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Chaos rose all around them. Surging like a beast through the waves of the Undersea when Cardan ran around corners of his own palace trying to find his wife.
His pregnant wife.
Cardan, for all of his show, was not an idiot. He knew that Jude could fight and he knew that she could hold her own far better than most people, including himself. He knew that she was strong and she would take any hint of help as a slight to her strength but at the same time he couldn’t help the fear that pumped through his heart like a caged animal.
Jude tended to be reckless. She would fight anything and everything on the notion that she had to. That she was constantly having to prove herself to everyone around her. To secure her place as the Queen of Elfhame even though Cardan would try to explain it to her time and time again that she didn’t.
That she was perfect as she was and he would handle anyone that tried to say otherwise.
He was scared for her. He was scared that he would lose her.
Yes she could protect herself and yes she was better with a blade than him but he would be a failure of a husband if he did not try.
She had been frustrated with him already. Telling him outright that she wasn’t feeling well because of the child and she needed time alone. They had agreed that they would be open with one another when she first found out. He knew that it could be dangerous for her and that it would be stressful given everything else. He’d tried to take up more work.
It wasn’t enough.
It seemed more and more recently that no matter what he did, she was upset with him. He did not take it to heart. Instead, he smiled, he quipped, he offered her a grin that might one day cheer her again.
She needed time. He tried to be respectful of that. She had wanted to be away from him.
It was what had him now running through the halls of their palace searching for her. He wasn’t going to let anything happen to her if he could stop it. He was too terrified of what it might mean. He was scared that he would lose her. That he would lose their child she carried.
Cardan ran faster than he thought he could. Using his magic and having the land stretch his senses out around him. To find his Queen and Wife. He needed her like he needed the air. Like he needed blood. For as rotten as his heart was, Cardan knew it had discovered love with her.
He had to find her. He couldn’t stop until he found her.
Through brutes and assassins. Cardan was more trained than people believed him to be. No one knew about his trainings with the Roach. He was easy enough to pretend at being a spy. He could hold his own if he truly wanted and needed to. He was determined and he was strong. He was poor with a blade but he was sharp with his magic and tongue. He could hold his own with a dagger if he had to. He wasn’t the best, but he could manage.
He wasn’t useless.
He refused to be useless for Jude.
Cardan turned a corner to see his wife fighting back against a group of five attackers. All of them armored and masked. All of them armed with sharp blades that looked far too lethal to be normal. He saw her fighting. He saw one of them make a strike for her stomach.
She almost didn’t dodge.
In the span of time it took to blink, Cardan was there. Fighting and striking. His magic calling on the land to guard Jude and pull her away. To guard her and keep her safe from the enemies that they were facing against. He couldn’t be sure that she would be safe in any other way than this.
“Go!”
He wanted her to run. It was in Jude’s nature to argue with him. To fight with him. Especially now. But he hoped that for once she might just listen to him. For the sake of the greater good.
For her sake.
“Cardan!”
He spun too late. Feeling the edge of a blade bury itself into his flesh. In seconds the hall was collapsing against his attackers. Smothering and suffocating them inside. He didn’t care if their bodies were crushed. He didn’t care what happened to them. The blade pulled away with the hand that dropped limp inside.
He was not a killer.
He would be what he had to be to protect his family.
Fire lit through his side when he tried to take a step. His blood quickly soaking his clothes but he knew the black would hide it. He didn’t look wounded. He didn’t seem hurt.
He didn’t care that he was hurt.
Turning back to Jude he crossed to her. His hands ghosting over her and examining her for any injury or hurt. Any scrape or bruise and he would ensure that these attackers were all found and punished to the highest levels of his wrath.
“Are you hurt?”
He had to be sure. He had—
“You idiot!”
She pushed him. He barely caught himself when he stumbled away.
“You could have died. You can’t fight. You’re in my way here.”
He blinked at her.
“You were about to be hurt or worse.”
