Page 7
“Can you die?” The question falls out of my mouth before I decide to ask it.
“I don’t know,” he admits. “We haven’t tested it. But as far as I’m aware, no one’s ever permanently killed a Revenant.”
Relief courses through me. If Logan can’t die, then the image that’s been burning behind my eyes since Kieran’s dagger buried itself in his chest—him on this deck, bleeding out, gone forever—isn’t real. It can’t happen. The man standing in front of me might be a Revenant with dead blood, borrowed eyes, and his soul hanging from a chain, but he’s the closest thing to permanent I’ve ever had.
“Good,” I say, and his hand comes up to my face, his thumb tracing my cheek.
Electricity jumps between his skin and mine, and his pupils blow wide, color flooding his cheeks. He’s warm where he’s touching me, and the barrier of black flames is a wall between us and everything that’s trying to tear us apart.
“You’re shaking,” he says.
“I’ve been shaking since Evie tried to kill me.”
His hand slides to the back of my neck and pulls me in, and then he’s kissing me, desperate and fierce. His lips are warm from my electricity, his fingers are tangled in my hair, and my hands are fisting the front of his blood-soaked shirt and pulling him closer, but never close enough.
Just like that, the shaking stops. Because Logan’s here. He’s alive. He can’t die.
I’m safe.
The thought hits me so hard my eyes burn. I haven’t felt safe since the Geryon ripped every secret on this ship wide open. Maybe I shouldn’t feel safe with a Revenant inside a barrier of black fire, but I’ve always felt safe with Logan, even when every piece of evidence says he’s the thing I should be running from.
When the kiss breaks, we’re both breathing hard. His forehead drops against mine, and his hand stays on the back of my neck, the silver sparks between us fading to a low, steady pulse.
“Why did you put up the barrier?” I ask, because my brain is starting to come back online and there are questions that need answers. “You could have let me do it in front of them. Then they wouldn’t be attacking the barrier, and we wouldn’t have to face a furious Kieran and Evie when we bring it back down.”
“Kieran and Evie don’t know I can compel witches,” he explains, his eyes as steady as ever. “They can never find out.”
“Right,” I say, unsure why I didn’t think of it. Logan’s had enough secrets revealed for the day. Now isn’t the time to add mind control to the growing list.
He nods, and from the sad look in his eyes, I have a feeling he’s thinking the same thing I am. That in a few seconds, this private sanctuary of ours will be gone, and we’ll return to being a Revenant and a star touched against a demigod and the witch who tried to kill me.
3
EVIE
The heat pouring off Kieran is so intense that the skin on my face tightens. Both of his swords are drawn and burning white-gold, and when the blades connect with Logan’s barrier, the impact shudders through the planks under my feet.
Silver threads of Jade’s lightning crackle across the surface where the steel hit, and Kieran swings again, harder. The rigging shakes, the sails snap, and the glow from his blades is so bright it burns my skin.
“Kieran!” I scream, the word shredding my throat on the way out. “Stop!”
He swings again without looking at me—with only one sword this time—his blade carving a terrifying arc through the air. Every muscle in his body is engaged, his shoulders rolling with a fluid power that’s the opposite of the controlled training he drills into us at the Scorched Circles. He swings again, and again, and again, making no more progress than he did the first time around.
I need to stop him. So, I take a deep breath of scorching air, cross the three feet between us, and grab the forearm that isn’t swinging a blade.
His skin sears my palm, pain lancing up my wrist so sharp and sudden that tears spring to my eyes. Every instinct I have screams at me to let go. But I clamp my jaw shut, swallow the cry climbing my throat, and hold on.
“Stop!” I scream again, and the scream is a gift, because it gives the pain somewhere to hide. “Kieran, stop!”
His arm freezes mid-swing. The glowing blades dim. The heat drops by ten degrees, and when his eyes find mine, the solid amber cracks and green bleeds through.
He’s terrifyingly beautiful in a way that makes my chest hurt and my brain short-circuit.
“He choked you.” His jaw is so tight the muscles are jumping beneath his skin, and he’s all coiled muscle around bone, ready to snap. “He put his magic around your throat, and I’m supposed to let him hide behind a wall?”
“I don’t care about Logan, or Jade, or Callie right now.” My fingers tighten on his arm, and the pressure grinds the burn deeper into my palm. But I keep my voice level, my face still, because if he sees what his skin is doing to mine, I’ll lose him to the guilt as fast as I’m losing him to the rage.
“Then what do you care about?”
