Flinch.
“You killed him, you killed him. You don’t deserve to live—”
And there was the memory again, every detail as remorselessly clear as day. Robert standing there in yesterday’s jeans, his chin covered in graying stubble as he frowned, then said, “When did we wash the percolator last?”
His frown turning to a grimace of pain, then slackening.
See, whispered a tiny, crystal voice deep within Jen. See.
No, Jen wailed, her mind curling in on itself. Never again.
Medusa’s insidious whisper filled the world with whispers of guilt, shame, failure, regret, humiliation.
See, said the small voice. It was Jen. But not Jen.
Jen’s mind roused a little, in question. Who are you?
I am you, you are me. See the truth. The voice as pure as the sweetest bell. See.
And there it was again, the memory that cut like glass: Robert throwing out a half-drunk cup of coffee, muttering about how it
tasted like rust, then pouring another cup. He sipped, then frowned. “When did we wash the percolator last?” he asked, and then the slackening of his face as he slowly crumpled to the floor. He landed on his side, the hot coffee splashing over his legs, the mug spinning away across the floor.
Jen’s mind readied to flinch away, but SEE! The crystal voice called, louder than Medusa’s repeated accusations. The old pain squeezed Jen’s heart as she dropped to her knees in the coffee, babbling, “Are you burnt? What’s wrong?”
Robert gazed up at her, lips moving . . . then he went totally slack . . . Her shaking hands as she straightened him out and whispered the CPR rules, but her hands shook so, precious moments were slipping away before she could get them to function—too slow—failed—
See, the voice insisted, a higher note.
And she was back again, seeing him fall, the coffee spilling, the mug spinning away. And there was Robert’s ashen face, his lips moving as he gazed up hazily at her.
She forced herself to hold still, to look at the memory.
Then she saw it: he whispered, “Live.”
Then he was gone.
It was all there in memory, But she’d been too desperate at the time to comprehend it.
Live, he’d said, his last word. The last thing on his mind was her. His last wish was to give her back her life. Two, three seconds, and then he was forever beyond pain.
Now she understood.
Even if she’d raced to her phone and called 911 it wouldn’t have mattered. If she’d been a newly recertified expert at CPR, it wouldn’t have mattered. Everything the doctors told her about sudden blood clots and hearts—nothing had shown up at his last checkup—she understood now.
Yes, the crystal voice said, and Jen knew that voice. It was her, and not her. There was nothing you could do. He was in pain, and then beyond pain. His last living thought was to set you free.
The last of the guilt burned away.
Phoenix? she said cautiously.
You have healed, the phoenix replied. And we are one. Come!
The two of them swept through the sticky web of Medusa’s spell and vanished in a starburst, drawn straight to that mighty furnace that had been pulling her ever since she first flew over it.
She shot down and down into the heart of the island’s volcano, reveling in the living rock, the fountain of heat, of life. It was here that a phoenix, a firebird, could be reborn.
It only took a heartbeat, then she soared skyward, pausing long enough to locate her mate’s mental signature on the mythic plane. Phoenix reached for unicorn, and wordlessly sent back that part of himself he had gifted her. She and her phoenix were now truly one.