[Nikolai]
I was off the horse before it fully stopped, boots hitting the ground hard as I ran toward her.
"Isolde!”
It was the first time I’d called out her name that desperately.
I dropped to my knees beside her, hands reaching for her shoulders, then hesitating—hovering uselessly over her broken body.
From the look of the wounds, all three arrows were silver-tipped and she’d lost too much blood.
Her eyes were open. Wide open.
Staring at nothing with that hollow, glassy look that made my stomach turn inside out.
Horror. That's what her expression held. Pure, frozen horror.
My hands trembled as I grabbed her shoulders, shaking her.
"Isolde. Isolde, wake up!”
It was a futile move to say the least. Her body was limp in my grip, head lolling to the side.
No.
No, no, no—
My body