“I don’t need you to coddle me when you can’t fight with a sword.”
“Jude—”
He didn’t understand. She was scared. He knew she was scared. He could see it in her eyes. In the way she was holding herself. He had frightened her.
“I know how to dodge. You were struck. You should have escaped.”
He willed his hands not to shake.
“Come with me. We should both run. For our child—”
“I can fight here.”
“Jude, I beg you—”
“Beg. I’m defending our home. Either do that as well or run. I don’t care.”
It stung. Like a slap to the face her words bit into him.
“I’m not leaving you.”
His resolve stayed the same. He would protect her if she wanted him to or not. He would defend her and their child if she would hate him for it or not. She would be alive to hate him. That was the only thing he cared about.
That was the only thing that made him stop from pointing out the wound in his side. The blood that he could feel pulsing out of him and heating his skin as it soaked into his clothes. Cardan stayed with her. Using his magic more than he did any of the physical fighting. He was trying to guide her out. He was trying to convince her to leave with him. To let their knights handle the fighting. She was Queen, she did not need to do this.
All of his words only seemed to upset her more.
Right to the moment that she was heading into a fight without a second care in the world. He wanted to be angry but he would be lying if he said that he didn’t expect it of her by now. That he wasn’t used to her doing things like this. Sacrificing herself for what she believed to be the greater good even when it would end with her harmed.
Cardan rushed in with her. Both of them fighting in a blur of motion and magic that he could hardly control. He fought. Watching Jude in the corner of his eye when she allowed him to get close enough to do so. He wanted to be with her. He wanted to protect her. He wanted to help her.
The fighting ended but Cardan didn’t hear it. All he heard was the pounding of his own heart. There was heat washing through his body with cold chasing too close after it. He felt himself shudder at the feeling of his side. All too aware of how his flesh was moving over itself. How he could feel the hole that was torn through him. How the land had been healing him before he had diverted all of his energy to fighting to protect her.
The hall was beginning to spin around him.
“Why are you standing there?”
He was leaning on the wall. He was trying to convince himself to move. To stand and fight and he couldn’t seem to will himself to do it.
He had to do it or he would fail her.
The moment Cardan tried, he was falling down to the ground. His legs folded beneath him. His side swallowed in too much pain. He couldn’t breathe. He could barely think. His arms wrapped around his middle.
Through swimming vision, Cardan looked at his wife. He saw her glare.
“It was a glancing blow.”
She was angry with him.
“I’ve fought through worse, get up.”
It was true. He had seen the things she’d fought through. How she would stand and fight. How she would win. How she could do so much more than he could. He tried. For her, he tried. His legs were shaking. All of him was shaking.
“You came here to protect us, so do it!”
They were going to be overwhelmed. More attackers were coming. More people were surrounding them. Catching sight of him down on the ground and his wife now without proper aid. She was wearing blood of their enemies. She was only one person against what looked like an army.
He hoped the amount was only his vision doubling itself.
Cardan reached for the land. Letting his magic do the work for him and forcing his mind to ignore the burning pain through his body. The magic was reaching for him already. It wanted to try to heal him. Screaming in alarm that something was wrong and with the heat he felt moving through his side he already knew.
But he could either try to heal himself now or protect his wife and child.
Cardan had already lost Jude twice before. He could not handle losing her again.
“Go!”
He hoped she would listen. The land was shaking. Nearly a reflection of his own body as the intruders of the palace were being crushed and caught by vines. One of them dove between him and Jude. The land locking them away from each other in effort to save them both. He locked his eyes with her over the body. Hoping that she would see the pain and the blood that was now soaking his side despite the way his hand was pressed over it. He hoped that he would defend her. That this would be enough.
That she might forgive him.
And the world went black.
Jude didn’t dare breathe as the dust began to settle. Dirt swirling in the air all around her as she pushed herself up. The land had all but swallowed them. Crushing their attackers in the meantime and she ignored the strain through her body as she pushed herself up to stand. A hand coming over her stomach to try to feel for anything that could be wrong. She was far enough along now that it was a concern.
