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These wounds would scar.

Just like Layne’s.

The chains yanked backward, dragging me across the dock toward the water.

“Evie!” Ethan dove, his hand catching mine. He gripped it tightly, his other hand desperately holding onto the dock’s post. His feet dug into the planks for purchase, fighting against the pull of cursed magic. “I’ve got you!”

Luminous tears blurred my vision as they fell down my cheeks. I gripped his hand as tight as I could, claws digging into his skin as he cried out in pain.

My gaze found Layne.

He just stood there. Unmoving, with a pained expression on his face, like he was begging me to let go and give in.

How could he…

Ethan’s grip on the post slipped, and we both slid backward—the sound of clanking chains mixed with our screams as we careened toward the black water.

It’s over, I thought, pressing my eyes shut, waiting to be dragged underneath, lost to whatever hell Layne had damned me to.

But we stopped, just short of the edge.

Opening my eyes, I saw Ethan’s strained face staring back at me. His foot had caught onto one of the broken boards from earlier.

Ethan gritted his teeth, a determined fire blazing in his eyes. “I’m not losing you again!”

The chains tightened around me as the hooks dragged down my skin even further, the force of their pull even stronger and relentless. My tail touched the water’s edge as we continued to inch further, the darkness waiting just below, ready to swallow us both.

Ethan groaned as his body trembled against the pull of magic. “Evie, just hold on—please just hold on⁠—”

“I can’t.” My voice broke. “Ethan, you have to let go, or it’ll take us both.”

The chains pulled tighter, my grip slipping.

“No!” Ethan’s fingers dug into me. “Don’t give up, don’t you dare give up!” He pulled me closer, despite the impossible pull of the chains’ magic.

Layne’s eyes narrowed.

Ethan pulled me toward him, pressing his forehead to mine. The words left his lips, gritting through the pain. “Don’t you understand? I can't let you go.” His grip tightened, his voice breaking as he whispered against my lips, “Evie, I don’t care what you are. I’ll always choose you.”

Our eyes locked, green and blue—land and sea—coming together as one.

My lips crashed into his.

The ache in my chest raged as the truth I’d been trying to keep locked and buried away inside me, cracked open. The truth I’d been denying for so long.

Monsters don’t get to feel this way.

Monsters don’t fall in love.

The villain doesn’t have happy endings.

The night I was murdered, I’d given everything away for the price of power. The curse had taken it all from me: my humanity, the life I knew, and the thing I never expected to find—love.

As Ethan’s hands clasped tightly to mine, my gaze lost in his, there was no denying it, and I’d never forgive myself for it.

The moment the admission settled in our hearts and minds, everything changed. The air around us shifted, becoming heavier with each second.

Ethan gasped, panicked eyes staring back at me.