“No.” He shakes his head. His voice is thick, water and mud and lake. “Let them.”
I draw back and watch helplessly. There is more than one way for me to be hurt—how did I not understand this until now? I thought I could burn myself down to save the world. But I never thought of what to do if the world burned all around me instead.
After a long time, the creatures start to change. They soften, becoming more and more formless. Finally, finally, they let Rowan go and seep back into the earth. He falls forward. The tendrils of Corruption unwind from him. The ground gives a final shudder, then goes still.
There’s no sound but the lap lap lap of waves against the shore. The creatures are gone. The wound in the shore has closed. The ground is black, still poisoned.
“Rowan?” I crouch beside his collapsed body. His shirt is stained with blackened blood, and his face is ashen. I can’t tell if he’s breathing. I press my trembling fingers against his throat in search of a pulse.
His lashes flutter, then he stares up at me with bloodshot eyes. He tries to push me away, but he’s overtaken by coughing. He curls up on his side, fighting for breath. He coughs and coughs, then chokes out mouthfuls of ink-dark water. He sits up, slowly, gasping for air. Spits out more of the oil-slick darkness and scrapes his wrist across his mouth.
“Arien.” He scans the shore, then sees Arien and Clover huddled beside the trees. Florence is holding a cloth to Arien’s arms; the contents of her basket are scattered across the ground. “Is he hurt?”
“Yes. I—” Tears fill my eyes. How can I tell Rowan—or anyone—the truth? “He was hurt, and it’s all my fault.”
Rowan’s expression darkens. “Never again.” He grips my arms with his bloodied fingers, fear and fury clear across his face. “Do you hear me? We are done with the rituals, with all of it.”
“You can’t give up. You know what will happen if it doesn’t stop.”
“Let it,” he whispers roughly. “Let it kill me. I don’t care. I’ll not have you—or Arien, or anyone—hurt again.”
He gets back to his feet, wrenching down his sleeves. More blood soaks through the cloth in dark streaks. He storms away, but when he reaches the gate, he falters and starts to stumble before catching himself against the scrolled iron arch. Florence goes to him quickly and wraps her arm around his waist. I watch him trying to shake her off as they disappear into the garden.
I go back to where Clover and Arien sit, and sink down beside them. I lean against one of the pale trees and press my face into my hands, breathing hard as I try to gather myself. The shore sprawls before us: cold and black and still. Clover rests her head on my shoulder and sighs. Arien stares out blankly toward the water. His hands are wrapped in a cloth, but he’s bled through the pale linen.
I’m relieved to see that the stains are crimson, not black. But this small moment of relief is quickly swallowed by guilt. I wasn’t strong enough. The wounds, the hurt, it’s all because I gave in to the Lord Under. I called on the lord of the dead, and this is what he did.
I thought I could help, but all I did was make everything worse.
Chapter Sixteen
Night folds around me. I’m in the hall outside Rowan’s room, a candle jar cupped tight between my hands. His door is closed.
A thread-thin gleam of light edges the frame. But when I knock, there’s no response.
I close my eyes and lean my forehead against the paneled wood.
The house is silent and still. I feel as though I’m the only one awake—or alive—in the entire estate. After we came back from the lake, Clover mended Arien’s arms, but his skin still looked charred and raw and ruined. She promised him it would be fine. She said it the same way Rowan did, after the tithe—fine fine fine. Hope knotted up in a lie.
While she worked, I lit candles, as many as I could find. In Arien’s room, I lined the sills and the mantel and the bedside table with them, and set them on the floor in each corner. Never again would I let the darkness come for me or for Arien. When the wind stirred through the walls, when it sounded like my name, I refused to listen.
Florence came into the room and dragged a chair over to the bed. Sent Clover and me away and said she would watch over Arien. I left him shrouded in light, sound asleep. I went to my own room and tried to sleep, too. But when I closed my eyes, all I could see was the ritual. Images that came in swift, hideous flashes. The claws. The teeth. The sound of Arien’s screams when the Lord Under hurt him.