Page 64 of Fated In Forever
She curled around me, warm and soft and delicious.Besides, it's beautiful here, isn't it? In a terrible sort of way. I like this castle. I could stay here forever.
The casual acceptance in her voice made my stomach clench. She shouldn't be finding beauty in this place. She shouldn't beadaptingto it, shouldn't be changing to match its dark splendor. But I could see the change happeningbefore my eyes—the Underworld was claiming her, as it had claimed me.
“Except…how long have we been here?” she wondered, her gaze fixed on the wandering souls circling along the vaulted ceiling. “Every time I wake up, I can’t tell what day it is, or even remember how much time has passed since we fought Ravok.”
The question hit me like a physical blow, because I didn’t know, either.
The only thing I was sure of was that time moved differently in this realm, stretching and contracting according to laws that had nothing to do with the passage of the sun and moon.
I'm not sure, I admitted,which is even more reason for you to leave. Think of what’s happening in your world. Think of Blake and Riordan, and your sister.
“I am.” She stared down at our joined hands, as if studying the contrast between her increasingly pale skin and my obsidian-tipped fingers. “Trust me…I am.”
I tugged her to her feet.Then come with me and see what I found. The portal seems dormant, but it’s a possible way out. Get dressed. Bring The Book, and the key.I raised her hand to my lips, pressing them to her skin. Now that I’d found the second portal, there was no time to waste, and seeing these changes in her, the truth slammed home.
She was not meant for this place.
And I’d been a fool to believe I could keep her.
“We always end up like this, don’t we?” She sounded so sad as she pulled on her clothes, tattered and worn now from the sand and the sharp rocks, then slipped on her boots. “You, always trying to do what’s best for me…and me, leaving you behind.”
She wasn't wrong.
But in this awful place, the magic flowing through me felt natural.
Right, as if I had been living as only half of myself for my entire mortal existence. And that was the danger. The Underworld was seductive, offering everything I had ever wanted—power, purpose, a place where I truly belonged. It would be easy to let this place claim me completely, to surrender to the dark beauty of this realm and never look back.
But Evangeline didn't belong here.
She was filled with light and warmth and hope, everything this place was not. If her transformation progressed much further, she could become something else entirely. And I never wanted her to change.
She was perfect.
In every way, Vicious was flawless, and I didn’t want a single hair on her head, a single freckle on her beautiful face to change. No, I wanted her to remain forever exactly as she was right now.
Fierce, stubborn, flawless in both heart and soul.
The realization hit me with startling clarity. Somewhere in the chaos of recent events, somewhere between her desperate attempts to save me and our shared plunge into the realm of the dead, I had fallen even deeper in love with Evangeline.
No, not love…this was more than love. We were bound together by our very souls, as if we had always been joined indelibly, back to the very beginning of time, and would remain so, until the very end.
Nothing would ever come between us.
Not being split apart by different realms, or death, or even time. The only thing could ever take Evangeline awayfrom me was if she became something else…and this place was doing that very thing.
“We’ll need The Book,” I said, smoothing my thumb over her tiny knuckles. “And the key.” I opened the drawer and took out the key, so small and bright between my enormous talons, carefully slipping the chain over her head. “Can you carry them for me?”
Esme had spent centuries unraveling the magic woven into every page of that relic.
There were spells, written plainly on every page, some too wicked to ever be spoken aloud.
But the power sealed within the tome itself was what I needed right now, a terrible and wonderful secret. The power to grant a single wish to The Book’s possessor.
This wasn't mere magic; legend stated The Book had the authority to rewrite existence itself, to alter the fundamental nature of reality according to the wisher's deepest desire. We had never tested the myth—Esme had always counseled saving that wish for a time when it would be direly needed—and now was that time.
Vicious narrowed her eyes, pulled her hand away. “Why do we need The Book? Tell me there isn’t some awful ritual we have to perform to open up the door.” Then she snorted. “Of course, there is, because that’s the way things work, isn’t it?”
“There is a chance,” I said, my voice tight with sudden urgency. “The Book contains the spell to open the portal, but I won’t know until I try.” A white lie, but a necessary one. “And I have to try, Vicious. You can’t stay here, and this could be your way home.”
