It was not enough. The curses had dimmed his power. There were too many. And some seemed immune to even his shadows. They barreled toward him, and Isla knew how these injuries worked. They rotted flesh and bone and did not heal. How many times had he already been struck?
The scar ran across the ground, for as far as she could see. Grim said it went across all of Nightshade. Right there, so close, was a village Grim had told her about—the one that had been deemed safe. Dreks swooped down into the streets. Cries. Children.
Grim looked up, as if sensing her. And Isla had the feeling that no matter where they were, even on a battlefield, he would always be able to find her.
Horror. Pure, unfiltered horror, and devastation, to find her here, in a place where everything would soon be dead.
Then—surprise.
Understanding. He had taken her starstick. There was only one way she could possibly be here.
They stared at each other, and for just a moment, it was like no one else was there. Just them. No dreks. No soldiers.
He looked at her like she was the beginning and end of his world, and he smiled—smiled because he had found love, even if it was just before he died.
Grim closed his eyes, and she knew what he was going to do. He was going to portal her away. He was going to die.
Before he could, a drek pierced his chest. Its talons went right through him.
She screamed, and it didn’t sound human; it sounded like scratching the night sky with a blade, like pain spun into a sound.
Other dreks shot down. Grim roared, and they all descended, seeing their chance. They gripped him by the shoulders, and his head went limp. They were going to tear him in two—
No.
No.
Isla didn’t hesitate before she took the sword in her hands—and dug it deep into the ground before her.
Nothing happened, not right away. She didn’t know how to break the curse, she didn’t know what to do, but she was desperate.
And there was something there. Something strange and twisted.
Isla grabbed it.
Her pain provided passage. Everything she was made of spilled out. The sword shook beneath her hands. Then, her fingers slipped, and when her hands hit the ground, death was unleashed.
From her poured an endless wave of shadows. The dreks shriveled and died. The soldiers became clouds of blood. Everything that wasn’t him disappeared.
Her darkness ate the world, and it had no limit. It kept going.
You and me . . . we’re infinite.
She felt infinite.
Power poured out of her like the ocean tilting itself to the side, unstoppable, uncontrollable; it raged and raged, and Isla kept screaming until it finally ran out. Because her love might be infinite, but her abilities were not. Her life was not.
It felt like she was saying goodbye, but she didn’t really care. Because he was there, and he would be okay, and she loved him, she loved him so much, she just hoped he would take what she was offering, all of the Wildling power she wasn’t supposed to have, because she knew he would take care of her people. Just like he had taken care of her.
Grim roared, and Isla sent her Wildling powers across the thread that bound them together. It was the last thing she did as she stumbled and fell.
Into his arms. He had portaled and caught her, and she knew he would survive his injuries, but he was searching her face like he was the one dying, and he was yelling at her, but all she could do was smile.
“Isla, come back to me. Come back.”
He shook her, and she could barely feel it; there was barely anything left.
Her body stiffened. Her breathing stopped. Grim roared.
“Wake up,” he said. His voice was thick with desperation. He was crying. “Stab me through the chest again if you have to, just wake up.”
She wanted to. She really did.
“Grim,” she said to him, the last of her life leaving her. She remembered what he told her. Pain could be useful. Pain was the strongest emotion. “Pain is not the strongest,” she said.
Then, her heart went still.
SACRIFICE
Isla took his powers. Grim’s shadows ceased, and he was hit by the full force of Oro’s fury. He landed on his back. Isla didn’t know how he wasn’t immediately killed.
Or how he slowly inched up, gasping for air. His hand lashed out as he tried to summon his shadows once more. He could not.
He frowned and turned to look at her with an earnestness that made her want to sink to the ground. “What is this, heart?” he asked.
She was sobbing, and he didn’t look betrayed—he looked devastated that she was crying. He was upset that she was upset at the fact that she had stolen his powers, readying him for Oro to kill—
She couldn’t do it. Her concentration wavered.
Still, she didn’t stop her hold on his powers.
Oro made a sword out of Starling energy. It crackled with strength, and he lifted it over his head. Grim wouldn’t be able to defend himself. She had weakened him. In one moment, he would be dead. He would be dead. He would be dead.
That was the first moment she had ever seen Grim afraid.
Just before the blade found his neck, he bellowed, “If I die, she dies.”
It wasn’t even his death that he feared. It was hers. Her death was what made him rabid, shaking, yelling, eyes wide and desperate.
Oro froze, just an inch from ending the Nightshade. “No,” Oro whispered, disbelieving. Furious. Understanding something Isla still hadn’t. “You didn’t.”
BEFORE
This is wrong, was Isla’s first thought. She shouldn’t be alive. Her body recognized it. Its life force had been drained away completely.
She opened her eyes, and Isla had never heard such a sound of relief.
Grim was kneeling in front of her. Her hand was in his. “Heart,” he said. “You’re here, heart.” It was like he still couldn’t believe it.
She had been somewhere else.
Now, she was back.
“How?” she asked.
His head lifted, and she saw tears in his eyes. His face was covered in dirt and blood, but he was here, kneeling before her, like she was something to worship. “You died,” he said, the word cracking. His voice was raw, like he had been screaming too. “You died in my arms.”
Grim closed his eyes, and tears fell. They made lines in the dirt and crusted blood. She reached for him on instinct, clearing them away. She had died. Were her people okay? Had giving her power to Grim through the thread that connected them worked?
She couldn’t cheat death. Grim couldn’t either. It didn’t make sense that she was still living.
“How?” she asked again.
MISSING PIECE
“You bound her to you,” Oro said, voice shaking with anger. With shock.
She remembered now. Grim’s explanation in the past. She knew binding someone to oneself meant sharing a life. Not just powers, but life itself.
One could not die without killing the other.
That was why, when the arrow had split her heart in two during the Centennial, she hadn’t died immediately. Not just because of the power of the heart of Lightlark . . . but because Grim was keeping her alive.
“It was only a temporary solution,” Oro said, voice shaking with anger, but also fear.
Grim nodded. “The other world offers a permanent one.”
That was the reason for this war. That was the reason for all this death. She remembered what Cleo had said. In the other world, souls can rise once more.