You’re doing this for him. Leon needs this.
I chant his name to myself, praying that I’m close to the end. That deep part of me is cleaved apart now, I can feel it. Or rather, I can feel the yawning gap and the black emptiness rushing in to fill it. Only a small tendril remains, a tiny part holding onto me, stubbornly resisting being severed.
I raise my arm as high as I can, a guttural cry rising in my throat.
I will find you, my love, in this world or the next.
Leon promised me something similar once. I swear the vow now as I bury my knife for the last time in my shadow self, slicing through the last thread.
The piece of my soul drifts free, leaving a rift behind. The darkness stretches inside me—endless and terrifying. It feels like it could swallow me whole, engulfing me from the inside out. For a moment, I’m afraid that’s exactly what will happen.
Then it settles, and I understand it was just finding its shape in its new home—a hole where precious soul used to be.
The shadow figure is still now, motionless on the floor in front of me. But something small floats up past my face, so faint and thin I barely spot it at first.
“That’s it,” Lafia gasps.
Mal rushes forward, lifting the bowl that carried the blood—now empty—and ushering the wisp of shadow into it with his hand.
“Take it to him,” Mal says, handing me the bowl and guiding me out of the circle. There’s a clatter, and I realize I’ve dropped the knife. It skitters near Corrin’s feet. The crime lord is so pale he looks like a ghost, and Damia is easing him to the ground, murmuring, “You can let go now. You did good.”
I don’t look back, so I don’t see the moment my shadow self dissipates, the darkness retreating back across the room, my real shadow returning to my feet. Instead, I focus on taking the bowl with both hands and letting myself be led to Leon’s chamber.
“Put it to his lips,” Mal instructs as we reach Leon’s side.
“You want him todrinkit?” Alastor asks incredulously. Most of them have followed us inside.
“To breathe it in,” Lafia corrects.
I cup the back of Leon’s head, raising it. His chest is still rising and falling, and when I part his lips against the edge of the bowl, I feel the slight gust of an exhale. I tilt the bowl and watch as his next inhale draws the wisp of shadow in between his teeth.
Mal places a hand over Leon’s mouth, presumably to make sure the piece of soul actually stays there. I blink up at him, confused.
“Is that it?”
He shakes his head. “No. Well, maybe? I don’t know. What do you feel?”
Lafia touches my arm. “The blood spell should’ve helped thin the barrier blocking your connection. It’s up to Leon to follow the mooring back to his body now, but that piece of soul is still part of you, Ana. Try to find it.”
Find it, and I’ll find him.
I close my eyes, reaching out across the connection, searching for some answer I didn’t get before. Even if I can’t sense Leon, I should be able to sensemyself.
When I brush against it, my whole body comes alive—my muscles tightening, my magic flooding into my veins. I canfeelit, and I can feel something firmly attached to it too. That presence is solid as mountain stone and fierce as an earthquake, yet it cradles my outstretched awareness like a safe, warm burrow. That presence—thatsoul—could belong to no one else.
Leon.
I wrap myself around it and pull, calling him home.
Chapter 4
Leon
Idrift in nothingness, unable to see, or touch, or hear. I have no past or future, only this moment, stretching on forever. I exist. I know that much, but without any form or substance to hang that existence onto, I’m not certain of anything else.
A nagging feeling tells me it wasn’t always this way. I have been put here, taken far away from everything I know and love.
That certainty fills me with deep sadness, but without any senses, the pain isn’t physical, just an emotion surrounding me.
