Not because of Margaux and her mad devotion. Not to serve asa sacrifice for a god who wouldn’t remember her life come morning. There were always new diversions for Calamité, for all of the gods. New things to hunger after, new schemes to plan.
Plans, plans, the gods always had so many plans.
I thought of Merrick, thought of all the things he’d planned for me, even before my first flame had been lit.
And suddenly, I had a plan of my own.
I took off down an aisle, darting through the walls of flames and smoke, making my way to the solitary plinth along the cavern’s perimeter. My candle burned as solidly as ever, just as tall as when I’d last seen it. I picked up its unlit mate, marveling at how well made it was, how strong and sure it would be.
I glanced at Merrick’s glowing orb of fire, burning silently aboveme.
“Thank you for giving me this life,” I whispered to him, praying he’d hear me, praying he’d understand. “I know this is not how you wished for me to use it. I know it’s not what you planned. But you did want me to do good things with my lives, great things. This is the very greatest thing I can think to do with it. Forgive me.”
“Hazel, no!”
Leopold was just behind me, his arms up, holding a set of candles.
There was just enough of the godsight left to see they were his and Euphemia’s.
“Leo,” I began, trying to keep my voice level, my tone calm. “You need to set down your candle. Carefully,” I added. “You can put it with mine, there.” I nodded back toward the plinth. Back to where my one and only candle burned.
“What are you doing, Hazel?” he asked, and his words sounded so much like mine, steady and composed, as if he too were trying to defuse a situation gone wrong.
I showed him the unlit taper. “We’ll use this for Euphemia. It’ll wipe out all her sickness. It will save her.”
Leopold shook his head. “If you do that, we play into everything Margaux wanted, and she’ll have won.” He took a step toward me and I felt the irrational urge to back away from him. “I’m not letting you shorten your life. Not for her. Not for us. The Marnaigne family has taken too much from you already.”
“My life won’t be short,” I protested. “Look at all the years I have before me.”
“And you’ll have even more if Euphemia gets mine. Think ofhow many lives you’ll touch, how many lives you’ll save. Thinkof all the good you will do with those years. I’ve lived twenty already, and what have I done with any of them? I’ll never accomplish half of what you will.”
“It’s not a competition.”
“Hazel, I want to be more. You’ve made me want to become more. More than that entitled prince you met all those months ago, drunken and raving in hallways, as if he had any idea of what life was really like outside the palace gates. This is how I can do it. This is how I can do wonderful things.”
“We’ll do wonderful and good thingstogether,” I said, taking a wary step toward him, then another. “If Euphemia gets my candle, I can have a life with you. A real life, a normal life. I won’t have to see you and your sisters and everyone I love grow old and die withoutme.”
He froze, the light from the candles catching his eyes, brightening his face with a luminous beauty. “You love me?” His words were whispered, full of disbelief and hope.
He took a step closer, as if he couldn’t bear for us to be so far apart. The candles were nearly within my reach.
Wordlessly, breathlessly, I nodded.
Leopold smiled. “Then this is so much easier.”
“Leo, no!” Before I could stop him, he brought Euphemia’s candle toward his. I lunged forward, holding mine out, and we crashed together, tumbling to the ground as we each fought to be the victor.
Here, just outside the cavern, it was so much darker, and I struggled against my failing godsight, trying to see which candle was where. Droplets of wax dripped over us as he struggled to keep Euphemia’s lit, as he struggled to not burn us all.
“Hazel, don’t!” he pleaded, twisting from my grasp, our limbs tangled. “Hazel,please!”
Leopold gasped as a wick sputtered out.
The smoke that followed curled up into my eyes, grasping like a skeletal claw. It was impossible for me to see. It stung my eyes, drawing tears, and everything looked so black.
Then, from that terrible darkness, a new flame sparked to life.
Epilogue
