Life or Death,I mused. But my choice was made. I stepped forward, icy wisps trailing behind me as I neared the door. Violet’s name echoed deep within my being, and the faint memory of her kiss, her warmth, her laughter propelled me forward. My hands hovered inches from the carved gilded chalice, trembling. Cold bled from it—a void that wasn’t empty, yet could never be filled. My fingertips tingled as though dipped in ice water.
I faltered. Every instinct screamed at me to pull back, to accept the quiet end, to allow nature to run its course. The balance that existed in all things—especially between Life and Death—weighed heavily on me. I had already defied Death once before, and though She stood near, I did not want to incite Her wrath. Ishouldlet the Grim take my soul to where it belonged.
Wherever the hell that is. . . I’m dying to find out.
The terrible joke brought a smile to my face. Violet would have laughed at that. She shared my dark sense of humor.
Once more, images of her face flared in my mind, and I thought of her defiance, her stubbornness, her fury. I remembered her voice—shrill and breaking through chaos as teeth tore into me.
“Rowan!”
The last of my restraint shattered.
“I will not fade,” I whispered to no one but myself, though Death stood as witness. My voice cracked like brittle ice. “I will not fade while she still needs me.”
The chalice seemed to lean towards me, its etched daggers of crimson glinting like a predator’s teeth. The pulsing light quickened. I pressed my palms flat to the chalice sigil, and Death’s words slithered within me, grasping the last of my hesitation with icy fingers.
“Fade you shall not.”
Heat exploded up my arm, searing and freezing simultaneously. Pain reverberated within me, as if I were being unmade and remade all at once. The carvings writhed beneath my hand, shifting like snakes. The weight of thousands of names, thousands of souls, pressed into me, through me, around me.
Behind me, the Grim moved for the first time. Its scythe tipped forward in what might have been acknowledgment, the iridescent blade catching impossible light before the entire figure faded like smoke on the wind.
Death stood passive and calm, Her mismatched face—beautiful and skeletal both—reflecting the gilded light of my choice. Her crimson eye and empty socket both bore into me with equal weight.
“The sun will greet you once more. You will rejoice and dance in her warmth. That is what Life brings.”
She lifted Her hand, palm upward, and a scale appeared between Her fingertips. It looked weightless yet impossibly heavy, tilting slowly to one side.
“But heed this warning: pain will taint your path, filling your soul with remorse. For your choices, you will weep, Rowan. The Forsaken have no place among the living. But know, your suffering will yield to triumph, and what once perished shall rise to hunt.”
“Wait—” I cried out as the door unlatched with a sound like flesh tearing, silencing my words.
So long as she is safe.The thought burned through my resolve.If it means her salvation, I would die and relive an eternity of beginnings and endings for her.
Death nodded, as if She’d heard my unspoken vow.
And then, with a sound like a million mouths inhaling at once, the door swung inward.
Gold light poured through, swallowing my vision. The corridor, the Grim, Death Herself—all dissolved into radiance so bright it had weight, had texture, hadsound.I felt my body unraveling, threads of self coming loose and reweaving into patterns I couldn’t comprehend.
Heat flooded through me, but nothing like the searing pain of touching the chalice. Instead, it was more like the warmth of the summer sun on winter skin. My lungs expanded, though there was no air to breathe. My heart—silent for so long—stuttered once, twice, then caught rhythm like a drum remembering its beat.
Sensation returned in a rush: the phantom press of rope around ribs, the ghost of Violet’s lips against mine, the sharp bite of autumn wind, the wet copper taste of blood, the sound of rain, the scent of jasmine and rot andlife.
I fell forward, unable to know if I was falling or rising, or both at once. Violet’s name burned on my tongue, a prayer and a promise and a plea all woven together. The golden light swallowed me whole.
Chapter 29
Violet
Damien scooped Rowan off the pavement as if he weighed nothing and headed back towards Oubliette, with Jules and me rushing to keep up. Everything about the proprietor defied logic, defied reason. He was mesmerizing, his presence a gravity that held my gaze. It felt absurd to notice how beautiful he was as he carried Rowan’s dying body, but it was also impossible to look away.
If I’d had a single moment to grasp the hilarity of seeing Rowan in a princess carry, I would have snagged a picture as ammunition for later. After he awoke.
If he ever wakes.
That thought lashed through me like a whip. I had no idea if Rowan would live. No idea if whatever had just happened in that alley—being attacked by actual vampyres—had taken too much from him. If the pale blue tinge to his lips meant he was already gone, just a body that hadn’t figured it out yet.
