Chapter 334: The Things that Hurt the Most
Just as I was starting to sink into unconsciousness, Korra took a sharp breath. Her eyes shot open and she sat up, a hand flying to feel her back. I shook my head and drove back the blackness creeping in on my vision, unknowingly holding my breath.
"Korra?" I asked, my tail stirring nervously.
She yawned and rubbed her eyes groggily. "Xiviyah? Man, what the hells happened? I feel like I got run over by a wagon."
She looked impossibly vulnerable and unguarded, like a child waking up from a nap. Her innocence held such polarity from the destruction, grief, and darkness I just stared at her, unable to so much as breathe.
The poison had been purged from her system, leaving her in shockingly good condition. Korra yawned again and stretched, blinking rapidly in the harsh light of raging fires and explosions echoing in the distance. She tilted her head quizzically and glanced around at the city and then finally up at me. Her eyes had lost the befuddlement of sleep and were wide and scared.
"Xiivyah...what’s happening?" she asked in a small voice. "Where are we?"
I took a shallow breath, my first since she awakened. "Korra, I...I did what I had to. I couldn’t let you die."
She frowned and stood, flinching as a powerful explosion rocked the air. "What happened?" she repeated, firmly this time.
Before I could even attempt an explanation, a figure landed beside us, cracking the ground with the force of the impact. I shied away and covered my face as shards of stone blew out like shrapnel, leaving a dozen shallow cuts on my exposed skin. One hit just above the glimmering wound on my side, sending a burst of tingles racing through my flesh. A shudder ran through me; a little lower and I would have been on the ground screaming.