After everything we had endured, I thought the universe night hit the pause button, give me a chance to catch my breath. To heal my heart.
But it turns out there was one final goodbye on my horizon.
And no matter how many times she tried to explain it, my brain refused to accept her words.
“We’ve all made deals to keep each other safe,” Haley said. We were back by the vans now, taking stock of what was left, trying to figure out accommodations for the next few nights, and she leaned against the side of the one with the tinted windows, her eyes imploring me to understand. “There was no other way.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked.
“By her grace, I was able to stay and fight, Gray. To see this through with you—to fight by you're side as my sister and as my best friend. And I've never felt more proud for honored. But now it’s over. We did what we set out to do. And I have to pay the price for that grace.”
Her grace…
Realization suddenly dawned, and I remembered Haley in the crypts, performing the blood spell that would ultimately save us from the hybrids.
The spell echoed in my memory.
Blood of hell, blood of night
I call on the darkness to show us the light
May evil and malice and violence intended
Return to its hosts uprooted, upended
Dark Goddess I bend, Dark Goddess I bow
Hear my petition, and thusly I vow
My service is yours, by blood and by blade
Until my last breath shall deem it unmade.
“You pledged her your service,” I said, remembering. I closed my eyes as the word hung between us, burning through my heart.
Pledged…
“I have been called to her court to meet with her elite guard. She has an assignment for me, possibly training. I don’t know the details.”
“So you’re just, what?” I asked. “At her beck and call?”
“That’s kind of how it works. She’s a goddess. I invoked her, and she heeded my call. We… We would have died otherwise.”
A shadow darkened her eyes, and for the first time since I’d met her, Haley seemed to have lost her sparkle.
“I love you, Gray,” she said now. “I just need you to know that.”
“Then why does this feel like a permanent goodbye?”
“It's not—I promise you that. But it might be a while before I can see you again. Take care of Addie and Georgie for me, okay?”
“You aren’t going to tell them?”
At this, her face crumpled, her voice dropping to a whisper. “I can’t.”
I hugged her close, feeling the tremble of her sobs in my arms. I tried as hard as I could to hold on tight, to make her stay, to undo the spell that had bound her to this fate.
But in the end, like so many others who’d come before her, I just had to let her go.
