Omega's Rebirth-Chapter 891: Aftermath ()
The room was eerily silent.
It wasn’t the calm, or easy silence. It wasn’t even a thoughtful silence deepened by musings. This was different. The silence in the room pressed down on Neveah on all sides.It was heavy...suffocating. Every inhaled breath ached deeply, like she wasn’t breathing in air but shards of broken glass that left bleeding cuts down the length of her airway.
It hurt. Terribly.
But she was used to it now. Pain. It was the one thing she knew best.
Neveah wasn’t certain how long passed by before she garnered the will to sit up on her bed again. She tried moving her upper body to a sitting position, but the wounds around her midriff burned, her muscles screamed in protest and her limbs felt like they weighed a ton. It wasn’t long before she gave up, exhaling a heavy breath as she sunk back into the sheets.
They felt coarse and unwelcoming, like grains of sand beneath her. A constant reminder that even now, just as it was before, this wasn’t home. It could never be. 𝑓𝘳𝑒𝑒𝓌𝘦𝘣𝘯ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝑚
Everon had checked in twice in this time, with tonics, painkillers and reassurances that didn’t quite feel like they had much effect.
Kaideon had visited a few times too while she slept, but no words had been exchanged. He only took her hand and held onto it, and after a while, left her to rest.
But Jian and Xenon stayed away.
She could tell they were close by, Xenon in particular lurked right outside the door, but he didn’t attempt to come in again. And painful as it was to admit, she was grateful for it. She wasn’t sure she felt up to facing them...she’d realized that when she stared at them, and all she could muster was that aching numbness.
She’d loved too hard. Too completely, that she just couldn’t wrap her head around it.
It wasn’t right. To be this way...feel this way, especially after they’d been parted so long. But she couldn’t help it. She couldn’t help this sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach, or the bitter taste in the back of her throat.
She had been the one to live, and he was dead. Like he deserved. Yet why did she feel like she had lost?
Maybe because living meant facing the pain, and devastation he’d left behind. While death, in itself, was freedom.
She forced away the dreary thoughts and gave it another go, pushing herself into a sitting position. Her midriff protested but she gritted her teeth, sweat beaded her forehead as she pushed through it till she was finally sitting, her back leaned against the headboard.
Exhaling a drawn out breath, she took a moment to steady her rapid breathing, weakly lifting a hand to wipe the sweat off her brows.
She glanced down, unsurprised to find a steadily growing patch of blood staining the side of her tunic. Moving had triggered her wounds again, but she didn’t pay it much mind. She would live, and that much was enough.
Neveah glanced around the room, only now did she take a better look at her surroundings. It was the familiar layout of the rooms in the Eclipse palace, but it wasn’t any one she had been in before.
She felt a slight sense of relief and gratitude to whoever had paid attention to this little detail. Waking up in the quarters Alessio had chosen for her, with its pastel walls and sickeningly sweet fragrance would have been devastating.
There was nothing she wanted more than to bury herself in some dark corner and never emerge again, but there were important matters to be handled. Matters only she could handle as the last living royal of the Eclipse domain.
She’d done her best to ignore the stench of blood and decay, carried on by the wind from the courtyard. And even the tension she could feel tightening like a noose around the Eclipse palace.
A domain without a ruler, a throne without a King. It was a disaster waiting to happen. And Neveah owed it to herself, and to every Eclipse wolf that had put their trust in her, to prevent that disaster from happening.
Enough damage had been done. Enough blood spilled. More than enough, truly.
Someone needed to draw the line. To make sure this devastating era ended right here. And there was no one else who could do it, but her. At the end of it all, she’d once born the name Lothaire.
But first...there was something else she needed to handle. Someone else...
Everon had made it clear she needed at least a week before she was anywhere close to being out of danger. He’d been very firm on his orders that she was not to leave this room or strain her body in any way, shape or form.
He had even pointed out that it was the sole reason they hadn’t immediately made the return trip back to the stronghold, but chose to remain here.
She wasn’t in any condition to travel, regardless of the means. Her body couldn’t handle the long flight, or the strain of space-defying magic in long-range portals.
Even so, this couldn’t wait. It was something worth ripping open her wounds again if it meant it would be handled in a timely manner.
Neveah slowly got off the bed, testing her feet against the solid floorboard. It took her a moment to find a stable footing to put her weight on, and rise to her feet. She held onto the headboard for support, taking a few deep breaths before trusting her feet to move as they should.
She made her way to the couch at the corner of the room, grabbing a coat Everon had left behind before heading for the door.
She didn’t get to reach for the door knob when the door came open on its own. Xenon stood on the other side, holding the door open, his brows furrowed in concern.
Their eyes met briefly and that sinking feeling returned. She was quick to avert her gaze, but she still sensed his eyes scanning her form, head to toe, and then twice over.
A beat of silence passed, and then he cleared his throat lightly, "Everon won’t like this."
