Page 249 of Burn of the Everflame

Henri took one look at the nearing mob and decided not to argue. “Thank you,” he murmured, the words heavy with two decades of complicated weight.

He threw Luther a look so stark with pity, so blatantly a sign of what was to come that I almost took my offer back, but he jogged off westward, grabbing my brother’s arm and dodging more swung punches as he dragged Teller with him.

Taran lingered, his worried stare searing my heart. “See you at the boat . . . right, Queenie?”

I fought back the building tears and flashed him a weak smile. “I’ll be right behind you.”

A look of pain carved his golden-tan features. He looked at Luther. “You too?”

Luther gave a single, silent nod.

“You promise?” Taran asked.

This time, Luther didn’t respond.

On the ground, Ophiucae’s chest began to rise again in stilted, heaving gasps.

“Go get your mate, cousin,” Luther called out. “Leave me to mine.” He placed a fist on his chest, and Taran—his typically joyous, irreverent demeanor darkened with grief—returned the gesture. Slowly, soul-shatteringly slow, he turned and left.

Luther’s gaze returned to me and hardened. “Do what you have to do, Diem, but you’re not doing it without me.”

Ophiucae twitched as his skin stitched back together. The army inched closer, their air magic whipping through the sky. At the base of the steps, the mortal men had noticed our change in numbers. Only Luther stood between them and the final two Crowns of Emarion.

The time for arguing was up. For better or worse, Luther would play a part in whatever came next.

He took my hand and set it on his chest. “This is yours.” He moved his hand to my heart. “And this is mine.”

I nodded. “All of it,” I whispered.

He captured me in a kiss that was rough and messy and excruciatingly brief, then tore away, lifting the Sword of Corbois just in time for the first of the mortals to mount the stairs. With a furious roar, he launched into battle.

I looked at Ophiucae, pulse pounding in my ears. One side of his face was smeared with inklike blood from his wounded eye, while the other stared at the midnight sky. My blood went cold as I watched it slowly blink.

I gripped Sorrow’s Edge in both hands and clutched it against me. The ancient whispers grew louder, more frantic, though I was not sure if they were begging me to use it or pleading for me to stop.

Ophiucae blinked again, this time with both eyes. He was healing impossibly fast—a chilling reminder that he was no mere Descended. The wound on his wrist had already closed, and the fingers on his hand squeezed into a quivering fist.

Hair rose along my neck as his flinty gaze dragged to me, then down to the sword in my hands.

“I see,” he rasped. “Just like my family, after all.”

My cheeks went hot with shame.

His hand shot forward to raise a shield that didn’t come, his magic still victim to Teller’s flameroot paste. He kicked weakly at the grassy soil, writhing to put distance between us. “I’m not going back.”

He sounded panicked and desperate, two things I never imagined he could be.

I took a few steps, and he pushed further backward.

“I will not go back to that island!” he roared.

I froze. At his side, his hands were trembling. This intimidating man, regarded by the Descended as a god to be worshipped and feared, bearer of the strongest magic Emarion had ever seen, who had brought entire realms to destruction and vowed to force the world to its knees at his feet . . . was scared.

Not of me, or of death.

Of the island.

Rain began to fall from the sky, but it was no gentle shower. The drops of water formed tiny, powerful hammers that pelted us at magic-fueled speed. The wind sped into a cyclone, forcing me to dig my feet into the soil to keep from being dragged away.