Page 162 of The Eighth Isle

My body let go of me then, even though I wasn’t exactly sure what I was feeling.

No, no—I was feelingnothing. Just emptiness. Just an echo in my chest, if that makes any sense.

Grey held me in his arms, and I pretended that I was okay. Just tired—but okay.

Was I, though? I really, really wasn’t sure.

But whatever I was feeling, I felt it through every second while I told the others exactly what had happened, what I’d done. While they told me that the land had caught fire indeed, just like I’d seen. While they told me that the process of Ennaris’s destruction had been the same when it came back together again.

Just like when the land had caught fire when Syraattackedit and it broke apart, the same thing happened when I willingly gavethat same magic to Ennaris and wished for it to heal.

Magic was such a wonderful thing—I’d known this since the beginning, since I first saw the fur on that rabbit glowing at my touch. I’d known it since I first played that piano made out of tree roots in the Burrow.

But even so, I still found it so hard to believe that it was over.

Over.

And Valentine wasn’t here.

We walked back to the lake slowly—the castle was indeed on the other side of it. The sirens, it seemed, had all gone into the water when the burning began. No words, no rage, no nothing—they’d simply ran and jumped into the water and had disappeared from the surface. Reeva thought they’d be back soon enough to talk, once things settled.

Grey thought that we still needed a way to make them submit.

“But what if they go back to…you know, the way things were before?” Mama Si asked as we all dragged our feet back through the woods.

My God, it wasthrivingfor real. I thought the land was healed after the curse, but this was completely different. It was so muchmorethat I could have ever possibly imagined.

“They will if it is convenient for them,” Reeva said. “We need a meeting with the rulers, Mamayka. Asap.”

“We will, my friend. Let’s just get to the castle and rest first, can we? I, for one, need a bath,” said Mama Si. “And Fall Doll here needs to sit down.” She turned to me. “I’m arranging that meeting with the gynecologist now. How does the end of the week sound?”

She was absolutely serious.

I swallowed hard. “Sounds great.”

“Excellent. Assa will get right to it.”

Assa, who was walking on her other side, laughed silently.

“Of course, Mama Si.”

She’d fought so well. All of them had fought with their everything—and Mama Si, too. I honestly had no idea she had it in her, but they’d all done what they had to do.

I shook my head at myself constantly because I was still so, so confused.Shocked.I just couldn’t pick what to think yet.

When we reached the edge of the lake, we stopped to see that no sign of the fight remained anywhere. No broken trees and noholes in the ground, just green grass on every inch of the surface, and the leaves bigger and shinier than I remembered.

“Where is he?” I asked again because I kept searching behind that rock that the roots of that tree still held hostage. I kept searching for a sign of Valentine—and there was nothing there. No blood. No body. Not even a piece of clothing—and no Shadow, either.

“He…disappeared,” said Reeva. “Vanished with the magic.” Amika was still holding her by the arm—she had messed up that leg pretty badly.

“But how?” How did one simplyvanish?

“Siren magic,” she told me, and in her wide brown eyes that looked so light and amber now I saw the sadness. The regret. Thesorryshe felt for me. “It’s my best guess. But he stepped in front of you when you started to run, and they all hit him at the same time. I didn’t see him again.”

“Give me a second,” I told Grey, and he took his arm off my shoulders to let me walk by myself. It was more difficult than I thought because my legs were so, so weak still, but I made it all the way to that rock.

Grass on the ground where there had been none. And those roots that were wrapped around the rock were so much thicker, and each grew tiny leaves on them, too.

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