“And now she’s alive.”
Oh my god. Oh myactualgod. There is no talking to him. The conversation is already dead on arrival. I press my fingers to my temples, inhaling deeply, trying to push past the overwhelming frustration crawling up my spine.
At some point, the three of them climb into the car, leaving the door open for me. And when I apparently stand here too long, silently fuming, Talon comes back to get me.
“Come on, Little Grim,” he coaxes.
Fuck his softness. Fuck his voice. Fuck everything about this night.
“Fuck you,” I spit at him. And to really drive my point home, Pain—my beautiful, vicious raven—circles overhead before letting loose a white-hot spiritual shit aimed right at Talon.
Of course, being a spectral bird, it doesn’t actually hit him. It phases right through him, straight into the abyss, probably reappearing in some unfortunate dimension. But it’s the thought that counts.
Talon’s mismatched eyes go wide for half a second before he sighs. “Don’t be like this,” he says. “Just get in the car, and everything will be fine.”
“Is that a threat?” I snarl. The anger is bubbling up, too big for my body, too much for my nonexistent lungs to contain. “You think you can make me?”
Talon’s smirk flickers for the briefest moment before it returns, lazy and amused—but now there’s a hint of wariness behind it.
“Not a threat, Little Grim. Just a reality check.” He tilts his head slightly. “You’re mad, I get it. But it’s done. She’s alive. No use throwing a tantrum about it.”
I want to rip his entire head off.
“You interfered,” I snap. “You have no idea what you’ve done. The balance—”
“Oh, spare me the lecture,” Talon interrupts, rolling his eyes. “No one’s gonna smite us for saving one girl.”
I growl under my breath. “You don’t know that.”
Nathaniel leans out of the car, arms resting on the open door. “Get in, Skye,” he says calmly. Not an order, not a plea. Just a fact. Like he already knows I will. Like it’s inevitable.
I narrow my eyes. “And if I don’t?”
His expression doesn’t change. “Then we'll make you.”
Fury coils tight in my chest. Oh, that’s just cute. I phase straight through the door, just to be petty, landing in the seat with my arms crossed so tight my non-existent nails would’ve dug into my non-existent skin. Talon slides in after me, completely unfazed—like phasing through solid objects is just another thing I do to behot—and Cassian pulls away from the curb without a word.
The drive back is silent.
It’s not until we pull up to the abandoned hospital, the engine still humming, that I finally speak.
“You lied to me,” I say, voice dripping with venom.
Nathaniel exhales through his nose, watching me carefully. “We didn’t touch your soul,” he says. “We didn’t break our word.”
“That’s not the point!” I snap, whirling on him. “The point is that you changed something that wasn’t meant to be changed. Youundid death.”
“And what’s so bad about that?” Talon leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “She didn’t deserve to die, did she? You said it yourself—it wasn’t murder. It was an accident.”
I clench my jaw so hard it aches. “Accidents don’t happen,” I grit out. “Not when it comes to death. When the pull calls, it’s final. That’s how it works. The balance has to be maintained or—”
“And how was the balance maintained whenyoudied?” Nathaniel's expression is so dark it's like looking straight into an abyss. “You were murdered. Did the balance feel fair to you then?”
I go still.
The car is silent.
I can feel all three of them watching me—waiting. I don’t answer, because his words strike something raw, somethingdeep. Something so buried that even thinking about it feels like peeling back my own skin.
