Vampire in Atlantis

said, grabbing Riley’s wrist. “We’re making her worse.”
    “Give it time,” Riley said. “They just got started. I’ve seen Erin and Marie at work with women in childbirth; I’ve seen how they helped me. We have to give them a chance.”
    “I’m not sure we have time to give them,” Keely whispered. She pointed to Brandacea, who suddenly arched up in the pod, her eyes still closed, gasping for breath.
    “It’s not working, Riley,” Erin said, clutching the side of the pod. “We’ve got to put the lid back on and get her back into stasis.”
    Marie cried out. “Now. We’re losing her. Put the lid back on, now, now, now!”
    Horace shook his head, tears running freely down his face. “The Emperor isn’t helping. Without it, nothing we do will matter. Once the stasis is broken, we can’t restore it without the Emperor’s magic. We tried before, you understand.”
    “What about good old CPR?” Keely said. “I’m not as ready as all of you to give up just because the mumbo jumbo doesn’t work. Move.”
    She shouldered them out of the way, bent over the pod, and prepared to administer CPR to Brandacea. “Riley, get over here and be ready to do mouth-to-mouth if she quits breathing.”
    Brandacea made a horrible groaning noise, arching up again, and then she collapsed back down and the light covering her body vanished. Her face, without the glow of light, was a deadly pale bluish-gray, as if she were a corpse that had died days before.
    Riley flinched back for an instant at the sight, before she put the whimsical notion out of her mind and began artificial respiration while Keely began the rhythmic push and release of CPR. Long minutes went by, Riley didn’t know how long, until finally she heard Erin shouting at her.
    “Riley! Riley, stop. It’s been way too long. There’s no hope. Riley, you have to stop now.”
    Riley lifted her head to see that everyone was staring at her. Keely had stopped CPR and every one of them, even Horace, was crying. Numbly, she looked down at Brandacea, only to see that the maiden’s eyes were fixed and open, staring at nothing for eternity.
    Riley shook her head, back and forth, as if denial would make reality change to suit her. “No. No, no, no. She can’t be dead, not because of me. No.”
    Erin took her arm and tried to pull her away from the pod, but Riley violently shook her off. “No! We have to try again. Try something else. Erin, more diamonds or emeralds or something. Sing louder. Keely, start CPR again. She’s not gone, she’s—”
    “She’s gone, mi amara ,” Conlan said from behind her, and suddenly her husband’s strong arms wrapped around her, as he tried to pull her away from Brandacea.
    Riley fought him with every ounce of her strength. “No! Leave me alone. I can do this, it’s my fault, I said to open the lid, take her out of storage. We had to try, but it’s my fault. I have to fix it. I have to save her. I have to—”
    “You cannot, my love. Some things cannot be fixed.” Conlan’s face was grim; a forbidding study in grief and despair. The lines around his eyes had deepened, almost overnight, and Riley had a moment of clarity in her own grief as she realized that the job of high prince was killing him. “She’s gone. All we can do now is find the Emperor and save the others.”
    Riley wanted to lean on him and cry, but she forced herself to stand on her own. She had done this. It was her responsibility. Her failure.
    “We need to help her. Give her a proper burial,” she said, and her voice only wobbled a little. Only a little.
    “No, Princess,” Horace said gently. “As you see.”
    She glanced down at the crystal pod, only to see that Brandacea was gone. Vanished completely, as though she’d never been there.
    “Without the magic to sustain her, the weight of thousands of years settled on her all at once,” Horace said. “She is gone, returned to dust as she would be if she had lived and died so long ago.”
    Riley walked over to the stasis pod next to Brandacea’s and stared down at the golden-haired woman inside. Merlina.
    “We won’t fail you, Merlina,” she promised. “Or Guen or Helena, either. No matter what it takes.”
    Conlan took her hand. “I swear to you that we will do everything we can.”
    “I know, because I’ll be there with you,” Riley said.
    Conlan shook his head, but Riley held up a hand to forestall any protest. “Ven said he couldn’t find Serai’s trail. I’m an