My eyes open at the closeness of his voice. I expect to see the graphic mess I’ve left in the foyer or hear guards marching down the halls ready to execute me at the king’s command, but instead, Nox stands in front of me, a beautifully cruel deception of reality. Color is leeched from him, his skin swathed in a shade of gray that reminds me of what he looked like when I last held him in my arms. When hedied. The memory forces me a step back, the room lost to the shadows pulsing and gray light seeping in around the edges of my vision.
We need to go.
“You aren’t real,” I whisper as I shake my head, hoping it will dispel the illusion. “I killed you.”
But Nox’s ghost follows me, closing the distance between us with a single stride. Dark magic curls around his shoulders and tumbles down his arms, the wisps stretching out towards me as if to link us by any means possible.You didn’t,Rhea. I’m here.
“Stop.”
I’m here, and we need to go—
“Stop!” My scream scatters the shadows, revealing the gore of what I did to Simon. Chest heaving, I spin away from it, only to face where Eve is laying, as if she is merely asleep. My fingers dig into my hair as I curl over myself, everything that I’ve been holding in and pushing back rushing to escape in the form of a terrible sob. “Please, don’t do this,” I beg, blinking hard against the tears in my eyes, the weight of what I’ve done pressing down on my chest as it slowly suffocates me. “Please, don’t taunt me with your memory. It isn’t fair to live in a world that you aren’t in. It isn’tfairthat you’re gone and I’m still here, and it’s myfault—”
Warm hands—the feeling soreal—gently grip the sides of my face, tilting it up until Nox is all I see. “Do you honestly think there is asingleforce on Olymazi or in the universes that surround us that could keep me from you?” His eyes bore into mine as he draws me closer, letting go of one side of my face to gently grab my wrist and guide my hand to his chest. Where a steady heartbeat hums beneath his ribs. “Don’t you remember what I told you back home?”
Of course I do. But the agreement won’t move past my lips, and my mind isso fullof my own grief and sadness and anger—so muchanger—that I can’t make sense of how Nox is standing in front of me. Of why my mind won’t just let himgo.
“I’m sorry that it took me so long,” he whispers, his forehead pressing against mine. When I don’t respond—when Ican’t, still sure he’s nothing more than a figment of my imagination—he leans back until his eyes meet mine, the silver in them bright. The skin at my cheek grows cold when he lifts his other hand, longing tugging at my heart from the loss of contact. But he moves to grab something underneath the collar of his black tunic. My brows furrow as I hold my breath, Nox’s heartbeat quickening beneath my hand. He pulls out a golden chain, andthat breath releases with a loud gasp. My engagement ring, the one that was yanked from my finger the night Daje and I were attacked, dangles from it, flashing pink for a quick second before the gray takes over again. My finger brushes against the metal, warm from where it rested against Nox’s chest. When my eyes find his again, tears limn them and his throat works with a rough swallow.
“Nox,” I whisper, trembling hands reaching up to cup the sides of his face, returning his gesture from earlier.
“I’m here,” he says, tucking the chain back beneath his tunic as he pulls me close, his arms banding so tightly around me that he is all I feel. Despite his hold on me, my inhale has never been deeper, and I want to stay here, in this moment where it’s just him and me and the realization that he’s alive even if logic tells me he shouldn’t be. But heavy bootsteps pound on the floor, growing closer and closer. Nox attempts to guide us towards the door, but I stop him with a hand at his chest. He follows my gaze to where Eve lays and though it's with reluctance, he lets me go, throwing up a wall of gathered shadows to form a barrier around us.
Walking to her, I kneel and rest my hand over Eve’s cheek, the tears I couldn’t form before falling heavily now. “I’m sorry,” I tell her, lip trembling as shouts sound beyond us, metal clashing with stone. “It will not be in vain.”
I stand and look to Nox, the menacing wall of his magic sinuous in its movements behind him. But he reaches his hand out for mine, and I don’t hesitate to grab it, following as he leads me to the door, the chill of the outside air stinging when it hits me.
