Page 374 of Burn of the Everflame

There was time for everything—friendly pranks and family dinners under the stars and steamy nights making love in each other’s arms. Time for politics and governance. Time to rebuild, time to create anew. Time to heal. After all that we’d been through, all that we’d lost, time was our truest reward, and I cherished every second.

Luther’s shadows grew, blotting out the early evening light as they hid me within their shroud, and Luther’s body crashed against my back. He grabbed my wrists and lifted them high as he pinned me against the door.

“You’re going to pay for this,” he warned, breath hot against my neck.

My skin tingled, heat pooling low in my belly. “Promises, promises,” I purred.

Luther stilled. His hands loosened on my wrists as the energy of his aura turned dark.

I winced, feeling his mood shift across our bond. Though I’d found my peace on the island, Luther had not been so lucky. The pain he’d suffered, both at my death and in the months that followed, still lingered in invisible scars. Sometimes he’d grip me in his sleep, fingers digging into my flesh with frantic terror. Swords had become a trigger—he rarely wore his, and when he did, I felt his chest tighten each time his fingers closed around its handle. Though I’d only meant to tease him with my comment, I knew his mind had carried him to the terrible, violent promise I’d once asked him to keep.

I pulled my arms free and twisted around. “I’m here,” I reassured him, burrowing a hand beneath his tunic until it brushed against his mark. “I’m safe. I’m alive.”

His forehead pressed to mine. “You’re here,” he repeated quietly. “You’re safe.” His hands looped around my waist. “You’re alive.”

I nodded. “The only promise we need now is to love each other forever.”

He let out a long exhale. “That’s a promise I’m happy to keep.”

I laid a tender kiss on his lips, then another, goading him out of his shadows and back into the light. He pulled me closer on the third, lips moving slowly against mine, until finally his touch relaxed, his kiss turning indulgent.

“See that, little Andrei?” Taran called out. “Aunt Queenie and Uncle Kingie are about to teach you how babies get made.”

Luther groaned, and my head fell back with laughter. “We’ll resume this later,” he said, setting a line of kisses down my neck as his shadows drifted away. “But if we have to fuck to the sound of that donkey all night long, just know that you’re the one to blame.”

He took my hand and we returned to others, chattering while we set to work preparing dinner. My mother arrived from the healers’ center, and much later, Remis and Eleanor appeared on the path, having been forced to walk the long distance from Lumnos City thanks to Taran’s stunt at the stables.

Luther cast orbs of light above a long wooden table he’d built himself, and we dragged chairs around it, piling it high with Fire-roasted vegetables, fluffy breads, and bowls of glistening, freshly picked fruits. Wine flowed freely, and so did the laughter. We toasted to Alixe and Teller, taking turns predicting their adventures in the After. Though our grief would never fully leave us, the pain of our past felt blissfully distant. Despite the occasional brays of a roaming donkey, the smile didn’t fade from Luther’s face all night.

The sky grew dark, and the hour grew late. The others hugged us tight and said goodbye as we promised to do it all again in a fortnight. I curled into Luther’s side on the steps of our porch, listening to chirping crickets and marshland frogs.

“This is nice,” I said, leaning my head on his shoulder. “A family. A home.”

“I would have been happy if all I had was you.” He took my hand and clasped it in his, our wedding rings clinking together. “But this is everything I could have dreamed of.”

I thought back on that day in the alleys of Paradise Row where I first saw Luther and my mother under the light of the blood sun, unaware how drastically my life was about to change. That girl had resented her life as a healer and dreamed of great adventures that would take her across the realms. She’d been terrified of love, running from Henri because he’d spoken to her of families and homes. She was trapped by secrets, blinding herself with flameroot and denial. She saw the world in stark, unswerving conflict: mortal against Descended, violence against peace, good against evil. And more than anything in the world, she wanted to fight.

If that Diem could see me now, she would not recognize the woman she became.

And yet, in so many ways, this was everything she’d ever dreamed of, too.

The honk of a donkey carried through the trees, and Luther let out an irritated grunt. “Get up,” he said, taking my hand and dragging me to my feet. “I’m ready to punish you.”

Tha-thump.

I looked over my shoulder. “Do you hear that?”

He tugged me toward the door. “Don’t even think of asking for mercy. In fact, every time I have to hear that gods-awful noise, I’m adding an hour to your torture.”

I stopped, pulling him back. “Luther, wait. Listen.”

“Diem, I’ve been listening to that miserable beast all n⁠—”

Tha-thump, tha-thump, tha-thump.

Luther’s head snapped around. He stilled, his stare locking with mine. Without another word, we ran to the yard, both craning our necks at the sky.

“I don’t see anything,” he said, squinting at the darkness. “Maybe it’s not⁠—”