Vampire in Atlantis

chin.
    “Oh, my love. You are still that blacksmith at heart, aren’t you? I was afraid you were too elegant and powerful and sophisticated for me, a poor inexperienced maiden, but you are still my Daniel, aren’t you?”
    He looked away from her, scanning the area, the sky, the trees, the river. Anything to avoid looking at her beautiful, innocent, hopeful face.
    “I can never be your Daniel. Forget that boy, that stupid useless blacksmith. What we thought we had was a childish dream, and we’re both too old and wise to believe that dreams can come true.”
    “But, Daniel—”
    “No. You deserve better, and I deserve the death I was seeking the day I fell into Atlantis and found you.”
    All traces of her laughter and even her smile were long gone when he dared glance at her again.
    “Oh, Daniel. Older and wiser never has to mean hopeless or in despair.” She reached out to him, but he moved away and pointed to the red wall of stone curving away from them about a hundred yards off.
    “I know those rocks. There’s a hidden cave with a stone structure the Sinagua built around the other side, and it faces onto a small canyon. There are stone stairs leading to spaces with enclosures even deeper in the cave, and we can rest there. The sun will be up soon, and in any event you need to rest.”
    She shook her head, stubborn as usual, but before she could argue, she cried out and fell to the ground, her body twitching and jerking uncontrollably.
    Regretting his harshness, he raced to her and lifted her off the ground and held her close until the spasms subsided. Why not tell her anything she wanted to hear? If she died from the damn Emperor’s magic, at least she’d have been happy for a few short hours. He grimly called himself a thousand kinds of fool until she could speak again.
    “She’s using it again. The witch. The Emperor is still some distance away, but we’re gaining on it. She seems to be learning how to use it. I’m not sure how much more I can take.” A bout of coughing interrupted her and she leaned against him until it stopped, but her voice was hoarse when she continued. “Rest. You’re right. I need to rest. I can’t help any of them if I fall apart before we even find it.”
    Lifting her into his arms, he strode to the cliff wall and tucked her head against his chest before he climbed the steps carved into the stone face to the cave dwelling. He didn’t let her look up until they’d moved back into the cave and away from the opening, so her fear of heights didn’t further incapacitate her. He hated to do anything that might scare her, but it wasn’t safe on the ground, especially not when the sun rose.
    “Rest now, mi amara ,” he said. “We don’t dare have a fire, in case the vampires have human thugs working for them who would see it.”
    She nodded and slumped down against a wall, clearly exhausted beyond the point of arguing or even speaking. He pulled the blankets from his pack and made a bed of sorts for her, then lay down next to her and pulled her into his arms, so her head was pillowed on his shoulder.
    “Tell me about that tower,” he said quietly, but with an undercurrent of pure steel. He would know the truth of this.
    She closed her eyes, as if she couldn’t bear to look at him while she spoke. “Even the soft ground of the palace gardens is unforgiving if the fall is from a high enough place. I shattered my body.”
    He inhaled sharply, feeling something inside him shatter, too, at the thought of her pain. “How did you live?”
    She shrugged slightly, her eyes still closed. “How does anyone survive anything in Atlantis? When I opened my eyes, sure I was about to die, the healers were running toward me. Soon I was good as new,” she said bitterly.
    “All but in your mind,” he said.
    “And my heart. Please, Daniel, let it go. I can’t talk about it now.”
    He kissed her—gentle, brief—and then forced himself to let it go. For her.
    “Do you need anything else? Food or water?”
    She didn’t answer, and he was afraid she was punishing him, but when he tilted his head to look into her eyes, she was sound asleep. Exhaustion and weakness had overcome her, and he needed to keep her safe until darkness came again and they could go on and succeed in their task. Nothing else mattered until then. Nothing.
    But she loves me , a dark voice whispered deep in the recesses of his heart. She loves me, and I will never, ever give her up.
    “She deserves