I don’t question how he knows where to guide me or stop him when he urges me into a sprint. We cross the gardens and stone pathways into an open grassy area where three horses and three men stand waiting, dark silhouettes against an even darkernight. “They are with us,” he says at my side when I tense. But it isn’t until we are close that I see their faces and allow myself to believe they aren’t a threat. Brisk and Xander stand together, heads bowed as they talk. But it’s who stands off to the side that nearly halts my steps, my chest heaving and eyes blinking through the still present shades of gray as my magic coils deeply in my gut.Daje. His eyes scan me intensely, and I can’t say I blame him for the way he stiffens as we near.
“The guards are coming,” Nox says with a panting breath as we come to a stop. But they all ignore him in favor of staring at my bloody dress.
“Is it yours?” Xander asks, stepping forward and sending Nox a disgruntled look.
“No,” I say with a shake of my head. Through a strangled breath, I add, “It’s Eve’s.” His eyes widen, lips parting in shock, while Brisk curses under his breath and runs a hand over his head. There isn’t time for more of a reaction as our attention is drawn in the direction we’ve just come from, the guards pouring out of the palace in numbers that make my stomach churn.
“Go,” Xander says, handing the reins of a beautiful black horse to Nox. Daje mounts a brown one with a stripe on his face, which leaves one horse remaining. “That one is for you.” He points to the beautiful horse whose white coat looks silver under the moonlight.
“Xander—”
“No. I’mnotleaving,” he snaps, cutting Brisk short.
“You were identified by Dolian. By the Trusted,” his friend says, clasping his shoulder. Neither wear their armor, instead cloaked in black similar to Nox and Daje. My shoulders fall at the news. Everything that Xander has worked for isruinednow. “We need to lay low while the king figures out how he is going to respond. We can’t lose anyone else,especiallynot you.” Xander looks poised to protest, but Brisk shakes him gently.
“Come on, Sunshine,” Nox says gently, chin jutting to the black horse. “Let them sort it out while we get ready.” My feet are slow to move as the urge to use my magic chokes me from within. But I let Nox direct me to his horse. “Can I help you up?” he asks. I might have thought I couldn’t possibly have more tears to cry, and yet, at the question, more spring to my eyes, the pressure building as I nod my head. To give permission to touch me feels foreign now after so many months, but to haveNoxask? A man who knows my body—knowsme—better than I know myself? It feels…wrong. Maybe because so much has changed since the last time we were together.
Questions I’m not sure I want the answers to press at the back of my teeth. But as Nox lifts me gently onto the horse, making sure I’m comfortable before launching himself up behind me, I keep them trapped there. He’s here, and that should be enough, shouldn’t it?
“We’re going.” Nox’s voice is a battle ax that drops right at Xander’s feet. It causes my cousin to glance his way, neither man wearing a congenial expression. “Come or don’t, but we leave now.” Nox slowly wraps an arm around my torso, giving me time to protest the movement. Instead, I force myself to lean back against him, my gaze catching on the glinting armor of the guards heading in our direction and, beyond them, the looming castle. I want to call it a monster for the way that place took so much from me. So muchofme. The monster, however, is not made of stone.
“Go,” Brisk urges. Xander pulls him into a one-armed hug, and it’s the last thing I see before Nox guides the horse around and sends him into a gallop, Daje and his horse keeping pace behind us as we move through the palace courtyard and out an unguarded side entrance to the road.
It isn’t long before I hear the hooves of another horse and exhale a relieved breath, but it’s short-lived knowing Xander is leaving behind everything he’s ever known.
The trees blur from gray to night-cloaked green as we pass, and though the siren ring is gone, I find myself jerking in fear that the king’s commands will suddenly be activated and I won’t be able to leave. But as we put more miles between us and the castle, quickly losing the clamoring of armor to that distance, I succumb to the gnawing exhaustion that overtakes even my terror. And when Nox whispers that it’s alright for me to close my eyes, that he’s got me and he’s never letting go, I don’t fight the sleep that comes for me.
Even if I know, deep down and hidden within those dark corners inside of me, that safety—like hope—is a fickle thing.
Part Seven
