Page 106 of Oracle of Ruin

I try to smile, but comes out as a grimace. I never knew death would be so painful. I can feel each of my organs as they shut down, I realize in a panic. I am unworthy. My time is running out.

Blinking back tears, I shakily grip his hand. “I love you.”

I say it so he knows it is for him, but also for the others. It is all I can say, all I can do.

I say it for Kya, who has shown me kindness above all else. For Amír, who taught me to survive and loves me in her own way. For Blaine and all we were, Torin and all we’ve lost. And for Rowan, who has to know that I have loved him in this lifetime more than all else, and will find and love him in the next.

I have my regrets, as any dying person does. I regret not being able to tell my parents that I love them to their faces, as anything more than a poor girl they took pity on. As their daughter. But this… this will have to be enough.

The ghost of a hand brushes my bangs from my face and a soft voice lilts a whisper to my ear.You were never meant to survive. You were designed for this since the day you were born. A sacrifice to the king, to the gods, and someday, to men. You were the one born to die.

Why do the gods choose to grant clarity to men in their final moments when it is too late? Once they’ve already damned us all. Even as the thought passes through my mind, I know no gods are to blame. My undoing is truly of my own design.

Death is not swift nor kind to me, but I do not regret raising that vial to my lips. Convulsions wrack my body, and Derrín’s hands shake where he tries to hold my shoulders still. Even as he holds me to him, I can feel his warmth fading, or rather, my ability to feel him. At least with the numbness coming, the pain lessens. Blood pours from my mouth, my nose, my ears. The poison has burned my vocal cords and distorted my voice to where it is no longer my own. I can feel the skin on my lips boil and peel back. And yet a small part of myself thanks the poison, and is grateful my fight is finally over.

A soft voice reaches out and brushes its fingertips across my freckles, down the bridge of my nose.Vera.

“I love you,” I repeat again with my last breath, even as Derrín’s screams rattle my bones, and I let the darkness pull me under.

Chapter43

Rowan

Sunlight bathes my mother’s peaceful face when I approach her. I slept on my decision to tell her about Lyra. Too much commotion has occurred in the past two days with the Ialeses coming home and I haven’t found a moment to confront her about my new knowledge. This morning, however, Aiko found me and called me a pitiful coward.

Now here we are.

Finneas comes to stand behind me while Aiko settles beside her and takes her hand in hers. She squeezes them, the gentleness of the action drawing my mother’s gaze to my solemn face.

“What, my Noiteron?” She smiles, strained even to my eyes.

I drop my chin to my chest and inhale deeply. How am I supposed to tell her what I know without breaking her heart? What if I fail, and worst of all, I fail her?

Finneas’s heavy hand falls on my shoulder. Aiko’s on my wrist. Even now, knowing they are Verosa’s parents and the threat Finneas made earlier, they are not afraid to stand by me. To stand in as the full family I never was gifted by blood.

Forcing my features to soften and my nerves to steel, I meet my mother’s worried gaze. “Lyra is alive.”

I want to tell her everything, to tell her how we met, how she knew me because I had her eyes. I want to ramble on and on and promise her that I will bring her sister back. That I will bring her home to her and kill the man that stole her.

But her mouth drops open.

And she screams.

She screams a great, shuddering sob and collapses into her hands. Aiko holds her shoulders to her chest as she convulses. I sit still, mute until silence befalls the room.

Horror fills my chest cavity—horror at the thought that I caused this, that I don’t know how to fix it. My mother may have weakened over the years, but still remained strong in a way that shadowed her former self. She’s never once sobbed before me, not to her knowledge, anyhow, and surely never screamed.

My panicked gaze shifts to Aiko, who is trying to comfort her, rocking her back and forth like a child. She’s inconsolable, and just as I am about to reach for her hands, she falls silent, the shrieking stopping just as quickly as it started.

No one moves, not even daring to blink or avert our gazes.

My mother sits up. Dries her eyes.

And smiles.

The sight is more horrifying than the guttural screams that were just wrought from her body.

“Emilie,” Aiko speaks slowly in a low tone, “what’s going through your head?”

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