn't awoken yet.

I was still trapped inside this darkness, his darkness, which was forming a cold prison around my mind. It was like an anesthetic, the strongest imaginable, shooting awfully slowly into my veins. This wasn't sleep, it was too empty and too conscious. I couldn't feel my senses.

Tom.

The only word moving me. Emptiness was painful, it was the absence of sensation. Maddening. I floated in nothingness, I felt like drifting into space, into infinite blackness. All the strings attaching me to Earth, my family and friends, my duty, my beliefs, all of them cut. I didn't weigh anything. 

Tom. It was only Tom there, and he was enough. No more strings, for he was a steel rope. My body stopped drifting. I have forgotten you. I don't deserve you. My body stayed where it was and I felt with relish as I regained a sense for up and down, light and dark, right and wrong. It was too good to be true, I didn't deserve this after all.

Suddenly, I fell. It wasn't the gentle rope, this was fast, too fast, I was entering the atmosphere. 

My eyes shot open then.

I exhaled audibly, air was so precious. My lungs felt free. I sat up and looked around me, I could've cried then. This chamber. God, no, this had to be a nightmare, and I would awake next to Tom any second - Tom! Where was he? 

"He's not here." 

My head shot to where this came from, it was hard to tell. In that chamber, it could've come from anywhere. No, this was reality, and he had me. A hundred candles lit the room, floating and standing, I knew this sight. My eyes followed the light to where it faded into darkness, a seemingly infinite room. There was no ceiling, the light ended somewhere in space. I imagined to have been there, spiritually, before I fell. Stars and planets and magnificent lights - I would've been in awe, if not for the circumstances.

An unbearable fear expanded in my chest, the blood shot through me wildly, I stared sweating. My body sensed what was coming for me, and it prepared me for a fight. I had to stand up and run, I thought, I wasn't bound to the bed. I knew deep inside, it was not because of the kindness of his heart, but because he had no need of restraining me.