Tears filled my eyes as I clawed at the ground. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t breathe. And yet, despite it all, my body kept moving forward. With my hands splayed on the ground, I crawled, desperately trying to get to Kalen. To the other half of my soul. To the part of me that was dying from the onslaught of his pain.
I lifted my head just in time to see him stride up to the beast. He widened his hands on either side of him, fury written in every line of his face, and then—
“Oh, no,” I whispered, realization pounding down on me. He was going to release his power.
My body shaking, I tried to scream out, to warn him that I was here. He hadn’t noticed me, and I was in the path of his power. It would hit me if he loosed it on this creature.
But the pain was so great, like my very soul had split in two, that all I could manage was a whimper. I sagged forward and pressed my face into the dirt, breathing in the scent of grass. And then I held on, waiting for it to hit me. At least Toryn had stayed with Nellie. She’d be safe from this. She was far enough away.
Dimly, I thought perhaps this was the vow’s twisted way of making Kalen do what he’d promised. He’d tried to outsmart the magic, but in the end, it always won.
Kalen roared. The overwhelmingthumpof his power echoed through the night, and every hair on my body stood on end. I ground my teeth against the force of it and the sensation of that power scraping along my skin, along my bones, along the innermost parts of my heart. And then I took in my last breath and waited for my life to blink out.
This was it, the moment every mortal feared. A strange peace settled over me as my vision filled with stars. The sky above called to me. Beyond this world, there was a place filled with light. A place where stars bathed every soul in a power that soothed even the worst pain until it was nothing more than a distant memory. I smiled.
And the world itself seemed to sigh.
I lifted my head, groaning. My vision blurred. Darkness pulsed around me. Mist still clung to my skin, and my head pounded like an angry drum. Through bleary eyes, I saw Kalen on his knees, holding Fenella’s limp body against him. The creature was dead, its talons curled. Somehow, I had survived.
Slowly, I climbed to my feet and stumbled toward Kalen. I could still feel his pain pulsing through me. I could hear the cracking of his voice as he repeated her name, over and over until it was nothing but a hoarse scrape of his throat. He didn’t notice me until I was standing just in front of him. Blood painted Fenella’s fighting leathers. I looked away from the hole in her chest.
“Kalen,” I said.
He looked up at me, and excruciating pain twisted his face. “Fenella is dead. The creature, it—”
“I saw.”
His brow slammed down. “You were that close? You shouldn’t have—”
“Move aside, Kalen,” I said with a calm that I hadn’t known I possessed. In fact, I’d never felt like this, as far as I could remember. That strange peace still filled me. Somehow, I knew it would not last long, but while I had it, I knew what I must do. “Let me see Fenella.”
He tightened his hold on her.
“It’s all right,” I whispered to him. “Trust me.”
Tension whipped between us. I could feel waves of grief crashing over me, but I let them pound through me, accepting them, letting them do what they must. I knelt beside Fenella as Kalen extracted himself. He stood and paced and jammed his fingers into his hair.
“She’s dead. There’s nothing you can do.” His voice held so much pain that I could hardly think around it. “The talon sliced through her heart. Not even fae can heal from that.”
Ignoring him, I placed my hands on her cheeks and closed my eyes. I’d remembered something from Oberon’s vision—something that echoed through my mind even now. Andromeda’s preferred power was death, but she had life, too. It was how Oberon had been able to grant the mortals of Teine so much protection, using her through the gemstone necklace. And she had been able to bring his love back to life using a vessel.
The only reason she hadn’t been able to place Bellicent in her own body was because it had been too late. Days had passed by before Oberon had gone to the vault and asked for help.
It wasn’t too late for Fenella.
I focused on peace, on the stars in the sky, on the healing magic I knew lay beyond this world. I didn’t understand it, not fully, but I didn’t need to. I just needed to feel that hope, that love, that unending kindness thathealedand never harmed.
“Tessa, what are you doing?” Kalen asked.
The peace rushed through me, filling me up until it cleared my mind and body of pain. My palms pressing into Fenella’s skin, I pushed. And then pushed and pushed some more, gritting my teeth, squeezing my eyes so tightly they burned.
All sound snapped away. My head filled with a ringing, a distant call. Everything went starkly, brutally cold, like a river of ice had frozen around me. I tried to pull in a breath and open my eyes, but everything vanished like the sputter of a candle snuffing out.
* * *
“Tessa,” Kalen murmured into my ear. Warmth flooded my senses, chasing away the ice in my bones. I sucked in a desperate gasp and sat up, blinking at the darkness around me. Strong hands palmed my face and turned my head to the side. Kalen’s sapphire eyes lit up the mists. “You’re here. You’re fine. I’ve got you.”
“Fenella.” The word scraped from my throat.
