Kieran moves to her until he’s an arm’s length away. “It’s not them. You’re wasting your energy. We need to go.”
“You saw me in the Fury Loop.” She glares at him, grounding herself to maintain the shield. “You know I can do this.”
“The Loop was amplifying your emotions.” He reaches for his dagger, as if he’s preparing to cut down her shield with steel if it starts draining her.
“And they’re not amplified now?” Evie laughs, although it comes out hollow. “I heard my brother’s voice. I saw him waving at me from that cliff. If my magic runs on emotion, I’ve got plenty to spare.”
Kieran’s hand tightens on the hilt of his dagger. For three full seconds, neither of them moves. He’s staring at her like he’s running the math on how much this will cost her, and she’s staring back like she’s daring him to try and stop her.
Then he gives her a single nod, closer to respect than permission, and the look that passes between them is charged enough that my electricity prickles in response to it.
Evie straightens under his gaze. It’s like she’s drawing strength from the fact that Kieran Cross, who doesn’t trust anything that isn’t steel, chose to trust her.
Kieran turns to Logan, the warmth in his expression vanishing so fast I’d question whether I imagined it if my electricity wasn’t still buzzing from the charge between them.
“Release your flames. She needs to see.”
“Fine,” Logan replies, and then his eyes find mine. “But if anything breaks, you fry it.”
I reach for the storm in response, and electricity answers, crackling and hungry.
He nods in approval, then turns to Evie. “I’ll drop my fire on three. Keep your shield up.”
He counts down, and with each number, my thunder answers, rolling across the sky in time with his voice. When he hits one, the black-lined fire gutters and dies, and the gray world beyond Evie’s shield snaps into focus so sharp it hurts.
The figures are still there, and my blood freezes at the sight of them.
Oliver’s grin is stretched over a skull that’s too long and narrow. Sam’s glasses are perched on a ridge of bone that used to be a nose. Elizabeth’s hair is draped over shoulders that bend backward. T flashes me a smile with multiple rows of razor-sharp teeth.
Evie makes a sound like someone punched her in the throat, and her shield flickers.
“Hold onto it.” Kieran’s at her side, and the hand that was gripping his blade reaches for her waist, stopping a breath before touching her. “Just a few more seconds.”
The cliff slides past, and the creatures shrink into the distance, their stolen faces twisting with hunger.
We continue forward, and finally, they disappear into the gray.
Evie’s heat shield drops, and when I release the lightning, it fades so reluctantly I’d almost swear it was disappointed it didn’t get to kill anything.
We all go silent as Evie stares at the empty gray where the cliff used to be. After a long moment, she lowers her hands, and when she speaks, her voice is steady in the way that means she’s forcing it to be.
“If we reached the cliffs, the rocks would have torn the boat apart.” She leans closer to Kieran, her eyes staring blankly out at the gray nothingness. “Sirens drag you under and strip the flesh from your bones before you have time to drown. All that would be left of us would be scraps drifting in the current.”
Kieran watches her, the hardness in his eyes replaced by a warmth that looks almost painful on his face, like tenderness is a language he’s forgotten how to speak. But somehow, he swallows past it and speaks anyway.
“Those faces would have made most people lose control of their shield, but you held. That took resolve stronger than steel.”
He doesn’t move afterward, as if the confession used up every word he had to spare.
Color rises in Evie’s cheeks, and she blinks twice, like she’s processing the compliment through her analytical brain and coming up short. Because Kieran Cross doesn’t soften, and he definitely doesn’t compare anyone to steel, which is the only thing in his life he’s ever treated as sacred.
She swallows hard. Then she does what she always does when her emotions threaten to overwhelm her data—she buries them under information.
“They pulled memories and desires from our minds,” she tells him, as if the words are meant only for his ears. “That’s how they knew what to tell us. That’s how they made it feel so real.”
The foot of space between them is buzzing with energy, but neither moves closer, and I feel like I’m intruding on a conversation that has nothing to do with words.
So, I grip the forward mast and stare at the horizon, trying not to think about the beautiful, horrible moment when I believed everything the voices promised me. I would have walked into the sea for any of them, and part of me still wants to.
