The Husband With many Identities

Danaya Valcrest watched the final blue line disappear from her grandmother’s core monitor.

The machine released one low note. A healer reached across the crystal panel and silenced it, but everyone in the emergency chamber had already heard the sound.

Lady Seraphine’s energy core had stopped and so as her heartbeat.

Thirty empty Energy Vials stood inside the brass rack beside her bed. Each one had been drained to maintain the preservation field surrounding her body. The Valcrest Family had spent more energy in the past hour than most low-level workers earned in several years.

But still, it had not been enough. Life is really precious, no one can buy it.

Danaya stood at the foot of the bed with her hands clenched behind her back. Her Level Ten core pressure filled the chamber, causing the flames inside the energy lamps to burn low.

No one dared approach her.

The chief healer removed his crystal lenses and lowered his head.

"Lady Danaya," he said as his hand trembles, he knows what would happen if Lady Danaya didn't get what she wants. "Her heart has stopped." The healer contiued. "Her core is no longer responding to the machine." 

Danaya kept her eyes on Seraphine, her Gradma who loved her without wanting anything in return.

Her grandmother looked smaller beneath the white blanket. The stern woman who had ruled the Valcrest Family for decades now lay pale and still, with a silver core regulator fastened around her wrist.

"How long can the preservation field maintain her body?" Danaya asked.

"Twelve minutes," the chief healer replied. "Perhaps fifteen if we connect more Energy Vials. But that will only preserve her organs. It cannot restart her core and heartbeat."

Garrick Valcrest stood on the other side of the bed. His wife, Mirella, held his arm. Neither spoke.

Several relatives had already begun crying. Others watched Danaya, waiting for her to decide what happened next.

Danaya had always known this day would come.

She had not expected it to come so soon. This is so sudden. She needs her grandma.

"Her core isn’t dead."

Everyone turned toward him.

Akeel stood near the closed doors with a worn leather case in his right hand. Rainwater clung to the bottom of his dark coat.

Two Valcrest guards remained several steps behind him.

He had not spoken since entering the chamber. With everyone focused on Seraphine, most of the family had nearly forgotten he was there.

Now the whispers began.

"That’s Akeel."

"Danaya’s runaway fiancé?"

"They finally found him? Where did they found him?"

"How dare he speak after what he did?"

Danaya’s core pressure sharpened.

The glasses on the table rattled harder.

She knew that face. She knew the name attached to it.

Akeel.

It was the face that should have stood beside her six months ago, when she waited in ceremonial clothes before Asterra City’s most powerful families.

Her fiancé never appeared.

The guests had watched the hours pass. Some whispered behind their hands. Others did not bother hiding their amusement.

Danaya had never forgotten the humiliation. But this man says he is not her fiancée, he is not what they are looking for. he is a complete different person. But they have the same face and name. Who is this man? Somehow she believes him. His mannerism is different, his aura is different. Is he really not her fiancée?

Now Akeel stood inside her grandmother’s emergency chamber, studying the machines surrounding the bed.

Danaya faced him.

"You have been silent until now," she said. "Why speak?"

Akeel looked at Seraphine.

"Because your healers are wrong."

The chief healer’s expression hardened.

Danaya took one step toward Akeel.

"After six months, those are the first words you choose to say to me?"

"I told you, I'm not him" He whispered, enough for her to hear him alone. "Your grandmother has twelve minutes," Akeel replied. "You can question me after we save her."

The relatives stirred at his answer.

Garrick glared at him. Mirella released a bitter laugh.

Danaya’s gaze remained fixed on Akeel.

"You believe you can save her?"

"I know I can."

His answer carried no hesitation.

The chief healer stepped forward.

"Lady Seraphine has no heartbeat and no core response," he said. "All seven of her primary energy channels have closed. There is nothing left to save."

Akeel looked at the dark monitor.

"You only examined the seven primary channels."

The healer frowned. "They control the entire core."

"Not when the core is collapsing inward."

The chief healer stared at him.

Akeel continued. "The secondary channel beneath her left shoulder is still holding a trace of energy. Your scanning pulse is passing over it."

The chief healer checked the monitor.

"There is no reading."

"Because the current is too weak for the machine to separate from the preservation field."

Mirella stepped away from Garrick.

"And who are you to challenge the finest healers in Asterra City?" she asked. "You disappeared before your wedding. That does not make you a core expert."

Akeel did not look at her.

"If I were wrong, the regulator on Seraphine’s wrist would already be dark."

Danaya looked down.

The silver regulator appeared lifeless at first. Then she noticed a faint light beneath its cracked surface.

It was weak, but it was there.

The chief healer hurried to Seraphine’s side and examined the regulator.

"That could be leftover energy from the preservation field," he said.

"It could be," Akeel replied. "Or it could be the final current keeping her core from dying."

Danaya looked at the timer.

Eleven minutes remained.

"What do you need?" she asked.