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What if, in order to free Blaise of the parasite, we don’t need to open the Rip at all?
What if I hold a bit of the Fabric in my hands?
CHAPTER35
BLAISE
My eyes are crossing from trying to decipher the smudged script of an ancient grimoire for the past hour when the lock on my cell rattles and Nox enters.
I have to blink multiple times to clear the glaze in my eyes, and I dog-ear a page to mark my place before clamping it shut.
“You’re lat—”
I don’t get to finish that accusation, because Nox grabs me by the back of my head and pulls my mouth to his.
The kiss is short but passionate, and when he pulls away, I find I’m a bit dizzy.
“I’m getting you out of here,” he says, running his hands down my neck, tucking my hair behind my ears before his hands come to rest on my shoulders.
There’s life in his pale eyes I haven’t recognized before, that I thought I might never see in him. Not after what happened to Gunter.
The sorrow isn’t gone, the grief over the loss of the male who raised him, but there’s something else, too. Something buzzing inside him, causing his fingers to twitch and his eyes to widen.
It kills me to dampen that spirit. “But your family. If you help me escape—” It’s strange, having to be the voice of reason. Trying to talk another person out of a terrible idea. I can see how Evander and Jerad were so exasperated with me constantly.
Nox shakes his head, a grin lighting up his entire face. “You’re not escaping. You’re being released. We both are.”
“Nox.” I shake my head, hardly believing my ears. “How? Oh.” I clap my hand over my mouth. “You figured it out—how to extract it—didn’t you?”
Nox kisses me again. It’s the type of kiss that promises a thousand more.
Then he tells me everything. He tells me of the queen’s threat to open the Rip to cleave the parasite from me, of her intention to barter something horrible in order to get the parasite to agree. He tells me of Gunter’s parcel, of wonderful genius Gunter, who must have realized just before his death the implications of plants grown near the Rip. Who likely hadn’t wanted to tell us and get our hopes up.
Nox tells me the plan, draws out the entire ritual for me on a scrap piece of parchment, and the more he talks, the more he draws, the more my heart floats.
There are a few ways it could go wrong, of course, but Nox has carefully considered those, thinks we can plan ahead to avoid them.
“What do you say?” he asks, holding my hands between his. They’re warm and steady, and I wonder then if we could manage the everyday tasks of life if we never let go.
I was never one for everyday tasks, anyway.
I want to say yes, but my mouth trembles, hesitates.
Nox frowns, reaches up and brushes the hair that’s fallen into my face yet again.
My throat aches and I glance away because I can’t stand to have those piercing moon-white eyes on me. Not if his answer is… “And then?”
“And then?” He cocks his head to the side. “I’m afraid that’s not the most specific of questions.”
I laugh, but it’s unconvincing. “And then you’ll return to your family, and I’ll return…” I swallow the lump in my throat. “Well, I’ll figure something out. And we’ll think fondly of one another when we’re old and decrepit and tell our respective grandchildren of the time we escaped from the clutches of an evil queen.”
Nox kisses me again, and it’s just the interruption I need.
“How about we tell them together?” he asks, pulling away.
My heart stutters a bit, but it’s a welcome malfunction. “Okay,” I say, because it’s the only word I can muster.
“Okay,” he says, and when he smiles, it’s the type of beautiful that fills my stomach with jagged rocks. Because even while he’s looking at me like this, it’s the type of smile I know I’m destined to miss.
