His fingers brush over my wrist, and he touches the new sigil. He’s quiet for a long time; then he asks, “Is it gone?”
The tiny seed of hope in his voice almost undoes me. I stretch out a hand toward him and close my eyes. He breathes. I listen. It’s a quiet, open sound, no rush or hiss of water. My magic stirs, a gentle curl of power that threads between us like a question. I feel him: burnt sugar and black tea and golden sunlight. I feel the Corruption: hunger and poison and darkness.
It’s still there. Buried down farther than it was. Quieter. But there.
“No. It’s not gone. But it will be soon.”
Rowan takes my hand and holds it gently, stroking a circle against my palm with his thumb. “I know what you did to stop me. What did you give up to him, Leta?”
“It was—I—” But just like before, when Arien asked me, I can’t put it into words. More tears fill my eyes. “It doesn’t matter.”
He leans closer, searching my face. “It matters to me.”
“It was an equal trade. Nothing more than you gave,” I manage. “And I gave it willingly.”
His expression darkens. “Equal to what? What did you give that would match my life, and the lives of my family?” I don’t answer, but after a moment passes, I see the realization settle on him. “Tell me the rest of the story from the night at the wayside cottage. You never did finish. I want to hear how it ends.”
I swallow back a sob and shake my head. “No.”
“Go on.” His voice gentles, and he strokes my cheek, wiping away the tears. “Beyond seven forests, beyond seven lakes…”
“I can’t.” My voice cracks. “I don’t remember. I don’t remember anything of my family. I gave them up—now and forever.”
For a moment Rowan hardly moves. Then his arms are around me, a sudden embrace. I sink against him, my ear over the rapid beat of his heart, and tuck my face into his shoulder. I start to cry harder. He rubs my back, strokes my hair, kisses away my tears. “I’m so sorry,” he says. “So sorry that I’ve brought you into this.”
He holds me for a long time, until I stop crying and the room is quiet, filled with just the sound of our twinned breath. We draw apart and look at each other. I wipe my face on my sleeve.
“I’m not.” It’s the first time I’ve spoken it aloud. The first time that I’ve realized it. He changed everything in my life, the day when he came to our cottage. And though at that moment I hated him and wanted him gone, now I find the memory is colored with tenderness. “I’m not sorry for anything. Not that I met you, or that I came here.”
“Right. You nearly died. You’ve bound yourself to the Lord Under. You gave up your family to stop me from destroying you.”
“Actually, you wanted to destroy everyone. You were very ambitious.” I press my fingers against the sigil on my wrist. Inside me, the magic stirs. The promise of power is right there, the magic like a flood, ready for me to unleash when the moon is full. “Do you remember what I said to you, that day in the kitchen after I first summoned the Lord Under?”
His mouth tips into a smile. “I’m sure it was something nonsensical, about wanting to risk yourself while we all stood back and watched you.”
“Well, yes,” I laugh. “I told you this was my choice. I’ve chosen this. My sacrifice, my promise, all of it.”
“Leta.” He catches my face between his hands. “I’d never have asked this of you. But now that you’ve done it, thank you. Thank you for stopping me. Thank you for saving me.”
I run my fingers over the marks on his neck, the scars and the bruises left from the magic. Light flickers across my palms as I touch him. “Did you know this would happen? Did you know the Corruption would change you rather than kill you?”
His eyes shutter closed. “I wasn’t certain, but I knew it was possible.”
“So you let everyone fear you and call you a monster, because you wanted them to stay away.”
“It’s true enough, isn’t it?”
“Is that why you didn’t want me to come here?”
“That wasn’t the only reason.” He laughs, embarrassed. “I’ve never—I never really wanted to be with anyone, to let them close. I knew it was impossible, that I couldn’t ever ask someone to be part of this.” He gestures to himself, to the landscape outside the window. An arc of his hand to summarize his entire life: the danger, the darkness, the Corruption.