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I have to look away when I whisper, “I can’t.”

He gently grabs my chin with his free hand and forces me to look at him. “You can.”

His gaze dips down to my lips, and he leans in. I can feel the heat of his breath on my face. My heart gallops, and all those filthy thoughts from earlier come barreling back into the forefront of my mind. He’s so demanding, so— “Come on, little witch.”

“W-what are you doing?”

“You consumed the bloodshade,” he says tightly, thumb caressing the corner of my mouth. I shiver. “Am I supposed to partake as well?”

His stupidity snaps me out of whatever spell he’d just cast on me.

“No,” I hiss, pushing him away, but not letting go of his hand. “You’d die, you bastard.”

“But you⁠—”

“I am death-kissed, Riven. I can walk the line between life and death. Bloodshade will not poison me; it will transport me to the Threshold.”

“The Threshold?”

“The world between life and death,” I explain. “Now, just… say the chant with me, and we’ll hope for the best.”

“We’ll hope for the best?”

“I already told you; I’ve never summoned the dead with someone living before. Just don’t let go of me until I sever the connection, got it?”

He nods.

Holding each other’s gaze, we chant in unison, “A fragile line we dare tread to summon Rosemarie Thaelon from the dead. From shores where damned flowers bloom, we call Rosemarie Thaelon forth from earthen tomb.”

By the third chant, light flickers around us as a mystical cage rises from the bloodied runes and traps us within the circle. My chest flares hot as gooseflesh pimples my skin beneath my clothes.

There’s a whisper on the breeze, a gentle hello, from a voice I haven’t heard in centuries.

Death.

With Riven’s hand firmly in mine, I answer her call. Hello, old friend.

You smell like the one who got away.

My brow furrows. What?

Rory Alarie. She drags her fingers against my arm as she pulls at my cloak. You wear her scent like a perfume, although it’s different now. Somehow more full of life than before she met me. But never mind that. Tell me, eternal one, why did you bring a living with you? Is he for trade?

No, I say, almost instinctively. He is not for you.

Everyone is mine eventually.

While what she says is true, I don’t want to hear it.

We’re here to speak with his grandmother.

Her laugh is subtle, a rustle of leaves. How boring.

May I pass with him?

Just this once. Next time you bring a living along, I may require something in return.

There won’t be a next time.