Black Blood (Series of Blood Book 4) Emma Hamm (popular novels txt) 📖

all colors into vague shapes. Monsters roamed in the darkness, and Pitch was their king.

He jerked her forward, hungrily devouring her mouth. He sipped brightness from her tongue, nipped pieces of her happiness from her lips, tried to crawl inside the haven of her body and mind.

And with each gasping breath, he drew out the effects of his siblings. He accepted their blasphemous stains upon his own soul to keep her pure. Anything to preserve the hymns he heard in her voice, the chapel bells of her smile, the salvation of her embrace.

He was losing form. Every bit of poison he drew from her skin sank talons into his control. His psyche shredded under the weight of anger and madness she had controlled with little more than lost eyesight.

“Pitch,” she whispered against his lips, “you’re taking too much.”

“Never enough.”

She wasn’t having it. His shadows swelled around them, and she sank her hands deep into the murky darkness of his power. She glowed. Her peace and serenity overpowered the madness of his siblings, of their power, of his own magic which desired to maim and hurt. She eased the wounds of the past and pieced together the tattered edges of his pride.

“Enough!” she cried out. The angry sizzle of her magic burned the edges of his shadows. “You will hurt yourself.”

“Losing you would hurt more than darkness.”

“You’ll turn yourself into something you're not.” She pressed her palms against his cheeks, forcing his gaze toward her. “I can see colors again, that is enough.”

“I won’t let them break you.”

“Losing my sight wouldn’t break me. Have a little more faith than that.”

He stared into her odd eyes, discomfited by the effect he had on her life. He smoothed his thumb along her jaw. “I have done so much to you. How have you not broken?”

“I see why you have done it all, Pitch. I understand why you had to do what you did.”

“But my siblings -”

“Everything is falling into place. To see the future, I needed her power. To desire to stay here, I needed you. And to see the world as it truly is, I had to lose my sight.” She leaned forward, ghosting her lips over his. “I do not regret your choices, although the pain and fear will sometimes crumble my resolve.”

He pressed his forehead to hers. “You are far too good for this world.”

“I was screaming only moments ago. I am not yet strong enough to save everyone.”

“We will do it together.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Pitch released his tight grip on her hair. He was afraid of his desperate emotions. Just the mere thought of losing her, that her pain had been his fault, sent him into a blinding rage so dangerous he wasn’t certain they would survive it. But Lydia had calmed him. Effortlessly, so it seemed.

His hands stroked the graceful curves of her horns. He smoothed his fingers down the silken strands of hair, across the beloved curves of her cheeks, the graceful lines of her collarbones.

“I am sorry it took this long to help.”

“You saved me countless times over, Pitch.” Lydia said. “You gave me back even the smallest bit of my sight. You have nothing to apologize for.”

Louis cleared his throat.

Pitch chuckled, shaking his head against hers with a rueful grin. “I thought we still lived alone.”

“No. You hired a maid.”

“I forgot I called him that.”

“He hasn’t.”

Pitch leaned back with a sigh. “Yes, Louis?”

“I just wanted to make sure everything was all right now. The lady was screaming awfully loud.”

Lydia tucked herself into the curve of Pitch’s shoulder. “I’m sorry for frightening you, Louis. I was in pain and wasn’t thinking straight.”

“You aren’t in pain anymore?”

He caught her wince before she answered. “Not nearly as bad as I was. Pitch helped.”

“Well all right,” Louis hovered by the door, hesitating. “Will you be needing anything else?”

“Go on, Louis. I’ll take care of her.”

Pitch was almost insulted that Louis didn’t leave immediately. One might think the Cat Shifter didn’t trust him. Why was it that no one ever trusted him?

Other than his own creations that was. Legion hadn’t hesitated to give over its body to his care. That was far more trust than just keeping a single person company.

Maybe he was just keeping company with the wrong people.

Lydia chuckled once Louis closed the door behind him. “Did you notice he got one last glance in before closing that?”

“Yes I did,” Pitch grumbled.

“He’s a dear soul, but he worries far too much for his own health.”

“His father doesn’t.”

Pitch shifted them. He moved up to the headboard himself, arranging her so he could wrap both arms around her too thin form. “You’ve lost weight again.”

“I’ve been sleeping.”

“I showed him how to hook you up to the feeder.”

“I think he wanted to make sure I was completely asleep before doing that. I don’t like waking up to needles.”

He didn’t like seeing her hooked up to machines either. Lydia had been weak for far too long, but he didn’t know how to strengthen her. He wasn’t certain if she would ever get stronger.

“I wasn’t gone that long,” he said.

“You were gone for a few weeks, Pitch.”

“What?”

“Time is warping for you too, I think.”

“I hope not, we have too much work to do for Time to warp.” He stroked the soft skin of her arms. “But I didn’t know I was gone that long.”

“I had other visions.”

Of course she had. Pitch longed for a time when their conversations didn’t comprise saving the world, visions, and doomsday plans. That would not be this day.

“Tell me.”

She stroked his chest, smoothing her hands down the soft fabric. “We’re too late. Malachi is already gathering his forces. He’s pulling together too many people from too many places.”

“So we need to distract him. Diverting his attention elsewhere would slow him down.”

“That was my thought.” He felt her lips curve against his neck. “I’ve been thinking about it for a while, and the only way to slow him down is a prophecy.”

“A prophecy?”

“Four people who are