Claws rake across me. Sink into me, sink through me. They scrape deep into my arms, my chest, my wrists, my thighs. The Lord Under grips my hands as the creatures tear through my skin. I taste blood, I’ve bitten my tongue. I taste the cold, ashen burn of my magic.
The creatures cut me.
I’m carved up, spread open, ready to be devoured.
They cut deep.
I think of shards. I think of knives. I think of claws. I think of sharpened teeth.
The Lord Under is still beside me. He holds me close. “Don’t be afraid.”
I call to the darkness. Come to me. The sigil on my wrist beats out a rhythmic pulse. The earth will be mended. The poison will be gone. Arien will be safe. He’ll turn fourteen at year’s end, have a cake shaped like a crescent moon. Clover will give him alchemy lessons. He’ll sit in the library and sketch patterns in his notebooks. He’ll be home.
And Rowan—
And Rowan—and I—
I remember how it felt to lie beside him in his room, in the moonlight. How I pushed aside the uncertainty and the danger and tried to forget everything. For that brief moment, when I was curled against him, I was only Leta. Loved and warm and safe.
The darkness gathers from the sky, from the air, from the trees, from the pieces that have poisoned the Lord Under. The ground beneath my feet turns to softened moss. The frightened voices in the trees turn gentle. I hear them whisper. They tell me the trees are hungry, too. They tell me there’s a hollow inside a new-grown heartwood, an empty space carved out for me.
But I’m not finished. I reach farther, up, beyond the world Below. I call to the poison that’s tainted the lake and the shore. The poison that’s infected Rowan. I call it down through the earth, through the worlds, and let it all in.
The darkness is inside me now. There’s poison in my blood, my heart, my bones. I’m bitten and bled and devoured. Piece by piece I dissolve. I am consumed by the dark. I let it take me. I let it become me.
At my wrist, the sigil burns. A seal on your heart, a seal on your arm. I feel a wash of colors, of emotions. Fear and elation. Resignation and relief. I picture the world Above mended and protected and safe. Everyone at Lakesedge—Clover and Florence and Rowan and Arien—safe. Because of me.
The Lord Under catches hold of me and I sink against him. Gently, gently, he lays me down in the water that has collected at the center of the stones.
All I can feel and taste and see is hunger. Darkness above and darkness beneath and darkness within.
“Let me go home,” I whisper. “Please.”
He bends to me, presses his forehead to mine. “I will.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The world is silent. A silence that swallows all sound. I’m adrift, far down beneath the water of the ink-dark lake. The waves rock me, soft and slow. They lift me up and up, until I break the surface.
It’s dawn, but the moon still dips in and out of the clouds. Silver light traces the shore as I’m washed onto the darkened ground. The sigil on my wrist aches.
Far off, there’s a faint light. A lantern flickers, a tiny flame that’s almost burned down. Someone stands beside it. The ache in my wrist turns to a steady pulse.
Rowan is waiting for me. He touches the spell. I feel myself, held precious in his mind as colors wash over me, pearl and rose and gold. I picture an incandescent thread, knotted between our hearts.
Waves rush over his boots as he crosses the shore and comes toward me. He bends to me, pulls me close. His breath is rough, unsteady. He’s crying. His fingers touch my throat, searching for my pulse. He lets out a sigh, relieved, when he feels my heartbeat.
His arms tighten around me, and he lifts me from the lake. He carries me away from the water, back to the pale trees. “Leta,” he whispers. “You’re safe.”
I try to respond but I can’t move, I can’t speak. I’m still lost in lightless silence. I lean against his chest, my head slumped heavily on his shoulder. I am a branch, a stone, a leaden weight. Behind us I can hear the lake, the hush and sigh of the waves. The sound softens as we reach the forest, replaced by the shiver of air through branches.
He lays me down beneath the trees. I look up at him—his eyes smudged with tired shadows, his throat marked by scars and bruises.
“Rowan.” When I speak his name, the tether between us glimmers. “Rowan.”
He leans close and brushes a kiss over my lips. At first, all I can taste is the lake. Beyond that, though, glows the tiniest ember, a little flare of remembered warmth. Honey, spice, molten heat. The two of us in the brilliant light beside the window.