Chapter 1
Reyla
They say love is a gift.
That it can be gentle, radiant.
Something that lifts you up.
But I’ve learned love can drown you just as quickly.
It can bleed you dry and leave nothing behind but aching need.
It can steal the last breath from your lungs while you smile and take it.
I never asked to fall for a man bound by darkness.
I never meant to tie my soul to his alone
But I would defy the fates,
and I would tear out my own heart if it meant his would keep beating.
Let the curse carve its name in me instead.
As long as he gets to stand in the light?—
just once,
unbroken.
Chapter 2
Lore
This place keeps what it’s given.
No one ever leaves whole.
With my wildfire by my side, I stepped out of the newly reformed labyrinth, my boots sinking into lush, dewy grass. Above, the sky stretched wide, impossibly vast after the labyrinth’s endless caverns. The horizon burned with fading gold, the last remnants of day slipping below the treetops. Stars were pricking to life in the deepening blue, scattered like jewels in a sea of dark velvet.
Beside me, Reyla tilted her head back to take in the sheer wonder of it all, and for one, solitary moment, I knew peace.
The air tasted clean, sweet. After being trapped in shadowy stone corridors and torturous games, even the scent of earth struck deep. Sun-warmed grass. The ghost of rain in the air. Itpressed against me like I’d been asleep inside an ancient place, and it wasn’t until the light touched my skin that I could feel how cold I’d been.
Farris shook himself and snorted, his silver-tipped fur ruffling in the breeze. His tail flicked in a lazy way, but his ears remained pricked forward, his gaze on the forest.
Dorion rubbed his arms and looked down at his hands as if he expected the shadows to return and claim him. We'd come too close to losing him inside the labyrinth.
Reyla and I stared into each other's eyes, our grins sappy but true. We'd escaped. We had one talisman left to find. And then we'd be free. Finally, finally, able to live a life full of hope and love.
The idea that this could be over, that I could think about tomorrow, next week, and the week after that, stunned me.
We walked farther into the meadow with Halendor Castle looming like a smoldering carcass in the distance to our right.
Farris trotted ahead, moving through the overgrown grass, his fur mussed and still bristling with leftover tension. His ears swiveled, his nose twitching to catch every shift of the wind.
“It’s over,” I said.
