Page 131 of Outlaw Ever After

A smile quirked up his mouth as he reached toward the posy with waning ability. “Spinning olden magic with her blessings. I always kenned ye’d be able to bring me to my knees.”

He grappled for the posy. Bringing it back to her. Felt her fingers enclose upon it like a lifeline as the wind swirled and bent the torchlight. That energy, it zapped and whirled though him at the blessing completing them.

“I’m afraid I have to leave ye again after all,” he whispered in her ear.

His eyes were closed. So tired. Her body racked with tears upon him. She clenched him harder, nails biting into his skin.

“But before, I left ye with nothing. This time…” Somehow his arm had slipped free and his palm was aside her belly, squeezing, bitter he would never see such seed grow to fruition. “I leave ye with the best part of me.”

“Stop,” she breathed. “Ye’re nay leaving me…ye’re nay , ye’re nay…”

Aye, he was. He couldn’t open his eyes anymore.

“I was always meant to find ye. I’ve loved ye thrice. For four and ten years, I never kissed another. Sing—” He couldn’t find his voice. “Sing me a song, woman,” he croaked. “Please.”

Her voice shook as she cried.

“Blessings made on Samhain nights before the midnight bell…

The posy burned in his fingers as he listened to the song of fates playing games with people’s destinies, even though most people didn’t believe anymore. He basked in her anguished words, her fingers that had taken to caressing his hair, tingling shooting over his scalp.

But lo behold our lovers dear whose worlds collide on three,

for only when the veils thin can their love be free.

Ah, so that’s what the song meant , he realized with waning clarity as his arm flopped to the earth and darkness veiled his mind. It was Souling Night. The final night of Allhallowtide. He’d always been meant to find her. To join with her. To oust the truth buried in the past, and unite their divided families through his blood. Her blessing had done just that, keeping him in this world long enough to help her discover MacGregor’s injustices. He’d just never been meant to stay.

Even the Devil’s Reaper had an hourglass that ran out of sand.

Chapter Forty-One

Broad hands were prying her upward.

“Let me go!” Peigi grappled to cling to her rogue’s lifeless body.

Collapsed atop him, she bundled her hand in the Comyn mantle Francine had loaned her, wrapped her hand with his desperately. A handfast.

“Stay here, nay leave me again,” she begged, shielding him from further madness, her strong, cocksure charmer who’d won the spear throw with a scythe and outsmarted her brother for years, and played the flute like Faunus for his nymphs, who’d…only ever kissed her.

The hands pried on her shoulders harder. She shook her head and squeezed their handfast, tears bubbling uncontrollably down her cheeks when she felt the warmth of his blood sticking to her skin, as it soaked into her knees from where it was pooling on the ground.

“No…” She fumbled to stanch it, her fingers sticky. He was so pale in the torchlight.

Summoning strength, she rolled him, grunting, flipping his bulk onto his belly to reveal a stab in his lower back. She pressed her hands into it, as if she could single-handedly heal such a wound. Her voice was gone. None of this mattered without him to share it with.

“Brother,” she garbled, finally looking up at Seamus, who had ceased trying to pick her up and simply rested with his hand across her back, head shaking helplessly. “How could ye? Ye were wrong about him.”

Seamus wiped her tear, his face haggard. “I ken.”

Her brow furrowed. She glanced around.

Tormund MacLeod, the dark-haired demon whom Caleb had served, skin adorned in scarified patterns and voice raking from what looked like an olden throat slashing, caressed his dagger back and forth upon MacGregor’s doublet like a whetstone, as if a cat toying with its dinner. “What should I do with him?” he murmured ominously. “Send him through the veil?”

Seamus, his brow resolute, growled, “Drop the blade, Kendrew.” MacGregor’s blade dropped.

“Help him.” She tugged on Seamus’s coat. “Please. Help him. He’s so lifeless. He’s…” Nay dead yet.

He still breathed, though it was shallow. The air was so still. No stirring. No fickle fae folk to toy with fates. Why must they make mischief? Why couldn’t they be useful for once?