75 Ruby? Are You Still In There?

"Ruby? Ruby you have to wake up! You have to!"

Her head lolled from side to side and a lock of pebble-gray hair flopped over her eye but she didn't respond. He checked for a heartbeat again and found nothing. Not a single beat to reassure him that she was still here.

No. She couldn't leave him too. Not when she was all he had left. Not when she gave him something worth living for.

"Ruby…please…" Ash begged in a broken voice. "You have to stay with me. I need you. I need you so much so come back, okay? Come back!"

Vampires couldn't cry but he felt a deep-rooted howl of anguish building up in his chest. He was too late to save the only thing that mattered to him. She was alive less than fifteen minutes ago and he hadn't made it in time.

Cradling Ruby against him, that howl made its way out of his throat. It didn���t break any glass this time but every werewolf in the room cringed since none were able to cover their ears as they fought.

There were already a dozen dead on the ground but the fight with the stronger ones was ongoing. The werewolves that had finished off their prey either helped their brethren with other vampires in the throne room or went somewhere else in the castle.

Dorian began to laugh even as he continued to fight against his three opponents. "So you truly did love her? Look how far you have fallen. If you weren't so abominably weak you might have been able to save at least one of the things you cared about but you were always destined to lose to me.

"Even if you manage to completely destroy the Cromwell coven tonight I still won because you lost everything. You have always been pathetic and this is the final proof. You are not worthy of being a vampire, Ash Mayhew."

"SHUT UP!" Ash roared.

He couldn't handle taunting on top of everything else. Because each word that miserable excuse for a fae spoke was the truth. This was his fault.

Ruby was a bright, beautiful girl whose only sin was being born with dangerously desirable powers. She got on this monster's radar entirely by chance and it ended up costing her life.

Of all the fae in the world to make him feel something again, why did it have to be one that Dorian Cromwell was after? Ash hadn't been able to prevent him from stealing what he found most precious either time they had gone up against each other.

Vampires continued dropping around him but nothing registered aside from the fact that Ruby was dead while Dorian was alive. That could not be allowed.

As soon as he was dead, Ash would end his own miserable life too. He had nothing else to stay for now that she was gone.

His own weak, pitiful, bloodstained hands. The blood of both his coven and this sweet, spunky fairy was all on him because he hadn't been able to save them.

Ash buried his face in Ruby's blue-and-gold neck and clutched her even tighter as another howl ripped through him. This time was different though. His entire body glowed red and shot out a bolt of red lightning that ended up hitting Dorian.

The coven leader let out a screech of pain and was momentarily paralyzed to the point that the werewolves were able to pin him to the ground. He was too stunned to even struggle.

"How? You have always been completely inept at blood magic so how did you manage to pull off an experimental technique?!" Dorian demanded.

The haze in Ash's mind cleared slightly at those words. Blood lightning was a work in progress that Ariadne's lover had been working on with a couple other researchers. If his magic had been amplified it meant that Ruby was still alive.

"Ruby?" he asked urgently. "Are you still in there? You have to say something. Twitch. Anything!"

She didn't respond but he had a flicker of hope that would not be squashed. He could still save her! Gingerly setting her down on her back so her wings wouldn't be bent, a crazy idea that might just work popped into his head.

Blood control was about making the blood flow to the muscles change to they could be moved at will. The electrical signals being sent by the brain were disrupted so they couldn't combat the power of the magic.

What if Ash controlled the blood specifically so it pumped through her heart properly again? It was only a theory but it shouldn't be terribly different than regular blood control. Which he had never been able to pull off before.

He knew how to do it in theory and if he was touching Ruby so his magic was amplified… It was a risk but one he had to take. If he didn't she would die for sure.

Closing his eyes and placing all of his concentration on feeling the flow of the blood within her body, Ash did the hand sign necessary to cast the spell with one hand and laid the other directly on her heart.

He could do this. He had to do this. If there was ever a time he wasn't allowed to screw up his magic it had to be now!

'Come on, heart,' Ash thought desperately. 'Beat. Bring her back to me.'