Breaking Dawn - Stephenie Meyer [119]
I held the blackness of nonexistence at bay by inches.
It wasnt enough, though-that determination. As the time ground on and on and the darkness gained by tiny eighths and sixteenths of my inches, I needed something more to draw strength from.
I couldnt pull even Edwards face into view. Not Jacobs, not Alices or Rosalies or Charlies or Renées or Carlisles or Esmes Nothing. It terrified me, and I wondered if it was too late.
I felt myself slipping-there was nothing to hold on to.
No! I had to survive this. Edward was depending on me. Jacob. Charlie Alice Rosalie Carlisle Renée Esme
Renesmee.
And then, though I still couldnt see anything, suddenly I could feel something. Like phantom limbs, I imagined I could feel my arms again. And in them, something small and hard and very, very warm.
My baby. My little nudger.
I had done it. Against the odds, I had been strong enough to survive Renesmee, to hold on to her until she was strong enough to live without me.
That spot of heat in my phantom arms felt so real. I clutched it closer. It was exactly where my heart should be. Holding tight the warm memory of my daughter, I knew that I would be able to fight the darkness as long as I needed to.
The warmth beside my heart got more and more real, warmer and warmer. Hotter. The heat was so real it was hard to believe that I was imagining it.
Hotter.
Uncomfortable now. Too hot. Much, much too hot.
Like grabbing the wrong end of a curling iron- my automatic response was to drop the scorching thing in my arms. But there was nothing in my arms. My arms were not curled to my chest. My arms were dead things lying somewhere at my side. The heat was inside me.
The burning grew-rose and peaked and rose again until it surpassed anything Id ever felt.
I felt the pulse behind the fire raging now in my chest and realized that Id found my heart again, just in time to wish I never had. To wish that Id embraced the blackness while Id still had the chance. I wanted to raise my arms and claw my chest open and rip the heart from it-anything to get rid of this torture. But I couldnt feel my arms, couldnt move one vanished finger.
James, snapping my leg under his foot. That was nothing. That was a soft place to rest on a feather bed. Id take that now, a hundred times. A hundred snaps. Id take it and be grateful.
The baby, kicking my ribs apart, breaking her way through me piece by piece. That was nothing. That was floating in a pool of cool water. Id take it a thousand times. Take it and be grateful.
The fire blazed hotter and I wanted to scream. To beg for someone to kill me now, before I lived one more second in this pain. But I couldnt move my lips. The weight was still there, pressing on me.
I realized it wasnt the darkness holding me down; it was my body. So heavy. Burying me in the flames that were chewing their way out from my heart now, spreading with impossible pain through my shoulders and stomach, scalding their way up my throat, licking at my face.
Why couldnt I move? Why couldnt I scream? This wasnt part of the stories.
My mind was unbearably clear-sharpened by the fierce pain-and I saw the answer almost as soon as I could form the questions.
The morphine.
It seemed like a million deaths ago that wed discussed it-Edward, Carlisle, and I. Edward and Carlisle had hoped that enough painkillers would help fight the pain of the venom. Carlisle had tried with Emmett, but the venom had burned ahead of the medicine, sealing his veins. There hadnt been time for it to spread.
Id kept my face smooth and nodded and thanked my rarely lucky stars that Edward could not read my mind.
Because Id had morphine and venom together in my system before, and I knew the truth. I knew the numbness of the medicine was completely irrelevant while the venom seared through my veins. But thered been no way I was going to mention that fact. Nothing that would make him more unwilling to change me.
I hadnt guessed that the morphine would have this effect-that it would pin me down and gag me. Hold me paralyzed