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Crack!
My heart seizes. I glance down at the breaking ice.Crack.Crack. My eyes clash with Fox’s.
And then I plunge.
Chapter
Thirty-Six
FOX
Ithought I knew death.
Eons of draining life, consuming it, watching eyes empty, hoarding wicked souls for eternity, watching them suffer for their sins was death.
I lived and breathed it, dealt and took it. I’ve seen it all.
But when Willow’s eyes collide with mine, time stops. No wind rustles the leaves. No birds chirp, nor insects crawl. There is only the vacuum of my heart, the black hole growing deeper as she is ripped from her place within it.
She is gone in seconds, falling beneath the ice, and my body will not listen to me.
“Willow!” I howl, stumbling down the bank to get to her andflickersimultaneously.
One second, it works. The next, I run. Stumble. Then I’m sliding across the ice, attacked by a thousand tiny cuts, and plunging into the moat’s cold embrace. The wisp is a lure sinking in one direction. But her silver hair is in another, almost swallowed by the darkness. I try everything in my arsenal to get to her. I shoot shadow to catch her,flickerto her, and send my wraith out. It all fractures as though she holds a charm to block my power.
Somehow, I have her. I’m gathering her in my arms and squeezing tight, willing my magic to obey.Save our queen.
In a flash, we’re on the rocky shore, gasping for breath. She chokes, coughs, vomits water, and gulps for air.
“Oh no,” she wails, scrambling to the frozen moat. “I lost him.”
I’ve never seen her so distraught. Her pain bleeds into mine. Her mind screams as she battles me to let her go.“I need him I need him without him I’m nothing.”
“Willow, stop.”
Grief crumples her face. Her lips are blue, her teeth chattering. “Please please please.”
“If you need him.” I cup her wet face between my hands. “I’ll get him. Stay here.”
Setting my jaw, I dive back in. This time, my body listens. My power is my own again. Iflickeraround the expanse of arctic water and fight the undercurrent for a single, shining star. It only takes me a couple of seconds, and then I am back on the shore, handing her the dangling pendant and watching the starlight transfer to her face.
I thought I knew life.
I thought the blessing gifted us that joy.
But as she takes her precious cargo, cradles it to her chest, and looks at me with glimmering gratitude, I realize I have only begun to understand it.
I am still the darkness, through and through. Yet, she is the light guiding us home. Her numb lips try to form words, but the cold seizes her frail, mortal body and tries to steal that light from me. Her lashes droop. Her shivering stops. The pendant slips from her fingers.
Gathering her and her precious cargo into my arms, I attempt toflickerher inside but go nowhere.
“FUCK!” My bellow echoes against the keep’s walls. What is wrong with me?
With a fire lit in my soul, I stagger up the bank and try everything to warm her. The shadows won’t touch her. The air won’t heat around her. Her heart is slowing, and I don’t know what to do.
Somehow, I get through the gate and shoulder through the castle’s front doors, leaving wet tracks behind. Never in my life have I asked for help, but I scream for it now until my throat is hoarse.
“Help! Someone help us!”
