My Darkening Ember

Chapter Twenty - One

He returned with a rag and a thick log, plunging the wood into the ice. Then he marched to his bag and took out an extra pair of trousers, tearing them up.

"Won't you need that?" I asked when he started tying it around the log.

"Not as much as you need to get warm." He went back to the bag, finding two small rocks of granite.

I was getting warmer, but I didn't want to protest. I still couldn't feel my toes, even if they were wrapped in wool.

"Here," he said and handed me the rag, "For the throat."

I don't know why but my eyes looked at the rag, then at him and I held the gaze for a few seconds before accepting the wet piece of cloth. The rag remained in my hands, on my lap, along with the dagger. 

He began trying to set the log alight but to no surprise, nothing came of it.

I watched him try a few more times, wondering if I should offer my assistance. I had started many fires when Lau and I would hide overnight at our cave, though I had never tried in an area frozen in solid ice.

The sounds of rock grinding up against each other made me tense, but the annoyed look on Xander's face had me curious. He gritted his teeth and I narrowed my eyes watching him lose his patience bit by bit, the rocks slamming harder against each other because of it.

"Maybe it won't light," I suddenly spoke through the silence being cursed with nothing but obnoxious bashing. Then I began to shake, slowly my body was waking up.

"It will." He responded, sounding even more annoyed. "With a bit of my force it will," he repeated.

"Your force," I uttered too silently for him to hear. "Some things just aren't meant to be," I spoke again. "Maybe it is not meant to be lit. Maybe, I'm not meant to breathe past my cursed day. Maybe you, aren't meant to get what you so desire. You can't force everything, Xander. I should be proof of that." I watched him turn to me with narrowed eyes, but he said nothing.

 "I will die. No force will save me then." 

"Stop talking as if there is nothing to be done. I told you I have-,"

"You don't have a way, do you? Or maybe you do but it's too far away." I spoke so softly that I was afraid the poison was eating away my voice. "You shouldn't waste your effort." He had done enough, tried enough, for himself or me I would never know, but it was over.

"Are you ready to die then?"

I chuckled but found nothing amusing, "No, but what's the use of fighting? Life and destiny will have their way and if I was not meant to travel further than here, with you, then I'm accepting that."

"Bullshit."

"Why?"

"Why? Tell me how you accepted death and stabbed that girl in the heart. Why did you swim and fight your way to the surface? You have fought me every step of the way here, even knowing that you wouldn't get to live for more than a week. You killed someone...someone who was sent here to murder you. If you want to die, why are you here while she is at the bottom of that lake?"

Tears came because of his words. I had no idea what I wanted anymore, what I craved. I wasn't even sure my emotions weren't clouded by the poison. Were they even real? Or was I lying to myself like he was saying? I was a killer, a sinful, regretful killer.

"Acceptance? No, no Elora you want to live. You just don't want to fear death, so you're trying to accept its arrival so you won't act like a coward."