Page 109 of In Your Light

Everyone turned to stare at Hadeom. He was still lying on the wooden boards, drenched to the bone, his black hair plastered to his forehead, and he continued to shiver.

“You what?” Fyn asked. “Hadeom, what does that mean?”

“Balancing my ledger,” he said with a smile, teeth chattering.

“You gave up being a god to save Sawyer?” Aurin asked.

Fray hadn’t noticed that he and Salem had come out, but Aurin was holding a folded blanket, his expression drawn.

“Something like that,” Hadeom said. “Help me up.”

Fyn helped Hadeom stand. He shook himself, and with an exerted groan, he flicked out feathers and shadows and shot upward, in full raven form.

He circled the cove once, gliding on the wind, sending out a shrill cry, before swooping down and landing on the end of the jetty in his human form, fully dry now. He grinned at Fyn, who raced to meet him, then collected him in a fierce embrace.

“You scared me,” Fyn said, kissing him.

Hadeom laughed, lifted Fyn off the ground, and spun him.

“I’ve never felt so good,” Hadeom said. “I’m so happy right now.”

Fyn put his hands on Hadeom’s face. “I’m proud of you.”

It was all kinds of cute and sweet, Fray had to admit. “I can’t believe Fyn’s the top,” he whispered.

Tobin elbowed him. “Shh.”

Cern clapped his hands again. “Who have I gotta see around here to get a bonfire started?”

Chapter

Twenty-Four

HADEOM

The night was pitch black and cold, and the large bonfire sent orange sparks skyward. It was a beacon of hope, Cern had said. A beacon of solidarity to remind them all of what mattered.

Cern had wanted a party, and that was what he was getting. He’d put the call out, and the wilds had answered.

Cephamorphs, faun, forest sprites, and the dreoilín, Cern’s druid bird.

Food, and blossom wine—Aurin had strongly vetoed the honey mead—dancing and laughter.

The only two people missing were Ciaran and Sawyer.

Cern’s plan had worked. Once he’d put the idea into Hadeom’s mind, he knew it was the right thing to do.

Because not only had Sawyer prayed to be a cephamorph, Hadeom had prayed to be free of his shackles.

And there was a way.

Hadeom had collected many samples, many extractions from all the different monsters he’d captured, and their technologies as well. Technologies that made not-human things possible.

That technology coupled with the cephamorphic genetic coding and sequencing and mRNA that edited and morphed at will made it possible.

Hadeom’s offer to the universe to balance the scales was the easiest decision he’d ever made.

To give something back when he’d spent millennia take-take-taking.