Mere moments after his telephone conversation with Summer, Connor startled as the woman he had just been speaking to, thousands of miles away, now appeared next to him.

Though, unlike Eliot, who had the benefit of the magically preserved vitae, or Kindred blood, in his veins, Summer had indeed aged naturally. Her long brown waves were now thin gray wisps, only reaching slightly below her shoulders, rather than to her waist as they had in her youth. Though her wide brown eyes were still soulful and alert, despite being creased with age.

“Take me to him,” were her only words to Connor, who simply nodded in return, once the shock of her sudden appearance had passed.

When they arrived in the cellar once again, Claire had painfully pulled herself up into a sitting position, the IV still in her arm, as it had now been for months, as her body raced to continuously try to heal the damage being done to her insides every moment. She leaned heavily back against the wall, having gently laid Eliot’s head upon her thigh, her fingers just barely stroking his chest through his thin shirt.

Summer’s face showed several emotions as she took in the nearly tangible pain in the other woman’s sad green eyes. “Claire?” she nearly choked on her name.

She attempted a smile through her pain, incredibly relieved to see Summer there before her, despite any history, and shared former lovers, the two had between them.

Turning her pained eyes to Connor, “Didn’t you tell her, Connor? Claire Beringer’s dead,” she managed, trying to hold the smile, which easily contorted into another grimace of pain.

Summer looked between the two of them as Connor gave Claire a sympathetic smile. Summer looked back at she and Eliot with a shaky breath. “I had heard you both were, actually.”

“Word travels fast, I guess,” she answered, blinking back more tears.

“So, if you’re not Claire, then who are you now?” Summer asked, sniffling slightly as she moved toward the bed.

She thought on Summer’s question a moment, both Summer and Connor looking at her expectantly. “Ravyn, perhaps,” she managed another smile before looking down at Eliot. “But if you can bring him back to me, Summer, maybe he can help me become a phoenix instead, someday,” she whispered, with all the hope she could muster through her red tears, and all that pain.

Summer took a deep breath as she moved to warily take a seat in the chair Connor had left near the bed. “So, before I even can do anything, I need to know what I’m even dealing with here,” she began. “How do you even know what a Paradox Realm even is, let alone that that’s where he is?”

Ravyn sighed quietly, “I don’t know what it is, not really, I just know that when I...” another moment to bite back another wave of pain, “when I looked inside his head, everything was all so...” she shook her head. “But the one message he could get to me was that he was trapped in this realm thing, and the only person who may know how to get him out was you,” she sniffled again.

“Looked in---” Summer just took another shaky breath. “But if that’s actually where Eliot is, he must have done something, really, really big,” she finished in a whisper.

Ravyn nodded somberly, “He did a lot. But remember that day, a few months ago now, I guess, when time suddenly jumped forward like seven hours or so?”

“Yeah, it was six am one minute and one pm the next. A lot of people were late for work that day,” Summer attempted a scoff to cover the worry in her dark eyes.

“Well, here, it went from ten pm to five am... in seconds. A lot of vampires met their Final Death that day, I imagine,” Ravyn whispered sadly, not even yet sure of how many of her friends and acquaintances, or rather, Claire’s, that she had now lost.

“And Eliot did that?” Summer restated, her worry deepening.

Trying not to get even more scared when she saw the look on Summer’s face, she continued, “So, I’m guessing this realm thing is that price that Eliot talked about? It’s some kind of... punishment?” Ravyn whispered, looking back down at him once again.

“It’s like a sort of jail for mages who broke too many of nature’s laws. There has to be some kind of way to keep things in balance, or else we’d all have conquered the world by now,” Summer attempted to make light of the situation to try and cover more of her own fears. Then she looked down and added, “Or maybe more like hell for mages, since there’s no wardens, except for the universe itself.”

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

“God, he did this to try to save me. And I’m not even saved yet, not really,” Ravyn raised her arm where the blood was still being pumped into her veins, only to wince in pain once more.

Summer bit her lip, “And I’m guessing that even if I can get him back, he’s going to have to break even more of nature’s laws to actually save you.” she whispered.

That’s when Connor interrupted, “What she needs saved from is hardly anything that nature can approve of either. Fixing it might even be considered restoring some balance. Cause this, this is definitely not natural,” he stressed as he gave Ravyn another sympathetic smile.