She knew that Cardan had been trying to help her but he was overbearing. She’d thought with all the apathy he’d had before that he would be interested and curious but not so close as he truly was. Instead, he was with her and doting on her every moment. It made her feel suffocated and even though she’d tried to tell him that, he didn’t stop.
He fret on her every move. Like she was made of glass and if there was one thing that Jude could not ever stand it was being seen as fragile. She had put far too much work into ensuring that the world knew she was something to fear. Something to be regarded and not taunted. And now he was determined to break that.
She knew he wasn’t. Not really. He worried and he told her that. She just wasn’t someone who knew how to be worried for.
She’d been harsher with him. Trying to bully him back away since her ask didn’t sink in the first times she’d tried. When the attack had started, she’d been alone.
She should have been glad to see Cardan coming for her. She should have been glad that he was fighting to protect her. Instead she couldn’t shake the thoughts in the back of her mind that told her he believed she was weak. That she couldn’t do it on her own.
She lashed out. She fought with him. She ordered him like she would order a knight if that was what he wanted to be. She argued her strength against his to make her point.
Now, she sat coughing. Feeling the burning through her lungs as she tried to keep her breath together. The silence that followed seemed deafening.
“Cardan?”
He would be calling for her. Searching for her. Doing something to get to her. With all the protectiveness that he’d been showing, he would not have just left. He wouldn’t be waiting.
The lack of answer made things worse.
“Cardan?!”
She tried again. Hoping that she would hear him through the wreckage of their home that sat all around her. Their attackers were dead, that much was more than clear. There was blood running down the side of her head. She could feel the tackiness of it through her hair. She had been struck and she didn’t know how long had passed from Cardan bringing their home down on top of them.
She wanted to say it couldn’t have been that long because the dirt was settling.
It had been several minutes now since she’d woken and it didn’t look any different around her.
She had no sign of her husband.
“Cardan!”
Jude worked her way toward where she had seen him last. Trying to figure if he wouldn’t or couldn’t get to her that she would then get to him. To see what was wrong. If the fight was still happening and if he needed help.
Instead, she climbed over a piece of wall that had become rubble and saw blood puddling over the ground. A body clothed in black laying atop of it. Unmoving. A tail soaked in it.
“Cardan.”
She breathed his name before rushing for him. Getting to his side and rolling him onto his back so that she could see him better. He didn’t move. He didn’t react in the slightest. His eyes closed and face turned ashen. His lips were parted just enough that she could see the red staining in his mouth.
“Cardan? Wake up.”
She’d said it was a glancing blow. She’d thought it was a glancing blow. She’d thought he was fine with how he stayed standing. How he fought. How he protected her.
When her hands found his wound now she saw something that looked far closer to what Madoc had given her when he nearly killed her. Her time had run out before the land saved her.
Cardan’s was ending now.
The land should have healed him already. It should have—
All of his fighting. Everything he’d done for her. He’d stopped from saving himself in order to save her.
Curses spilt from her tongue. Angry and terrified all the same as she pushed pressure to his wound. As she begged for him to keep breathing and his heart to stay beating. As she plead to the world to help her save him. To keep him alive and heal him. To make sure she wasn't alone after this fight. She didn’t know if it would work. She didn’t know when she still felt so much blood beneath her hands.
And then Cardan coughed. Weak and ragged and his eyes were opening. Gold rimmed slits that peered up at her and weak lips that tried to grin. He wasn’t moving. He was too hurt.
She smothered him in a hug regardless. Crushing their bodies together and clinging to him so he would feel her fear. Her desperation. Her joy that he was alive. Her apology for what she had done.
“Don’t you ever do that again.”
She felt him try to hold her back. She felt his shaking.
“Promise me, Cardan.”
“I cannot.”