Page 86 of Broken Star

What if we still fall apart?

What if no matter what we do, the Tides will pull us into the futures we already saw, and I’ll lose her anyway?

My hands shake as I release thin patterns of frost across her skin, fractals of ice spreading like the threads of my unraveling soul. She’s so beautiful like this, with the reflection of magic glinting in her hair, with her lips slightly parted, with her body so close that for a second, I can almost believe she’s still mine.

Maybe that’s why I hesitate.

Because if I tell her the truth, I’ll be throwing my heart at her feet, and letting her destroy the sliver of me that’s still intact.

But before I can bring myself to force the words out, the air shifts, thickening with something ancient, hungry, and merciless.

The Tides are pulling at the fabric of fate again, unraveling into another vision.

But this one is different. It expands slowly, like the universe itself is savoring the torment it’s about to show us.

Sapphire presses closer, and my hand finds the small of her back, grounding her. Groundingmyself.

“What now?” she asks softly, but the words barely register, because the vision is forming in front of us, and I already know it’s going to ruin me.

At first, all I see is destruction.

The sandy, shimmering ground is uneven, torn apart by magic—ourmagic. Water clings to every surface, reflecting jagged, broken glimpses of what’s left. Ice is shattered, its edges slick with blood, and magic lingers in the air, sharp and raw.

And in the center of it, there’sus.

Not the hardened versions of us from before. Not her standing over my body with a bloody dagger. Not me abandoned on a frozen throne.

It’s just Sapphire and me,still and lifeless on the ground.

As entwined in death as we’ve so often been in life.

Her hand is splayed over my chest. My arm is curved around her, like even in my final breath, I was trying to shield her from something—toprotecther from something.

Our daggers lie discarded at our sides, and the blood is on my hands, on her face… it’severywhere.

But we aren’t reaching for our weapons. We aren’t clawing at the ground. We aren’t trying to fight fate in our last moments.

We chose this.

We died together.

A jagged pain rips through my chest, so sharp and sudden that I wonder if the vision is bleeding into reality.

And then, before I can stop her, Sapphire drops to her knees.

I follow.

Because I can’tnotfollow.

I pull her against me, gripping her like I’m afraid she’ll slip away. Like if I let go for even a second, I’ll open my eyes and find us lying there, cold and gone, like we are in the vision.

And for once, I have nothing to say.

No sharp retort. No cold wit to shield my feelings. No smirk to cover the way I can’t breathe. No bitter, self-destructive remark to hide that this moment is unraveling every thread of my soul. No raw confession that puts my heart at her feet for her to wreck more than it already is.

Nothing. Because this?

This is the end of us.

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