But then, with a battle cry that made her blood run cold, he surged into a powerful leap and threw himself onto the Ancient.
They were too close to the edge of the cliff.
The forward momentum was too great to be stopped.
Alex's eyes flew wide when she realized what was about to happen. She squeezed them shut an instant later, as Seth and the Ancient careened over the ledge together.
-----"Seth!"
Kade shouted his brother's name, the cotton in his head from the blow he took having cleared instantly when he saw Seth locked in battle with the Ancient. Horror choked him not a second later, as they sailed past him at the cliff's edge and plummeted into the darkness.
There was a great rumbling that seemed to come from all around him, like the roll of thunder, only he felt it in the ground beneath him. Above him, too.
Then, the violent crack of ice and hard-packed snow giving way from the rocky crag overhead. The avalanche roared off the cliff, tons of crushing snow and ice, sweeping like a tidal wave past Kade's head and down, into the mountain's steep cleft below. A blinding, choking cloud of fine, powdery crystals rose up in its wake, chilling Kade's face and forcing him to look away from the snow-filled crevasse where the Ancient and his brother had fallen. Nothing could survive the suffocating weight of that much snow.
Kade felt soft hands coming around his shoulders, the warmth of Alex's body catching him in her embrace, holding him close. And behind them on the ledge, he heard the low sounds of voices. Hunter, Tegan, and Chase, a hush of murmured disbelief for everything that had just occurred.
"Kade," Alex whispered, her tone quiet and comforting. "Oh, God ... Kade." All he wanted was to wrap his arms around her and accept the love she offered him now, but his heart cried out for his twin. The thought of losing his brother raked him; Seth's sacrifice was too difficult to process. Too terrible to be real.
Kade extracted himself from Alex's sheltering arms and scrabbled to the sheer edge of the cliff.
"Seth!" he yelled into the rocky void, straining to find even the slimmest thread of hope that his brother might not be dead.
And then ... a dark, broken form, lying on a jagged outcrop about a hundred feet down. Moving only slightly, but alive.
slightly, but alive.
Hope soared in Kade's chest.
"Jesus Christ. It's him." He got to his feet. "Seth, hang on!" Alex gasped. "Kade, what are you doing? Kade, don't--" He stepped off the edge.
Alex's scream followed him as he dropped at a calculated leap, down into the cleft of rock. His booted feet came to a rest beside his brother. Kade crouched and swept the ice and snow away from Seth's battered face and body.
"Goddamn you, Seth." His voice cracked with a mix of relief and pain as he took in the extensive injuries that his brother had sustained in both the fight with the Ancient and the fall. Seth bled from multiple contusions on his head and limbs, but it was the vicious gash in his torso that concerned Kade the most. Regenerating from that kind of damage would be a challenge for the fittest Breed male, but for one in Seth's gaunt, emaciated condition? Shit. It didn't look good for him at all. Seth's eyes were closed, his body limp and broken. He was barely breathing, except for the thin rasp of air that wheezed out of his lungs when he parted his lips and tried to speak to Kade.
"G-go," he huffed out after a moment. "You can't ... can't save me, brother." Kade exhaled a sharp curse. "Like hell I can't. I'm going to get you out of here."
"No. Leave me ... I am dying. Already dead. You and I both know it."
"Not like this, brother," Kade ground out. "You will heal. I'll take you home to Father's Darkhaven, and you will recover from all of this."
"No," Seth murmured quietly. His eyes peeled open slowly on his pained hiss. "No, Kade. I won't." The sight of his twin's gaze almost made him glance away. The pupils were needle-thin, vertical slits bathed in bright amber. Seth's gaze was hot with anguish, a feral gaze. His fangs were still extended. The glyphs that were visible through large rips in his clothing were dark and pulsing with color, as though he starved for blood.
All the signs were there, but it killed Kade to recognize them.
From the time he'd last seen him, his brother had succumbed to Bloodlust. Seth was Rogue.
"There's no going back for me now," Seth murmured. "You tried to warn me ..."
"Ah, f**k," Kade whispered. "Ah, damn it, Seth. No. No, this can't be." Seth sucked in a short gasp and a violent cough racked him. His body shuddered. His skin seemed to grow paler before Kade's eyes. "Let me go, brother. Please."
Kade shook his head. "I can't. You know that. I wouldn't have given up on you, not before ... not now. You saved my life up there, Seth. Now, goddamn it, I'm gonna save yours." He turned his head and shouted up the cliff to Tegan and the others above. "I need some ropes. My brother's wounded. He can't make it up on his own. I'm going to need a harness to lift him back to the top." The warriors peered down at them, then vanished to carry out Kade's request. Then Alex's face appeared in their place, just the sight of her a haven to him, giving him a feeling of pure, honest love-something he'd needed more than anything in that moment. Seth's cracked, bloodied lips parted in a weak smile. "You're in love," he said, something wistful in his wheezing voice.
"Yeah," Kade replied. "Her name is Alexandra. I'm going to make her my mate, if she'll have me." Seth closed his eyes, gave a weak nod. "I would have liked to have met her."
"You will." Kade stared down at him, seeing a stillness washing over his broken body. "You have to hang on, Seth. Come on ... open your eyes. Keep breathing, damn you!"