Claudia takes a deep, steadying breath. Standing, she nods. “I always knew I loved Cassius enough to suffer at the hands ofyour bargain.” She pulls her hair over her shoulder and shoots one final, withering glare at Odette.
She’ll get her revenge on her for this.
She’ll get it soon.
Her eyes cut back to Sidarphion. “Do it.”
Without any hesitation, he drives his sharp teeth straight into her neck, and his power lurches through her veins until it spears her very soul. His tongue slides over his previous bite, and he laughs.
This time, the bite is twice as big, and hurts twice as much.
But his power makes it worth it. It’s a balm. It’s a reward. It pours into her blood and warms her bones. It eats the tension from her muscles, swallows the grief that pooled in her stomach.
It makes her feel like she’s been reborn into someone else. Something new.
When he pulls back, it’s as if an integral part of her is taken out of her body. More than a piece of her soul—maybe all that is left of it.
He swallows, then smiles. “Done. I’ll see you tonight, Starling. It will be nothing like it was before. I can promise you that.”
In a plume of shadowy night, Sidarphion disappears.
Turning her attention back to Cassius, she sits beside him and pulls him into her lap.
The star-shaped mark below his eye is gone. Cradling his face, she says, “Can you hear me, Cassius? Come back, my love. Come back to me. Come home.”
He stirs.
He groans.
He opens his eyes.
DAYDREAM, NIGHTMARE
Sidarphion grants the gift of fate. Knower of all that will be, he hears the prayers of scholars asking for insights on destiny and prophecy.
Redacted fromThe Book of Cygnus: Sidarphion 1:1–2
Frothy sunlight cuts through the pale, misty sky. The six of them, battered and bruised, walk back inside the manor.
Marcherie’s neck is broken, her vocal cords shredded possibly beyond repair. Odette’s neck wounds are similar—all from Claudia. Angel has some cuts and bruises, and his breathing has yet to steady since he retrieved Marcherie’s unconscious body from the lake. Alistair has bits of glass buried in his palms from holding on to spells too hard.
Cassius is alive, but unaware. He’s in a quiet daze, his face twisted in pained confusion. It’s like he doesn’t know where he is.
Claudia is too angry to know where she’s wounded. She cannot feel anything but rage.
Once inside, Alistair lays Cassius down on the sofa. Angel helps get the glass out of his hand, and then Alistair sets up shop in the kitchen, brewing every healing elixir he can manage and spending the next few hours acting as their physician.
Claudia won’t leave Cassius’s side. His eyes keep closing, fluttering, like he’s dreaming. Odette walks into the room as Claudia is running her fingers through Cassius’s hair.
She glares up at Odette, doing nothing to mask her hatred.
“I am truly sorry, Claudia,” Odette says. “But it was him or March, and—”
“Stop.”
Her breath hitches, but she straightens up and confidently states, “I knew I wasn’t killing him forever. I knew Sidarphion would be able to bring him back.”
“Yes,” Claudia hisses, gesturing to the wet bite on her neck, “but look at the cost.”
