Beside me, the others screamed.
Darian was frantic, shouting words I didn’t hear—my name, maybe, or Linc’s—but the words blurred together, lost in the chaos. Fenric fought his bindings, his movements wild. Cindrissian cursed under his breath, usual calm shattered, fury pouring from every inch of him.
But I didn’t hear them.
Not really.
Because the only thing I could hear?—
Was Linc.
His was steady, despite the agony rippling through his battered body. Despite the fact that he was the one suffering.
He knelt before me, bloodied, exhausted, gasping for breath, but somehow his eyes were steady as they held mine.
“Hey,” he said, so quietly I almost didn’t hear it over the sound of my own heartbeat thundering in my ears. “Look at me.”
I couldn’t. I couldn’t look at him, couldn’t see the understanding in his features, the acceptance of what I was about to do. The way he was trying to make this easier for me when I was the one holding the knife.
“Isara.” His voice was stronger now, more certain. Not a command, but a request. “Please.”
I lifted my head, met his gaze, and nearly broke apart completely.
Because there was no fear there. No panic. No desperate pleading for his life.
There was only love. Pure, overwhelming, devastating love—not for me, but forthem. For Fenric, whose tortured screams were echoing off the walls. For all of us, really, but mostly for the man whose agony was tearing him apart from the inside.
“I know what you’re thinking,” he said, and that sad smile—gods, that fucking smile—spread across his bloodied lips. “That you can’t do this. That this will destroy you.”
I was shaking, my whole body rejecting what my mind knew had to happen.
“But you can.” Blood trickled from his mouth. “You can do this, Isara. Because you’re stronger than you think, and because?—”
His eyes flicked toward Fenric, toward the writhing, broken form of the man he loved, and the pain that crossed his features was so raw it carved something out of my chest.
“Because he’s dying, and you’re the only one who can save him.”
“Linc—” The word came out as a sob, broken and desperate.
“Shhh.” He was still smiling, that terrible, beautiful smile that said he forgave me before I’d even done anything to forgive. “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.”
No, it wasn’t.Nothing about this was okay. Nothing about this would ever be okay.
But Fenric screamed again, and Linc’s face crumpled for just a moment—pure anguish flashing across his features before he forced that smile back into place.
“He’ll understand,” Linc whispered, and his voice broke just slightly. “Fenric will understand. You know he will. He’d do the same thing if our positions were reversed.”
He would. Gods, he absolutely would.
“Just do it,” Linc said, and there was something almost pleading in his tone now. Not for his life, but for me. For my ability to live with what came next. “Save him. Just do it.”
My hands were trembling so badly I could barely grip the knife.
“You’ll be okay,” he said, and somehow he made it sound like the truth. “You will. You’re going to be okay, Isara. All of you are.”
The certainty in his voice nearly undid me. The absolute faith he had in our ability to survive this, to keep going even after?—
I took a step forward.
