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Chapter Sixty

The bloodbond is broken. I can feel its absence, like part of my very soul has vanished in moments. There’s a part of me, instinctual and involuntary, that feels bereaved. But mostly, I want to laugh with relief, which I do, burying my face in Lonan’s chest as he holds me while we balance on the bone bridge. He slips the silver stake back into the pocket of my dress. His arms wrap around me, and he tucks his chin over my head.

“It’s all right,” Lonan says. “It’s over.”

I laugh bitterly. I can feel the poison deadening in me. My muscles feel weak and heavy. There’s a burning sensation down my arms, behind my eyes. The wound on my neck where his teeth pierced my skin aches. But I’m free—from my siphon nature and from my heartlessness.

I have feared this for so long. But as the rush of emotions course through me, as tears well in my eyes for only the second time in many years, I don’t feel drowned by them. Instead my feelings layer and swirl together, as complex as the Light and the Dark and the Dim—grief and hope, anger and joy, and here with Lonan—safety. Belonging. Acceptance in all my fire and chaos. It is still pain, but it’s the warm, welcome pain of a wound being cleaned.

My timepiece is broken. Never again will I carve my own skin with the Dark, burying my pain in bloody poetry. I’m not sure if I’ll even be able to wield the Dark anymore, but that’s a problem for Tomorrow Vesper. Today Vesper will bury her face in Lonan’s chest and let herself breathe.

But the night is not over. And the Ridding knows it.

The bones tremble beneath our feet. I look up at Lonan, and then my stomach jumps as the femur under my foot drops. I wrestle for balance. On both sides of us, bones begin to fall to the ground, rolling back toward their graves.

“The clocktower!” Lonan shouts.

I rush toward the face of the great clock. At first, I place my feet carefully, but then the bridge begins to dip.

“Go!” Lonan shouts.

I fling caution aside and sprint, praying that my feet find purchase. Every bone beneath my soles dips as I run up a falling incline of them. The ball of my foot finds the stone ledge, and I turn behind me to grab hold of Lonan. The bone bridge collapses as I take his hand. My stomach lurches as his fingers slip in mine and his feet scramble to find the side of the tower, still slick with rain. I grasp the hour hand, spearing toward the iron six, and wrench him upright. I pull, cursing his weight and his height. Momentum pushes him toward me, and he grabs hold of my waist and the hand of the clock behind us, leaning away from the long fall to the ground.

For the first time since childhood, I can feel my heart pound against my ribs with my chest pressed to Lonan’s. His breath is cool on my face, and even in all this chaos, his eyelids lower. There’s something intense and weighty about the way he looks at me that fills my belly with warmth.

“Thank you,” he says, and there are worlds of meaning in the way he says it.

I glance down at the ground. “What now?” Freezing rain still beats against us. We’re stuck at the top of the tower.

Lonan lifts his head to assess the clock. Pinning me against him and holding the hour hand with one arm, he reaches for his sword. It burns red and he thrusts it into the clockface beside us. The glass pane shatters under its magic, and I shield my head as shards pelt down on me. Lonan steps through the opening left between the iron supports that held the pane and leads me through by the hand the way a gentleman helps a lady out of a carriage—an absurd thought given our filthy states.

There are no Saints in the clocktower. The room is dark and covered in dust—there’s no indication that the great bell overhead has rung for the first time in years tonight. I lead Lonan toward the trapdoor, when a voice from the dark stops me.

“It is extraordinary, I think, that the two of you excel in all things, even in your treason.”

My godfather steps out of the dark. His eyes are deep, shades of sleepless purple rimming them. His hands are folded behind his back in a guise of calm. But I can feel the strain emanating from him, the barely concealed rage in those tired eyes.

“Where have you been?” I ask, instinctively backing toward Lonan.

I am so used to feeling a burst of joy when I see him—the belonging and approval and care he has always provided were a balm to a heartbroken girl. But this man killed my father. I don’t know if he ever truly loved me or not, but I am certain of one thing—he always loved power more.

“It’s nearly dawn,” he says. “The two of you have managed to survive the Ridding, endured every trial. Congratulations.” But nothing in his expression appears pleased. He sighs deeply, grief in his eyes. “I am sorry you’ve had to endure this, Vesper. It wasn’t my intention. I warned you to stay in your room.”

“You can’t be serious.” The bodies of my friends are not yet cold. And he thinks I should’ve stayed in my room.

“You think me a terrible man now, do you, Nightingale?” He shakes his head. “I know you don’t see it now. But what King Marcel is doing is wicked. It’s ruthless.” He takes a step toward me, and Lonan mirrors his movements, like he’ll launch himself between us if he sees my godfather move on me. “You cannot separate the Dark and the Light. They were always meant to be one. Marcel had to be stopped.”

“Is Imaelhain so different?”

“We’ve preserved the Light in Imaelhain. Look at you both. You two are my pride. My prize students. What every meiga should be.”

“I’m not your anything.”

He smiles grimly. “You’re so angry with me. I can see that. And I know it’s justified.” He studies me a moment. “Do you know what I thought, the moment I found you, Vesper?”

I don’t respond. I hold on to anger like a shield.

“I thought I’d never seen a more darling girl. I mean that. It makes what needs to be done so much harder.”