Ezra pressed the command. The chamber inside the house roared.
The ritual snapped.
And the new bond began to pull.
Chapter 29
Cristian
The world came back in pieces.
The stone floor stopped shaking. The pressure in my chest eased. My pulse steadied. I dragged in a long, clean breath, and the pull of the ritual slid away from me like someone had torn open the ceiling and let the room clear.
Nadia stirred in my arms. Her fingers flexed. Her heartbeat picked up speed. Her skin warmed under my hands.
She gasped softly and lifted her face from my shoulder. I touched her cheek, stunned, lost, overwhelmed. She looked alive. Fully alive. Her color had returned. The clouded look in her eyes had faded, and fresh energy rushed between us in a steady, familiar pulse.
Relief punched through me in a way I could not contain. She reached up and cradled the back of my neck, pressing trembling lips to my cheek.
“We made it,” she whispered.
“And you are safe,” I said. “Thank goodness. You are safe.”
Behind us, Hammond wailed. His body sagged forward over Ambrosia’s corpse. His skin wrinkled in real time, like decades were pulling through him at once. His hair lost its color, and his spine bent. Hands shaking, he grabbed at the air.
“No. No. No. Please. Stop,” he cried.
Ezra stared at him with wide eyes. “That is… Wow. That is not what I thought would happen.”
Hammond’s knees buckled, then he collapsed beside Ambrosia’s body, breathing weakly. His face sagged, deep lines etching into his skin. He gave one last broken sob, then he fell silent.
My head spun. “What did you do?”
Ezra shrugged helplessly. “Honestly, I’m not entirely sure.”
A groan came from the floor near Lena. Cassian pushed himself up with surprising strength. His color looked better than it had even before the fight. Lena steadied him as he sat upright.
He wiped blood from his chin and gave her a crooked smile. “Is now a bad time to tell you I think you look incredible when you’re worried about me?”
“You’re impossible. I was worried about Nadia.”
“I’m alive. That is something.”
She rolled her eyes.
Nadia wrapped her arms around my neck and buried her face in my shoulder as she sobbed. Tears soaked my skin, her whole body shaking with relief.
Tears slid down my cheeks as I held her close. “I am so sorry,” I whispered into her hair. “I made every wrong choice. I put you in danger. I broke what we had. I am so sorry.”
She pulled away to look at me. “Hush,” she said softly, cupping my cheeks and shaking her head. “You loved me the best way you knew. You tried to protect me. I am thankful for you. I always was.”
My heart felt so full, it threatened to burst.
Ezra stood and dusted off his jeans. “All right,” he said. “Before anything else collapses or explodes or curses us, can we all leave this cursed manor? Preferably now?”
We gathered ourselves. Cassian said he needed help walking and insisted on doing it with Lena’s arm around him. Ezra cradled his laptop like it held the last key to life. Nadia stayed pressed against my side. I kept a hand on her back the entire time.
Outside, the night air was clean.