Ravyn bit back another tear, “Then again, neither is me still sitting here over three hundred years after I really did die.”

Summer sighed as she looked at Ravyn sadly once again, “Long ago, I told Eliot that I just wanted to fix things for you. Maybe this is my chance to actually do that, finally,” she continued in the same whisper.

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Summer continued casting into the morning, long past the sunrise forcing Ravyn back into her deathlike slumber once again. When she awoke at the next night’s sunset, Summer was still casting. Ravyn and Connor looked at one another worriedly, noting the obvious toll it was taking on Summer. After all, she was no longer the young, strong mage that she had been back when they had first met at the start of the century, nearly forty years ago now.

Finally, when the clock once again struck four am, Summer finally ended the ritual she had been casting for the entire day and night, her exhaustion obvious. “I need, I just need to sleep,” she breathed the words as she made herself walk the few heavy steps to fall into a deep slumber atop the cot that was Connor’s usual bed.

Connor moved quickly to check Summer’s vital signs, as Ravyn spoke just as worriedly. “God, do you think she’s...” she attempted, her own pain just as taxing as that casting had seemed to be for Summer. But her words fell short when Eliot stirred at last.

Ravyn was still in the same upright position with her back to the wall, as she had been the previous night. It was just easier to sleep like that than to even try to make her body move much at all, with that multitude of fangs still eating away at her insides. Eliot’s head still lay in her lap as the softest murmur left his lips at last.

Ravyn looked down into those deep brown eyes that he had finally opened again. Some combination of a cry and a laugh left her lips as she spoke, “You really gotta stop taking such long naps. That can’t be healthy.”

Nearly the same sound escaped Eliot’s lips as he returned her smile. He pushed himself up into a sitting position as well, being as careful as he could to not cause her any more pain, despite his joy at finally being able to look into her beautiful eyes again.

“I love you so much...” he whispered, “Ravyn.”

“What? How did you...”

“I’ve always known that’s who you would become,” he whispered as he leaned forward to cover her lips in a kiss they had waited on for way, way too many long years. When the kiss ended at last, he still held her close for a long moment. “And now, I believe I have a promise to keep.”

Ravyn swallowed as she sadly looked up into his eyes, fearing that he was about to leave her yet again. “You mean, to Hollister?”

He gave her a surprised smile, “Summer has long since fulfilled that one for me. And now she’s made it possible for me to fulfill the one I made to you, so very, very long ago,” he said as he let out a deep breath and carefully moved to stand. “To save you.”

Ravyn’s voice trembled at his words, “But, what if that triggers even more of that Paradox stuff? It nearly killed you, then trapped you in that place. Eliot, I honestly don’t know if it would really be worth the risk,” Ravyn pleaded for him to not endanger himself again for her sake. He had already spent over half of his life doing just that.

“Some things are worth any risk,” he told her, his tone making it clear that his mind was set. This had been his life goal ever since he found out he even could possibly save her. And that’s exactly what he intended to do.

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Eliot didn’t finish his casting til it was mere minutes from dawn. As he did, he too collapsed heavily into the seat next to the bed. His hands grasped the mattress in a white knuckled grip as the first few tremors of pain hit him, though he was more concerned with Ravyn’s state.

“Are you OK, Eliot?” she whispered as she saw him biting back a bit of his own pain.

“I believe that was my question,” he managed a smile up at her.

Almost as though just then being reminded of her own current state, Ravyn also managed the smallest smile. “Things feel really... strange, inside right now. But,” she swallowed, pondering her words, “the pain, it seems to be... gone?” she responded, surprised by her own words.

Before Eliot could add any of his own words to his relieved smile, the inevitable sunrise did come, and force her back to sleep once again.

“What did you do?” Connor asked in awe as he approached the bed from where he had watched the entire scene while also trying to make sure Summer was still faring as well as she could after such mental exhaustion. “I mean aside from ‘magic,’” he added. “What did you actually do?”

Eliot took another breath as his own pain eventually began to dull. “Oh I just killed them... all of them.”

Connor paled slightly, “I assume you mean the snakes, somehow?” he asked worriedly.

“But thankfully she’s asleep again,” Eliot breathed heavily. “Cause now comes the hard part.”