There wasn’t any time to waste waiting for her. If she left him to bleed out, then she left. He tried not to think about the possibility - she was Holy aligned, a member of the church. Someone who should rightly turn him away, but he had faith in her when he had none in anyone else.
(Aspel and Li and Wolfe. They knew this side of him. If they turned him away, it wouldn’t be for this.)
He stepped back, concentrated, readying another Unholy Sacrifice, feeling the Dark gather around him. And with the dark came Araceli's Light, a blanket of white magic to wrap him and his injuries and hold them tight. A premature Curaga sapped her of energy (her arithmetician learnings having taught her of slow and steady) but still she stood without shaking and hoped this would hold him over until the next change she had enough for a spell.
The feeling of the Light wrapping around him was familiar enough, and as the wounds closed, he unleashed his attack. The monster’s stone exterior cracked, splinters cobwebbing up its chest and down its arms and legs. One more, he thought. One more and it’ll go down.
His shoulder burned from the consecutive attacks, and blood trickled down his face. Still, he licked his lips and gathered one last attack. The Dark came easier this time, but he didn’t call forth Unholy Sacrifice - it wasn’t needed, would be overkill. Instead, he adjusted his grip on his ax and lashed out, his Abyssal Blade striking true and the Babil splintered, cracked and crumbled.
As that monster fell, another roared in response called by the sound of the Babel breaking. Not yet. She could not heal him yet; her gut wrenched at the sight of his injuries. The wait had to pay off. “Are you—” Before she could finish the question, a second beast hurtled towards them.
Holding her breath, Araceli swerved to avoid the incoming tortoise, its stomps sending her flying towards Jareth. Like flying.
“Celi!” Instinctually, he widened his arms, his ax dropping to the ground, catching her and pulling her to him. His breathing was ragged - scared - as he looked her over. She didn’t look any worse off, but he ran his hands down her shoulders, anyway. The ground tremored and he brought his attention back to the Adamantitan; there was no way he could take that down alone.
There was also no way he could ask Celi to help.
Fuck.
“You need to run.”
“But what about you?” Her hands rose up to meet his. Always leaving him. Was this the past again?
“I’ll be fine,” he lied. The best he could hope to do against that thing was wound it and then run, but even then, he wasn’t sure if he could do it. If Celi stayed, kept him whole, then maybe…
No. He couldn’t put her at risk like that.
Araceli frowned, a soft crease furrowing her brow. The shortest of moments passed as she weighed the options. As a healer, she was needed elsewhere, anywhere in these times of emergencies; she could not fall here and leave the city without help. But she could not leave him either, could not resign herself to have him fall.
“No,” she said firmly, her voice steady but not argumentative, as plain as if she was telling him the weather. “I can stay.” She gripped his hands tighter, sending a wave of Cure over them both, before letting go. There was no time to waste.
He growled in frustration, but there just wasn’t time to argue with her. His hands dropped and he took a step back so that he was no longer touching her. “Stay behind me, then,” he told her, bending to retrieve his dropped weapon. “If you know any spells that will take it down, cast.”
No directive to keep him healed (but this was her priority regardless). Just the instruction to keep focused.
One quick nod and he ran out to meet the monster.
She held her breath, nodded in response. They began again (the fight, restart their relationship of ten years ago or ten years counting).
Her hands glowed with white magic; dark tendrils wrapped around him. They could make it through this, she believed. The adamantitan had size on its side, but they had each other.