His jaw tightens as he slowly tries to close his hand, but I catch his fingers with my thumbs, flattening them until his palm tilts to the light. Silver streaked by violet, a touch of midnight and a splash of dawn. His hand holds the entirety of the world’s colors, with a few wayward splotches along the joints where he must have squeezed it once.
Because in my heart, I know I’m not wrong. Faolan has held a soulstone in his palm.
Which means the Wolf is going to die.
“Put me down.”
Faolan eases me to the planks, and I nearly crumple on legs asweak as a newborn foal’s. His face is so familiar and so foreign. I don’t recognize the way he chews his lip or the flush creeping up his throat. I can still taste him there, salt lingering on my tongue.
Gods, I need room to breathe—to think.
Except I can’t think, because Faolan is marked andIam not, and—
I stare at my own bare hands. “This doesn’t make sense.”
“It does if your magic comes from your blood and not from a soulstone.” Faolan’s gaze lands heavy on me, his chest caving in with one hard breath. “You were never cursed, Saoirse.”
A ringing strikes my ears. Settles deep in my bones until they want to fold. “I am.”
“No”—he laughs, the sound raw—“you’re not.”
“Faolan, I touched a soulstone—”
“As a child, yes, I know.” Faolan’s smile drops. “But if you were purely mortal, or a soulstone had actually cursed you, your palm would bear the same colors as mine. Didn’t you ever wonder why it didn’t?”
I stare stupidly as light ripples across his ragged mark, silver bleeding into pink like the moon invading the morning sky. “I told you before, my father said the marks fade with time. He said most people—”
“Die before they can?” Faolan’s laugh is empty as he raises his hand. “Aye, well, here’s living proof that’s a load of shite.”
I shake my head. “But you’re not mad. A-and you’re not dead, so what did you—”
“I struck a soul bargain.”
My mouth goes dry, my fingertips cold. “That’s a myth.”
“If I had a coin for every time—”
“Faolan.” His name comes out in a desperate lurch. “Be serious. Please.”
“I am, love.”
My bones turn to liquid as I search his brow for that quirk of humor, his swollen lips for any hint of a lie. The longer I look, the more the world tilts. Because if Faolan were teasing me, freckles would dance across the bridge of his nose and light would slant through the blue of his eyes.
Their color is flat, the depths of them still.
I shut my eyes. “Asoul bargain.”
It’s an ancient, terrible magic I’ve always hoped was pure legend. Trickster gods once offered unthinkable gains in exchange for a person’s soul: the strength of ten men, longevity of life, beauty to rival the mountains, immortality through stories and song.
But those ways ended with the gods, and while Faolan yearns to be a legend, he wouldn’t claim it at the cost of his own life. There’s nothing that could be so important he’d risk…
“Tell me you didn’t.” Any lingering heat flickers out. “Faolan, tell me you didn’t dothisfor me.”
He grips the back of his neck, glaring at the scar. “Technically it was for my life. The Isle of Lost Souls was just part of the deal. But I didn’t realize what I was doing, and—”
My knees give out. I sink to the ground in a heap of tangled clothes and burning skin, my head held up only by the fingers clawing through my hair. I’m honestly not sure if it’s a laugh that seizes my throat, or a sob.
“How the feck do you bargain away yoursoulwithout realizing? And who responded to you?! Faolan—the gods are dead!”
