He never told me about Douglas.
I asked for the chance to kill Thomas myself. If anyone must suffer, it had to be him. Mr. Pratterman refused to add him to the deal. Shouldn’t the Devil want sinners’ souls? He only promised, “There are other machinations at play for Mr. Seymour.”
Mr. Pratterman offered to bestow the power on me in that room of melting wax. At first I protested. What use was there for dark magic on an island away from the world? But my use of the island—his island—was not without its own payment. A few sailors’ souls every month, a handful of fishermen. Lives that the sea would devour anyway. Why not make use of them?
“You will come to need this power, Eleanor.” My name rolled off his tongue, as he accentuated every other sentence. “For her. Which means you must learn how to wield it.”
It was all I needed to forget about Thomas. This wasn’t about revenge. I would’ve given him the rest of the world if it meant saving her. Liney would never feel the lick of Thomas’s true flames.
The table and chairs melted into the floor. He reached forward and placed his hands on my shoulders. The room chilled around those ash-covered palms. Every muscle pulsed in a molten ripple. Heat became home, and a wick sprouted deep in my chest to his flame.
“You will find the signs you need tonight. Escape, and I’ll do the rest.”
Tonight.My heartbeat flickered. Uproot my sister, destroy my family, but leave the villain who brought me here untouched.
“Thank you—”
“But, Eleanor.” His eyes flashed with fire, leaving their afterglow burned into my retinas. “I’m strict on payment. While you’re on my island, you’ll fuel the lighthouse and my power within it. I will collect what is owed, with or against you. A sister’s love is deep, but no certainty tome. What is your collateral?”
I asked so few questions then, desperate for escape. When I searched Mr. Pratterman’s moonlight eyes, I saw familiar danger. The heady, tart tea dulled my fear, and the sweltering heat left me almost drunk. My mind simmered as much as my skin beneath his fingers.
“You’ll have me, if I fail,” I promised. What did I matter? None of this was for me. And I wouldn’t fail; I was so sure of it.
“I’ll have Miss Forsyth?”
I didn’t wonder how he knew my surname. Had my search been one-sided, or two?
“Yes.”
I took his hands and squeezed harder than I’d ever done before, powercoursing through me. Fear turned to freedom as my body absorbed it. I could protect myself, my sister, our future. It was so simple yet intoxicating. How could I ever let that feeling slip once tasted?
“Do we recite Latin or prick my thumb over a candle—”
He cut me off with the simplest closing of a pact there is.
The Devil leaned down and kissed me.
10Liney
To Sever
I never feared my sister before tonight.
I imagine her eyes instead of the lantern’s light as I spiral down the stairs. How could illusions have burned so bright?
I always trusted my sister before tonight.
By the time I reach the storage room, I’m lost. I’ve sensed something about this island, about Elle, but I could never name it. The heat of her hands. The strength she musters from nothing. Now she speaks in tongues?
I pace the room, running my hands up and down my arms. A clap of thunder makes me jump. We’ve always been extensions of each other, strands braided together to form something stronger. But the eyes I met as I ducked under the lens were a stranger’s.
I head down to our living space to perform the inventory Elle tasked me with as quick as I can. It’s a relief to breathe deep here where the wind is dulled, though the pounding of the icy rain hasn’t lessened. I place the lantern in the middle of the room. Nothing’s out of place: bedin one corner, chesterfield and fireplace in another, kitchen beside the front door, and dishes all where they should be. One of the shutters has been wrenched open on the ocean side of the room.
I peer out the window for any signs of life. A wave sprays over the glass, as though we reside inside a sea devil with the window as a porthole into the depths. It sweeps away the frost that formed. While the storm frightens me, the wash of the wave doesn’t. The churning rhythm is comforting.
The surf falls back to the black rocks to feed into the next surge, and still there’s no red light. Nothing but pelting sleet against the glass and darkness beyond. The sailors will only see the same dark nothing until we are the rocks that they’ll be thrown upon. They won’t make it.
I look back to my lantern. It is small, but it might be enough to—
