Leoni reached into her pocket and pulled out a needle and a thread. “You’ll see,” she said.
“Well, whatever you do,” I panted, “can you do it soon? I’m not sure how much longer I can hold this thing.”
“I agree,” Driscoll yelled. “It’s really not easy keeping these trees parted. They’re very willful today and not happy about me bending them this way and that.”
Leoni ran to Loch’s unconscious form and crouched down. She glanced up at me. “You need to bring his shadow over here. He’s too heavy to move.”
“I’ll need Driscoll’s help,” I yelled back while clamping both legs tight around the shadow’s wriggling form.
“I was afraid you were going to say that,” Driscoll muttered, closing his fists and letting his hold on the trees go.
They snapped back into place, dousing us in the darkness of their shade. The other shadows let out gasps of relief and melted into theforest. Driscoll sprinted to me, grabbing the shadow’s arms as I clambered off it and grabbed its legs. The shadow bucked, hissing and shrieking, trying desperately to escape. We held on tight and carried it over to where Leoni and Loch waited.
“Line its feet up with Loch’s,” Leoni instructed.
I grunted as we pressed the shadow’s feet against Loch’s boots, and Leoni got to work while Driscoll and I held the shadow down.
“Just a little longer,” Leoni said, sewing the shadow’s feet to Loch’s boots.
I stared, fascinated. What an odd way to reconnect a shadow with its human. Gran had just pressed her shadow’s feet to her own, but maybe someone without shadow magic needed extra measures. I’d ask about it later when Loch was safe.
Finally, she was done. The shadow pulled and pulled and screeched, but it couldn’t get loose. I rolled Loch from his side onto his back, cupping his face with my hand. The blue lines began shriveling away, shrinking down from his face, his chest, his stomach, until they were finally gone. Like they’d never been there at all.
His eyes stayed closed, and his chest—it didn’t move.
“Why isn’t he waking?” I shot a frantic look to Leoni and Driscoll, both of them staring with horror. “Why isn’t it working? We got his shadow back.”
Leoni’s eyes welled with tears. “I failed him. I failed my court.”
“No,” I said. “No. You can’t give up. We can’t give up.”
Leoni pushed herself to her feet and walked to Loch, then pressed two fingers into his neck. She swallowed. “No pulse.”
“No,” I said fiercely. “We have to do something.”
I banged on Loch’s chest. “C’mon, fight. Fight for your life.”
Fight for me.
Tears streamed down Driscoll’s face, and Leoni sank to her knees, staring at Loch’s lifeless form in shock.
I brushed back the curls stuck to his forehead. This couldn’t be his end. Our end.
I pressed my lips to his and let out a ragged scream, my fists pounding into his chest. Sorrow filled me at the injustice of it all. That someone as good and kind and wonderful as Loch would ultimately die in this way: to protect me. He’d thought I was worth dying for. He’dthought I was everything. He’d come for me again and again. He’d allowed me to be myself in a way I never had. He’d believed in me so fiercely, even when I didn’t believe in myself. I was his everything, and he was mine. If he died, I wasn’t sure I’d recover.
That sorrow slowly turned to something more powerful that churned in my gut and flared to life inside of me. Heat flickered along my skin, dancing down to my hands that I banged into Loch’s chest once again.
“Poppy, what is that?” Driscoll asked through tears.
I slowly lifted my head and looked down at the sparks of lightning that shot to Loch’s chest through my fingers. His whole body convulsed, bucking and lifting from the ground. I scrambled back, staring at my hands and then at Loch’s chest. Spirits below, I’d probably almost set him on fire.
Suddenly, Loch gasped, one deep breath, sucking in a lungful of air as his chest rose up in a sharp motion. Driscoll’s and Leoni’s mouths dropped open, while I just sat frozen, unable to even breathe as I dared hope that maybe, just maybe, this hadn’t been his end after all.
Loch’s eyes flew open and he shot up, clutching at his chest, gasping for air. A cry escaped my mouth as I draped myself over him.
“You’re alive. You’re alive.” I repeated it over and over, pressing kisses to his cheeks, his hair, his forehead.
“Bloody fucking earth,” Driscoll said. “I think you brought him back.”
