“I can survive if it means you don’t walk into a trap,” she said, reading my hesitation. “I can hold on if it means breaking this never-ending cycle.”
“You’re asking me to trust that this time will be different when sixteen other versions have failed.”
“No.” She pulled me closer, her forehead pressed against mine. “I’m asking you to trust me. Not the pattern, not the prophecy, not some cosmic fucking wheel—me. Elle. The woman you’ve gotten really attached to and would burn both worlds for.”
Despite everything, the rage, the fear, I almost smiled. “That’s not what you said before.”
“I’m paraphrasing. The point stands.” Her hands slid up to frame my face. “I’m not the same Elle from the other iterations. I know about them now. I know what fails. And I’m too stubborn and too pissed off to let Auradelle win just because sixteen other versions of me couldn’t figure it out.”
I studied her face—exhausted, marked, but absolutely fierce. She was right. This Elle wasn’t like the others. And I did. Trust her. Completely.
Even though it meant five days of travel with her pain echoing through the bond. Even though it meant feeling every moment of tomorrow’s torture session and the next day’s, unable to reach her, unable to help. Even though every instinct I had screamed at me to leave now, to close that distance as fast as physically possible.
“Just don’t lose yourself before you get there,” she whispered.
“I won’t.” I kissed her forehead. “You’re my anchor.”
“And we’re both alive,” she added.
“That too.”
The space around us was starting to destabilize—her physical body pulling her back, exhaustion and pain too deep to maintain this connection much longer.
“Wait,” I said. “I’ll make sure our assault is different from the other timelines.” I pulled her close for one last desperate kiss. “No charging in blind. No walking into obvious traps. No repeating the same mistakes.”
“Good.” She kissed me back fiercely. “Because I’m tired of dying in other timelines. This one needs to stick.”
“It will.” I made it a vow, a promise, a threat to reality itself. “This iteration breaks the wheel. Or I’ll tear through time itself to make sure it does.”
She was fading faster now, her form becoming translucent.
“Stay alive,” I commanded. “Whatever happens tomorrow, whatever he does to you—stay alive.”
“You too. Don’t let the corruption—”
But the connection shattered before she could finish.
One moment she was in my arms, solid and real. The next, I came back to myself standing in the middle of the rebel camp, my corruption having carved a perfect circle of destruction around me. Trees were dead within twenty feet. Grass turned to ash. Even the stones looked scorched.
The others stood well back, watching me with the usual mix of fear and wariness. But my eyes found Eltrien immediately.
He stood at the edge of the group, mycelial marks pulsing with that infuriating calm, watching me with eyes that held too much knowledge.
“You knew,” I said, and my voice came out more growl than speech. “About the iterations. About the sixteen failures. You’ve known the whole fucking time.”
Silence fell over the camp like a shroud.
“Sixteen what?” Thrak asked, confused.
“Timelines,” I said, not taking my eyes off Eltrien. “Sixteen times this story has played out. Sixteen times Elle and I have tried to stop Auradelle. Sixteen times we’ve failed and the cycle resets. And our dear healer has been carrying that knowledge like a dirty little secret.”
Eltrien’s marks pulsed faster, but his expression remained calm. “Yes.”
Just that. Yes. No denial, no explanation, just flat admission.
“You want to elaborate on that?” Vashael demanded, her voice sharp. “You want to explain why you’ve been guiding us through a pattern you knew was doomed to fail?”
“Because every other time I tried to change it actively, we failed faster.” Eltrien’s voice was steady, but I could see cracks forming in his composure. “Sixteen iterations, and I’ve tried everything. Warning you early—you don’t believe me. Telling you the prophecy—you try to fight it and fail worse. Hiding information—you make the same mistakes. No matter what I do, the wheel keeps turning.”
