“Let me go home,” I whisper. “Please.”
He bends to me, presses his forehead to mine. “I will.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The world is silent. A silence that swallows all sound. I’m adrift, far down beneath the water of the ink-dark lake. The waves rock me, soft and slow. They lift me up and up, until I break the surface.
It’s dawn, but the moon still dips in and out of the clouds. Silver light traces the shore as I’m washed onto the darkened ground. The sigil on my wrist aches.
Far off, there’s a faint light. A lantern flickers, a tiny flame that’s almost burned down. Someone stands beside it. The ache in my wrist turns to a steady pulse.
Rowan is waiting for me. He touches the spell. I feel myself, held precious in his mind as colors wash over me, pearl and rose and gold. I picture an incandescent thread, knotted between our hearts.
Waves rush over his boots as he crosses the shore andcomes toward me. He bends to me, pulls me close. His breath is rough, unsteady. He’s crying. His fingers touch my throat, searching for my pulse. He lets out a sigh, relieved, when he feels my heartbeat.
His arms tighten around me, and he lifts me from the lake. He carries me away from the water, back to the pale trees. “Leta,” he whispers. “You’re safe.”
I try to respond but I can’t move, I can’t speak. I’m still lost in lightless silence. I lean against his chest, my head slumped heavily on his shoulder. I am a branch, a stone, a leaden weight. Behind us I can hear the lake, the hush and sigh of the waves. The sound softens as we reach the forest, replaced by the shiver of air through branches.
He lays me down beneath the trees. I look up at him—his eyes smudged with tired shadows, his throat marked by scars and bruises.
“Rowan.” When I speak his name, the tether between us glimmers.“Rowan.”
He leans close and brushes a kiss over my lips. At first, all I can taste is the lake. Beyond that, though, glows the tiniest ember, a little flare of remembered warmth. Honey, spice, molten heat. The two of us in the brilliant light beside the window.
The world comes awake, blink by blink, sound by sound. Someone takes my hand. Arien. He’s crying, too. “I thought you were lost. I thought you’d be gone forever.”
“No,” I manage faintly. “Not forever.”
I try to move, try to unfold. It takes a long time. I put a shaking hand against the ground and push myself upright.Nausea surges through me. My lungs go tight. I can’t breathe. I begin coughing, then can’t stop, turning on my side as a wash of bitter, ink-dark water rushes from my mouth.
I can’t—I can’t—
All I can feel are claws, and teeth, and my skin being torn apart.
Rowan gently rubs my back as I struggle to catch my breath. I dig my fingers into the earth and curl forward as I choke and spit out the endless mouthfuls of poison. Finally, it stops. I try to scrub my mouth clean against my wrist, but I’m smeared all over with blood and dirt. I spit again, then slump down weakly, sprawled out with my back to the earth, my face to the sky.
Rowan folds his sleeve over his hand and wipes my face. Then he smooths back my hair and touches my sweat-damp cheek, looking at me as though he isn’t sure I’m real. “Leta. You’re home.”
I try to smile up at him, but instead a sob slips out. My eyes blur, and I press my hands against my face. I feel like something broken that’s been put back together imperfectly, the cracks sealed with gold paint. Mended, but changed. I can still feel the dark all over me. Inside me. The way the creatures tore me apart. The last terrible breath I took before I was devoured.
Florence tucks a blanket around my shoulders, and I curl into it gratefully. Clover kneels down beside me. She takes my hands between her own; her fingers alight with magic. Her power is warm against my skin, but the heat does nothing to cut through the chill that’s overtaken me.
“You’re safe,” she says, her voice heavy with tears. “Oh, Violeta. I’m so glad you came back.”
I slowly sit up. Rowan puts his arms around me and I rest against him, my fingers clutched weakly in a fold of his mud-stained cloak. I look out across the shore. The ground is still dark, the wound that opened and let me into the world Below still cuts through the earth. But everything is still. As though it’s waiting.
I turn to Arien and Clover.
“You can mend it now.” I don’t have words, yet, for what I saw. For what I did. Perhaps I never will. “It’s safe.”
They exchange a look, then rise to their feet. I wait by the trees, just as I did on the night of the first ritual, and watch them walk down to the water. I can’t stop shivering. Rowan holds me and strokes my hair, cards the tangles with his fingers. He murmurs to me as he picks loose leaves and bits of moss, all the pieces of forest and lake that are woven through my curls.
“You were brave.” He whispers it over and over, and I let myself fall into the rhythm of his words. “You were brave, you were brave.”
“I’m so cold.”
He holds me tighter, close against his chest. “I’ll keep you warm.”
