At first his features blur and fracture. His mouth splits as he smiles until there are two sets of sharp teeth, one interlaid with the other. Slashes in the sides of his throat open and close in time with his breath.
I want to look away, but I can’t. I’m pinned by the horror of him. He’s terrible and beautiful and otherworldly. He is something I am not meant to see.
Then—it all settles. The cuts on his throat close over into thin, translucent lines; his mouth becomes one mouth, still curved into a smile.
He is here. Trulyhere.
“Hello, Violeta.” Even his voice is stronger, more real. He looks at the altar, at the offering, then at the floor, smeared with my blood. “So, you’ve called me.”
He is all I feared. He’sworse, because while I expected the fear, the horror, I didn’t expect his cold, stark beauty. The Lord Under is more than an opposite half to the Lady’s golden brilliance. He’s the silver of a sharp-edged crescent moon.
I am lost in the cold of him.
He looks at me. He sees me. Heknowsme. His smile widens and turns sharp at the edges. He makes a low sound. A pleased, satisfied hum. “I almost thought you had forgotten me.”
All my apprehension, and all I’d meant to say to him, is washed away. Replaced by a single endless shiver, strong enough that I feel it over my tongue, my teeth, down the sides of my ribs.
“No. I didn’t forget you.”
“My little Violet, lost in the forest.” He holds out his own hands to me, the candlelight dancing across his opalescent claws. Warmth throbs at my palms, like a faint, far-off heartbeat.
“Our bargain changed Arien.Youchanged Arien.” Memories nettle at me, all we faced after the Vair Woods. “And at the ritual, I asked you to save him, but instead you hurt him.”
“I had to hurt him in order to save him. My help always comes with a price. What is it they say…Once saved from death? It leaves a mark, that brush with death. Even I can’t undo that.” He laughs coldly. “A blackened lake, a poisoned magic, a wound, a curse… a girl who can speak to a god.”
“Is that why I can see you now?”
“Yes,” he says. “We are connected. We always have been, since that midnight in the woods.”
I look at his beautiful, inhuman face, and the wrongness of it fills me with a bitten-back panic.You shouldn’t do this. You shouldn’t beableto do this.
His features are clear to me now, but around the edges ofhis expression—a blink, a smile, a furrowed brow—is something else. Something decidedlyotheris still there, beyond the pale gleam of his eyes, the curve of his smile, the sharp glint of his teeth.
He is an eternal, terrible creature. And he is connected to me.
It’s confirmation of what I already guessed. But to hear him speak it leaves me cold. “Why me? Of all those you’ve saved or bargained with, why me?”
“You were so brave when you faced me. You gave up your magic so willingly to save your brother. I suspect if I’d asked your life in exchange for his, you’d have given that, too.” He touches the tips of his claws against his chin, smiling. “It made an impression, your selflessness. Your magic warmed me for a long while.”
“What about all those times when I was hurt and scared and alone? If we’re soconnected, where were you then? Why did you only seek me out now?”
The Lord Under narrows the distance between us slightly. His smile is still there, still sharp and hard. For just a beat, I remember the feel of his hand on mine. How he was gentle as he led me through the woods.
“I couldn’t, until now,” he explains. “I’ve a strength here, at Lakesedge. All the lords of this estate have known me. Some have loved me, some have feared me, and every candle they’ve lit at the altar, every observance they’ve made has tended me well. When you arrived here, I was able to reach you in a way I could not before.”
“If that’s true, then why didn’t you help Rowan when hecalled on you? He’s been just as close to the world Below as I have. Closer. He’s lit the candles and made observance. He’stendedyou with his fear.”
“I needed him in a different way than I need you.”
“What do you mean?”
His eyes narrow at me impatiently. “What is it you want, Violeta? Why did you decide to finally summon me?”
“I—You told me once that I could mend the Corruption. I came to ask you how.”
“No.” He moves closer toward me. Another wash of water trickles down from the walls. “No, that’s not what youwant.”
Want.It pulls at me, that word. My eyes flutter closed. I picture myself and Arien before the night in the woods, when we had our family, when we werehome. I don’t want to go back, but I want to feel that way again. Loved and warm and safe.
