Other dreks shot down. Grim roared, and they all descended, seeing their chance. They gripped him by the shoulders, and his head went limp. They were going to tear him in two—
No.
No.
Isla didn’t hesitate before she took the sword in her hands—and dug it deep into the ground before her.
Nothing happened, not right away. She didn’t know how to break the curse, she didn’t know what to do, but she was desperate.
And there was something there. Something strange and twisted.
Isla grabbed it.
Her pain provided passage. Everything she was made of spilled out. The sword shook beneath her hands. Then, her fingers slipped, and when her hands hit the ground, death was unleashed.
From her poured an endless wave of shadows. The dreks shriveled and died. The soldiers became clouds of blood. Everything that wasn’t him disappeared.
Her darkness ate the world, and it had no limit. It kept going.
You and me ... we’re infinite.
She felt infinite.
Power poured out of her like the ocean tilting itself to the side, unstoppable, uncontrollable; it raged and raged, and Isla kept screaming until it finally ran out. Because her love might be infinite, but her abilities were not. Her life was not.
It felt like she was saying goodbye, but she didn’t really care. Because he was there, and he would be okay, and she loved him, she loved him so much, she just hoped he would take what she was offering, all of the Wildling power she wasn’t supposed to have, because she knew he would take care of her people. Just like he had taken care of her.
Grim roared, and Isla sent her Wildling powers across the thread that bound them together. It was the last thing she did as she stumbled and fell.
Into his arms. He had portaled and caught her, and she knew he would survive his injuries, but he was searching her face like he was the one dying, and he was yelling at her, but all she could do was smile.
“Isla, come back to me. Come back.”
He shook her, and she could barely feel it; there was barely anything left.
Her body stiffened. Her breathing stopped. Grim roared.
“Wake up,” he said. His voice was thick with desperation. He wascrying. “Stab me through the chest again if you have to, just wake up.”
She wanted to. She really did.
“Grim,” she said to him, the last of her life leaving her. She remembered what he told her.Pain could be useful. Pain was the strongest emotion.“Pain is not the strongest,” she said.
Then, her heart went still.
SACRIFICE
Isla took his powers. Grim’s shadows ceased, and he was hit by the full force of Oro’s fury. He landed on his back. Isla didn’t know how he wasn’t immediately killed.
Or how he slowly inched up, gasping for air. His hand lashed out as he tried to summon his shadows once more. He could not.
He frowned and turned to look at her with an earnestness that made her want to sink to the ground. “What is this, heart?” he asked.
She was sobbing, and he didn’t look betrayed—he looked devastated that she was crying. He wasupset that she was upset at the fact that she had stolen his powers, readying him for Oro to kill—
She couldn’t do it. Her concentration wavered.
Still, she didn’t stop her hold on his powers.
