“We have to go back down there. We have to find the others. We have to think of a new plan. And we have to help.”
“It’s not going to work though, is it?” she says, shaking her head in desperation. “They’re all going to die. They’re all going to die because of me.”
“Briony,” I snap.
She’s muttering to herself now, lost in her thoughts, her breathing coming fast. I recognize the panic threatening to overwhelm her. I’ve felt it myself. Many times.
I take hold of both her shoulders and shake her hard.
“Briony. Snap out of it. Just breathe. Come on. Just breathe. You have to.”
She stares up at me with bewildered eyes, wide and green. Her chest heaves as she gasps for air.
I march her to the window. I scan the people down there, the tiny figures fighting to the death. And then I spot them.
First Beaufort, plowing forward with a sword in his hands, swinging it back and forth as he shoots his magic. Then Dray’s wolf, tearing in from a different direction, slicing through soldiers as if they were nothing at all. And then there’s Fox, standing strong in the chaos as his magic swims around him.
“Look, Nini,” I say. “They’re there, right there. We’ll go to them now. And together we will do this. We’ll end this.”
I glance back at her face. Her breath is steadying.
“Fight the Empress?”
“Yes, Nini, fight the Empress.”
“But she’s surrounded by her army.”
“Then we’ll fight them too.”
“We can’t fight her and the army together. We’re not that strong, Thorne.”
“I believe we are, Nini.” She stares at me unconvinced and I hold up my arm and draw back my sleeve, revealing the fated marks stamped on my wrist. “Fate wants this. It wants us to change things. And it wouldn’t bring us together if we weren’t strong enough.” I shake my arm. “Don’t you see?” She glancesdown at the pattern – light and shadow combined, entwined together. “It’s down to us to change things – to restore balance to the realm. To let the light shine once more. That has to be us, Nini. We have to do it.”
“I didn’t think you believed in all that stuff. You said fate had cursed you.”
“Fate has given me you, Nini. I’m anything but cursed.”
“Even if following me out there now leads to your death?”
“I don’t believe that’s going to happen.”
She nods, although her body still trembles in my grasp. “You really think we can?” she whispers.
“I don’t think it, Nini. I know it,” I say.
“So what do you think we should do, Thorne?” she says.
“I think we go back down there and this time we dangle the bait.”
“Bait?” she says.
“Yes, Nini. You,” I say. “They’re here for you.”
We stare at each other. There’s no need for words. A lifetime of emotions passes in the air between us.
I squeeze her shoulders. She manages a little smile.
“Okay,” she says. “Let’s do this.”
