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A female who turns to look at him while wearing my face, who smiles up at him with a mirror image of my lips.

A female who reaches for his⁠—

Two palace guards leap from behind the trees and catch me around the arms.

“Riven!” His name cracks out of me as violent as a lightning strike. “Stop the wedding!”

Chapter 41

RIVEN

“Stop the wedding!”

Her voice—gods, her voice—is music I feared I’d never hear again.

I spin toward the sound and freeze.

She’s drenched from head to toe, white hair a tangle of knots, feet bare against the earth, as her dress drips water onto the ground.

Breathless. Furious. Alive.

So very much alive.

My Gwyn.

She’s fighting off two palace guards like vengeance in female form, snarling curses, eyes lit with purpose as if the Viretree itself rose to carry her here.

And maybe it did.

Roots burst from the ground, snaring the guards by the ankles and yanking them away.

She doesn’t even flinch. Doesn’t stop. Only lifts her chin and finds me through the chaos—and smiles.

Radiant. Heart-stopping.

It’s a moment suspended in time.

It’s just her and me.

A breath caught between lifetimes.

A silent promise.

I take a step toward her.

“No!” Vessaryn’s scream pierces the moment.

Pain cleaves through me.

A blade, sharp and hot, drives clean through my back and into my heart.

I gasp.

The taste of iron pools in my mouth as my knees hit the ground.

The world tilts off its axis, and I am crawling, crawling, to Gwyn.

Her screams are distant, like I’m already fading.