“He was the missing Lunar Witch,” I said, the words feeling torn from me. It was such a startling confession to make out loud, to voice it to someone who could confirm it.
My mother nodded in agreement. “He said he was your guardian, and that he would allow us to raise you so long as we took him in and told everyone he was your father’s son from an affair on the road. Nobody questioned it, because nobody cares when people like us have illegitimate heirs.”
“Could he be alive?” I asked, twisting to look at Caldris in shock.
“It’s possible,” he agreed, nodding. But if Brann had survived that day on the cliff, why hadn’t he found me in the weeks that had passed since?
“Whatever happened to your brother, you have to consider what he wanted for you. I don’t understand what’s waiting for you in Alfheimr or why he swore everything would change the moment you stepped foot on Faerie soil, but I know that he loved you more than anything. For him to make a choice that your death was necessary, I truly fear what will happen if you cross that boundary, Estrella,” my mother said, and I knew it pained her to admit it. I’d seen the anguish in her eyes the day they’d tried to sacrifice me to the Veil, and I knew my mother loved me.
I nodded back to her, tightening my grip on the sword before I turned my gaze back to the God of the Dead. “I know,” I said, sinking my teeth into my bottom lip and trying to push back the cloying sadness that threatened to draw me under. I’d never be able to do what needed to be done, not with him alive to heal me.
Caldris smiled, stepping toward me as he unlaced the ties on the leather and metal covering his chest. He dropped it to the ground as he took another step, moving closer until the tip of my sword pressed into the fabric of his shirt. “I told you once before, I would rather die than go on without you.”
I swallowed, the lump of sorrow in my throat making it hard to breathe. “Caldris,” I murmured, the anguish in my voice palpable in the air. We were too far past the point where I could pretend I didn’t care for him, that he didn’t own my soul. Even if I hated him for putting me in this position, for saving me when I hadn’t wanted it. Death would have been far more convenient than the horror that was coming for me.
That part of me that was his continued to reach across the gap between us, wanting nothing more than to stare into his blue eyes until my last breath. “Just promise me that your face will be the last thing I see before the darkness claims me.”
“You aren’t supposed to accept it,” I said, barely resisting the urge to drop the sword so I could punch him. “You’re supposed to fight me.”
He reached out, wrapping his palm around the sharp edge of the blade. His blood slid free as he cut himself, mixing with the blood of all the men he’d killed in his attempt to get to me.
To save me.
“Why would I want to fight with you, my star?” he asked sadly. “I just want to love you until my last breath. You were worth every century I waited, even if I only had you for a short time.”
I squeezed the hilt more firmly, clinging to it even though I already knew the answer to the question in my soul.
It was him. Always him.
I released it as soon as the thought solidified in my mind, letting the dagger clutter to the ground. It dropped as if in slow motion, as if fate itself recognized the descent for what it was.
The beginning of the end.
Caldris closed the distance between us before it clattered against the ground, stepping over the blade as he slid a hand beneath the curtain of my hair. His hand cupped my neck, my face, my mark and everything he could reach. Staring into my eyes for a moment, he lowered his mouth to mine and kissed me with the slow, consuming passion that we didn’t have time for.
Time we’d been robbed of, no matter what the outcome of crossing the boundary would be. He pulled back, staring down at me. “Let me take you to Catancia,” he murmured.
“But you have to bring Mab’s daughter to her. We both know—”
“We know nothing,” Caldris said, touching my lips with his to silence me. “I have to bring you and Fallon there to present you to her, but there’s no reason we cannot make a stop along the way. Let me take you to the frozen falls of Lumen. Accept me as your mate as you already agreed to do. We’ll stand a chance of breaking the bond she placed on me as a child. If she can no longer command me, then I won’t need to bring you to her at all. We could be free.”
His words built an ache inside of me, a longing I hadn’t wanted to admit I possessed. I wanted nothing more than to be free, except to be with him. The promise of having both seemed completely unattainable, with his possessiveness and the way he thought to protect me from all the horrors of the world.
Could I ever really be free with a male like Caldris at my side?
“Okay,” I whispered, slumping my shoulders forward as I gave my answer. If there was even the slightest chance that we could find a place that offered us peace, I had to take it.
The smile that lit his face would hold in my memory for the rest of my days, the shock of relief crashing into my chest making my heart skip a beat. He crushed me to his chest, wrapping his free arm around the small of my back tightly and dropping his mouth to mine.
His gaze held mine as his lips teased the flesh of my mouth. He murmured against them, the intensity and intimacy of his smoldering stare raising the hair on my arms. The words felt significant, pulsing through the silence of the gardens as the Fae Marked moved from their hiding place. “I am going to love you until the stars disappear from the night sky and the sun ceases to shine. Until the world returns to the void from whence it was born and chaos reigns once again.”
He touched his lips to mine as he dropped his hands to grab my own. Raising them at our sides, he pressed his palms against mine and aligned our fingers the best he could. My skin hummed with warmth as I closed my eyes, breathing in the deep scent of lotus flowers on the lake in the summer with a hint of sandalwood as the winter breeze washed over my face.
When he pulled his mouth away, I blinked up at him, the golden light radiating from our hands. Something in the magic required an answer, a calling I couldn’t ignore. “Until chaos reigns and eternity begins anew, and for every moment after,” I said, turning my attention to our laced fingers. Golden threads twined around the backs, squeezing them together until I gasped in pain. The threads cut into my skin, the red stain of blood trailing down Caldris’s skin in the same way.
“My soul, my heart, my flesh, and my sword are yours, and if ever there should come a day when your heart ceases to beat, I will follow you into the Void.” He twisted our bound hands, letting my blood glide across my flesh to touch the edges of his. The moment the first drop touched his blood, the golden threads tightened suddenly and then burst out in a sudden wave of light.
He lowered our hands to our sides, releasing mine so that I could raise it and stare at the crisscrossing marks the threads had left. The blood was gone, and if it hadn’t been for the golden lines shimmering from under my skin, I might have thought it had all been a figment of my imagination.
“What have you done?” Imelda asked, stepping forward through the hush in the group that had gathered to watch. She took my hand in hers, running her fingers over the faint gold lines and turning a wide, white-eyed stare to me finally. She stepped back, dropping her hands to her sides slowly.