“The rib is cracked, not broken. You’ll live.” She presses a cloth against the blade wound on my shoulder. “The infection?—”
“I know.” The Bloom spreads through my blood, claiming more ground, pushing closer to the transformation threshold with every hour. “It’s getting worse.”
“Worse than you told me.”
“Worse than I told you,” I admit. “The violence feeds it. The more I kill, the more it grows. By dawn?—”
“By dawn, we end this. One way or another.” Her stare locks onto mine. “And when it’s over, you let me decide whether you’re worth saving.”
“What if I’m not?”
“Then I’ll decide that too.” Her hand rises. Touches my face the same way I touched hers in the passage. “But I don’t think that’s how this ends. I think you’re going to survive. I think we’re both going to survive. And I think what comes after is going to be worth whatever we have to do tonight.”
The infection pulses in my blood. The need that never goes away, the craving that’s slowly claiming me, the transformation that waits at the end of this road if we fail.
But her hand is warm against my face. Her eyes hold what looks like faith. And since the Abbot’s voice echoed through the speaking tubes, hope surfaces where only fear existed before.
Fragile and foolish and impossible to ignore.
“At dawn,” I say.
“At dawn.” She leans closer. Rests her forehead against my shoulder. “Tonight, we rest. Let me treat your wounds and watch over you while you sleep.”
“I don’t sleep.”
“Then let me watch over you while you pretend.” Her lips curve. Almost a smile. “I’ve learned to tell the difference.”
The chamber grows quiet. Cael tends his own wounds in the corner. Circe settles against the far wall, exhaustion finally claiming her. And Arwen stays close—her hands working medicine into my damaged flesh, her presence grounding me in ways the Bloom can’t override.
When the sun rises, we face the Garden. The Abbot. The Crimson Seed.
Tonight, I let myself believe we might actually win.
TWENTY-SEVEN
ARWEN
The herbs aren’t working anymore.
Zrynok sits shirtless on the narrow cot, the infection’s map spreading visibly across his chest — the familiar red web has climbed past his collarbone, reaching toward his heart with terrible purpose. The Bloom is advancing. What the herbs held yesterday, they cannot hold today.
“The concentrated exposure changed something.” I hear my voice. Flat. Professional. The voice I used when the Keepers demanded reports on other initiates’ progress. “The Bloom in your blood isn’t responding to standard suppression anymore.”
His jaw tightens. I feel the muscle bunch under my palm where it rests against his chest.
“Then we move up the timeline.”
He starts to rise. I press down—not hard enough to stop him if he truly wants to move, but enough to make my objection clear.
“Don’t.”
“Hit the Garden tonight.” He pushes past my resistance, sitting upright despite the way his body protests. The wounds from the barracks fight haven’t fully healed. The cracked ribmakes him wince with every deep breath. “Kill the Abbot. Destroy everything before the infection finishes me.”
“That’s suicide.”
“That’s strategy.” His damaged eye catches the candlelight, amber flickering in the milky depths. “I’m not getting better, Arwen. Every hour I wait, the Bloom claims more ground. Better to spend what strength I have on something useful than to waste it fighting a battle I’m going to lose.”
“You’re not strong enough?—”
