Lightning flashes again. I feel a raindrop fall on my arm, and I look down to watch the blood swirl within it.
The world shall end in fire and flood.
“There’s always hope,” I say. I turn to my sister, the woman who started all of this, who carried on my parents’ legacy and led us to this point.
The woman who killed my mother to save my life. To save me from having to do it. To save the man I love from having to do it.
“Let us go, Adria. We can save this world.” I grab Ronan’s hand, and he looks at me, nodding.
It’s time to meet our destiny.
“Go, Sylvie,” says Seth. “She won’t hurt us.”
The rain begins to fall. The blood washes from my skin as Ronan and I walk to Kira, our eyes on Adria. She watches us wordlessly as we depart, latching ourselves onto Kira’s back and taking to the skies.
The ground shrinks beneath us, the dusty land turning dark with rain as we climb into the night sky. By the time we’re above the clouds, my skin is clean, the last of my mother’s blood falling down on Faros with the rain.
“Sylvie, I’m so sorry, my love.” Ronan wraps his arms around my waist as I sink back into him, his head resting on my shoulder.
“It wasn’t your fault. I don’t think it could have gone any differently. She made her choice long ago.” She had chosen her war, her need for revenge, over her children time and time again. “She wasn’t the one who raised me.”
Tears spring to my eyes as I think of Larus, as I think of her blade in his heart.
“I’m so sorry for that too. You’ve been through so much.”
I cry quietly, pulling away to grip Kira’s neck. “I don’t deserve your comfort.”
“Sylvie.” Ronan moves forward and pulls me back to him. “Darling, I know why you did what you did. As much as it hurt me, there was a part of me that believed you were right. And Ihated myself for being too weak to walk away myself. For forcing you to do it.”
“I just thought that maybe I could save you from dying, but look at where it got you. You almost died today. That was my fault.”
“No.” He strokes my hair as he holds me. “You couldn’t have known. We still don’t know. There’s a chance that we go to that altar, and it kills us. There’s a chance it ends everything.”
“But you don’t believe that.” I already know this from his feelings, but I need to hear him say it.
“No, I don’t. I believe this is exactly what we’re meant to do, and I know you do too now. I never gave up on you, Sylvie. There were dark nights after you left, but I knew in my heart it wasn’t the end for us.”
I press my head against his chest. “You came for me.”
“I’ll always come for you. You’re my wife, Sylvie. I love you.”
He says it plainly, simply, as if it’s one of the fundamental truths of the universe. He says it without pride, without a need to prove it to me or himself or anyone.
He says it just because it’s true. Because from the moment we met, it could be no other way.
“I love you too, Ronan. Until the day I die, and the day after that.”
He kisses my cheek. “And the day after that.”
We send Kira back into the sky after she sets us down on the hilltop on top of Avaris. Whatever happens next, it’s for us alone, and I couldn’t live with myself if anything happened to her.
She coos protectively as she hesitates to leave us, but Ronan assures her we’ll be alright.
And I believe him.
The hill where the temple once stood looks the same as when we saw it last. There’s no altar here from the visions, no temple.
“What do we do?” I ask.
