Page 104 of The Second Death of Locke
They fell and fell, the air pushed from her lungs as they hit the surface of the water. The sea was merciless and terrible. As she dropped, falling through the dark, she clawed for any idea, any instinct of what she was meant to do—but she only felt her own cloudy terror. And now, still miles from the place where Locke once was, she felt the dark sea coming to claim her.
She reached for the surface, but she could not find it. She fought out of her armor, weighing her down, drowning her. She couldn’t find Kier, either; she could only feel his pain and panic echoing in the tether like an animal cry. She opened her mouth, and the water swelled inside of her. She gasped, choking, and then she wasn’t swimming at all.
Forget about us, someone called in the back of her mind.
She opened her eyes, the salt water burning, and tried to claw for air. “I remember!” she shouted into the sea, where no one could hear her, where no one would watch the High Lady of Locke as she died. “I will never forget.”
I gave everything for you. She heard Severin’s voice, curling in the back of her brain.I gave everything. And what would you give, to bring it back?
Grey squeezed her eyes shut against the raging sea.Take it, she thought desperately, salt water invading her lungs.Whatever you want. Whatever you need. Take it all.
A hand grasped hers and tugged just as the sea started to roil.
And Retarik laid her hand upon Kitalma’s breast. Between them, the power glowed with divine golden heat. The Isle shook as Kitalma spake, “You are mine and I am yours, and let us never again be whole.”
Folklore recovered from the Isle of Locke, date unknown, author unknown
twenty-four
WHEN GREY WOKE, HERfirst thought was that her cantankerous grandmother who was once Locke had been right: there was something after death. Above her, she could not see the sky: on all sides there was only white swirling mist, and rock under her body.
She sat up.
There was solid ground beneath her. She was dripping wet, icy cold from the sea, but she was no longerinthe sea. She was on a rocky cliff. Ahead of her there was only mist, but when she edged forward and looked down, she could see the black rock face, and more mist below. It had long been called the Obsidian Isle, and she felt the name curling around her now as she took in the inky darkness of the cliffs.
She sat back. To one side, through the gloom, she could just make out the solid stone walls of the fortress. Behind her, when she turned, the fog was ceding, slipping away from the skinny trees of the Ghostwood.
She stood. The cliffs of Locke were solid under her feet.
She turned in a slow circle, searching for—something. Unlike her, the ground was dry, as if the Isle had never been submerged at all.
There, at the edge of the wood, she spotted a shape. A body,face-down on the scrubby ground. She took two steps, three, and then she was running.
Protect me, Grey begged—she was not magic, nothing more than a mostly spent well of power, but she felt the island cave to her requests. Shefeltthe tremulous safety of it.
And she could not think; she could barely breathe. Dripping salt water and mud, she sprinted across the space between her and the wood and launched herself at that broken form, clad in black.
She threw herself to her knees in the dirt beside him, her hands going to his shoulders. She cursed herself, searching for the tether inside of her, but everything felt different here. She grabbed him by the shoulders and heaved, rolling him over.
Everything stopped. Went still as stone.
It was awful—because it was Kier, and for the first time in her life, he was unfamiliar to her. His skin was marred with purple splotches of bruises and part of his ear was missing and his eye was black and his arm had come loose from its sling so the broken edge of his collarbone pushed at his skin at an awkward, impossible angle.
How could he survive that? How couldanyonesurvive that?
He did not move. He did not breathe. Her heart sank inside her like a stone when she realized that hehadn’tsurvived it.
That was the unfamiliarity. The uncanniness. His face was lifeless, all spark of what made KierKiergone, lost to the sea and the cliffs and the air. Grey reached within herself for a tether that had snapped, torn from the root.
“Kier,” she pleaded, gripping his chin. She rolled him back to his side, not caring about his injuries, and pounded on his back. “Kiernan. Kier, please.”
Nothing. She pressed a finger to the space under his jaw. There was not even the trace of a pulse. The tether inside of her was gone, leaving only raw, aching emptiness behind. It had been years since she’d gone to reach for it and felt nothing at all, not even the suggestion of his existence. She hadn’t felt this empty since before they were bound.
“Don’t fuckingdothis,” she snarled, rolling him onto his back, pressing his chest in a measured pattern, as if she could force his heart back to beating. “I won’t love you if you do this,” she said, herthroat thick with tears, forcing the lie through her lips. “You can’t make me love you if you’re just going to…” Her pattern faltered, and she pushed harder, feeling the ribs cracking under her hands. “Come back to me, Kier.”
Nothing.
Grey couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t keep breaking him, couldn’t keep doing this. Kier was dead, and there was nothing she could do to bring him back. She ran her hands up his soaked shirt, over the curve of his jaw, cradling his face. His skin was cold to the touch, clammy with seawater. Her hand trembled as she reached forward, running her fingertips over the curve of his lips, thumb skimming the cut of his scar.
