I wish I could share their relief. It’s over, I’m safe, we’re all safe. But a heaviness weights my chest, and I can’t shake it off, no matter how hard I try.
The rain turns heavier, falling steadily through the leaves and over the lawn. I tilt my face to the sky, and the rain looks dark. Like shadows, like poisoned blood. My vision starts to blur. We reach the house, step into the kitchen. I take a single breath and let the scent of smoke, of spiced tea, of warmth ghost through my lungs.
Then the cold spreads over me.
I look down at my hands and touch the blackened crescent that scars my palm. It splits. Ink-dark water spills from the wound. There are cuts and cuts and cuts all over my arms and wrists and fingers. And my skin, beneath the wounds and the blood, is lined with darkness. Rowan gasps. “You’re—you’re—”
Poisoned.
“It can’t be.” I’m shivering so hard I can barely speak. “I mended it. It was gone.”
But I can feel the Corruption uncurling beneath my skin. It has teeth and claws. It hungers.
Arien and Clover crowd through the doorway. Florence comes in behind them, the blankets still draped, forgotten, over her arm. Horror and despair fill their eyes.
“This was how I stopped the Corruption,” I whisper. “I let it inside me. It’s still there. It’s part of me now. And I think it’s going to destroy me.”
Arien runs to me. I cling to him as he starts to cry. “You promised. You promised you’d be safe.”
Clover throws her arms around me and presses her tear-streaked face against my shoulder. Florence touches my cheek with shaking fingers, her other hand pressed over her mouth. They encircle me, and for one single, perfect moment I am safe and I am home.
Then the darkness closes in. I take a struggling breath past the poison snared like thorns through my chest. My mouth is full of blood. My vision is blotched black.
Rowan pulls me close. His hand grips tightly at my waist, his shaking fingers knotted into my skirts. “Leta, please.”
I wrap my arms around him and bury my face against his chest. His heartbeat is frantic beneath my ear. I know there’s only one way this can end.
I look up at him, blurred by tears. “Take me to the altar.”
“No.” His voice turns fierce. “No.”
I try to move forward on my own, but my legs give way. He catches me before I fall, and I sink against him.
Rowan looks at me with despair. “I can’t do this, Leta. I can’t give you to him.”
“He’s the only one who can help me.”
His expression shutters. His arms tighten around me and he hesitates a moment. I think he’ll refuse, that I’ll be here in his arms until I’m lost to the shadows. But then he carries me into the parlor, with Arien, Florence, and Clover close behind us.
Rowan lowers me down beneath the icon. I clutch a handful of his shirt, drag him toward me. I start to kiss him, kisses that taste of bitter herbs, blood, and ash. “I love you.”
He sighs a helpless, furious breath across my mouth, then he kisses me back. And in spite of all his fear and anger—he’s gentle, so gentle, like I’m a fragile thing, made of glass.
I put my hand on the altar, smearing blood across the wooden frame. I find the dwindling thread of my magic and draw out just enough power to light a single candle. In the icon, the Lord Under is sharp-edged and dark, his fingers laced with shadows.
“What have you done?” I whisper, desperate. “What have you done to me?”
The world shifts and fractures. I see Rowan, with his dark cloak and long hair, haloed by the pale light from the window. I see the Lord Under, with the heartwood forest at his back, his hand outstretched, a sharp smile carved across his face.
Both come toward me. Both take my hand. Both whisper against my ear.
“Leta.” Rowan sounds so far off, so far away. Like I am back in the lake, beneath the endless water. “Don’t let it claim you.”
“Violeta.” The Lord Under runs his claws across the scar on my palm. “You did this to yourself, my Violet. You let it in. Our worlds are mended, but the Corruption isn’t finished, not yet. It needs to devour you. Only then will it be completely gone.”
I bite down hard into my lip until I taste blood and see stars. The pain steadies me, bringing the world back into focus. I reach for Rowan and cup my hands around his cheeks. I kiss him as the poison spreads through me, so strong and hungry and ruthless that I can barely fight it.
He strokes my face, his fingers trembling. “Stay with me, Leta. Please.”