Page 6 of Lady for Embers

“She cannot bring him back,” Hazel cut in. Even the High Witch’s usually stern voice was softer, kinder. Just as blunt, but full of pity. “His heart stopped. Moments ago. While she slept.”

He has not crossed fully to the After. There is still time.

She pulled the cork from the vial, drinking down what she immediately recognized as blood.

Blood that tasted dark and cold, of night and death, of wildness and the unknown.

There is still time.

Those four words were the only thing she focused on. Anything else, and she’d slip into the nothingness once more. She’d give in to the hysteria raking at her, slithering through her veins, sinking in deep.

The new Mark ?ared slightly, and Cassius stepped forward, taking her forearm in his hand.

“How did you get this?” he murmured, his thumb brushing along the Mark.

She felt it then. He’d fed. His power reserves were brimming with something ?erce and intense andhot. She glanced at Cyrus, a slice on his forearm still visible con?rming her suspicion.

She’d never been able to sense the power of another magic-wielder before. But she could feel all of them. The ?ames of Cyrus and Eliza. Rayner’s strange ashes and smoke. Briar’s water and ice that matched her own. The High Witch’s healing gifts.

She met Cassius’s gaze, unable to ?gure out what kind of power she was feeling from him, but she wasn’t focused enough to even try to work out that puzzle. Whatever Cass saw in her eyes, though, had him taking a step back. Cyrus apparently saw it too, because he was rushing forward, ?ames swirling from his palm and reaching towards her.

But she was already moving. She was not entirely sure what this Mark did that the Lord of Night had given her, but it was night itself that pooled in her hand. Not her shadows, but pure darkness, absorbing the light of Cyrus’s ?ames.

“Scarlett!” Cassius cried, his eye going wide in disbelief.

Her gaze ?icked back to him, and her shadows did appear then. They leapt from her to her Guardian, latching on and sinking in deep to his freshly ?lled magic wells. He grunted, falling to a knee, hands hitting the sand to hold himself up, as she pulled deeply, seeking out every last ounce of his magic.

“Scarlett! Stop!” Cyrus was shouting, dropping down beside Cassius as if he could somehow shield him.

Hands were reaching for her. Eliza. Rayner. Her shadows held them back.

Water and ice tried to restrain her. The darkness absorbed it all.

Her own power wells were ?lling, gorging on Cassius’s gifts, and she moved to Sorin’s side. Dropping to her knees, she reached for a dagger in her boot, but it wasn’t there. All of her weapons were gone. She saw Eliza shift in her periphery, moving to try and block all of her weapons piled in the sand.

A wicked sneer formed on her lips as she met the Fae general’s grey eyes, and Eliza seemed to shrink back from her. They’d tried to prepare for her wrath. For the whirlwind of rage and grief that was working to encompass her.

There was no preparing for her storm.

If she could stop this, if she could keep him on this side of the Veil, no one was going to stop her. Not the Fire General. Not her family. Not the gods. And certainly not the fucking Fates.

She reached for a knife Sorin had sheathed at his thigh. Rotating his arm, she found the Source Mark. She ran the blade across the Mark before cutting her palm. And then, like the night she gave him this Mark, she poured her magic into him. Every last bit of embers. Every drop of water and ice. Every shadow. Every white ?ame. All of the dark and coldthingthat had come from the Lord of Night. All of her healing gifts as an Avonleyan. She gave it all to Sorin. Every piece that was left of her shattered soul.

“You promised me, Sorin Aditya,” she rasped between breaths. “There would be no more goodbyes. There would always be a you and me. You promised. I cannot live in a world without you. I will not do it. Come back.” Her voice broke on the last words, tears slipping down her face from the draining of her power and strain on her heart. “Come back to me. You promised.”

Someone tried to pull her away, but she threw them back with her shadows that were still drawing from Cassius.

“Scarlett. Enough.” That was Cyrus’s voice in her ear, full of anguish and panic, but steady and ?rm. “Scarlett, stop. He cannot come back. And I know that pain. I know—gods, Iknowwhat you are feeling right now—but you are killing Cassius by trying to change this. You arekillinghim, Scarlett. Do you hear me? Please hear me.” He was begging, pleading with her.

“He promised, Cyrus,” she gritted out, power still pouring from her and into her twin ?ame.

“I know, Scarlett. I know he did.”

“No more goodbyes.”

“There will be another one if you do not stop.”

His hands were on her face, trying to force her gaze to his, but her eyes were ?xed on Sorin’s chest. This had to work. He had said it wasn’t too late. That there was still time. He had said to have hope. He had said...

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