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“I’ll help you,” I said.
He dropped the jacket. “What?”
“It’ll save your mother, won’t it? And your reputation with the king?”
He picked his jacket up off the floor. “Yes, I suppose…but…why would that concern you? We stole you, Esmeralda. You’re in danger because of us.”
I looked up at the stars, the ones I had wished on so many times. If I had had any chance to save my mother from her death, I would have sold my soul for it. But I knew it wasn’t possible. She was gone. I couldn’t save my mother anymore, but maybe I could save someone else’s.
“It concerns me more than you think,” I said. “Whatever you need, I’ll give you. Just tell me what to do.”
REDEMPTION DAY
CHAPTER 11—OPENING
I was shaking by sundown.
“You’re going to cut yourself open before the ceremony if you keep trying to chop vegetables like that,” Luc said, noticing my hands.
I dropped the knife, holding my face in my hands. If I shut my eyes tight enough, I was back in my room, waking up in my bed next to the oceanside. I would wake up to Father’s blueberry crepes for Sunday brunch, then curl up with Mother on the sofa with our embroidery and talk about the current art exhibits in town.
Warm hands suddenly covered my own, pulling them away from my face.
“Open your eyes, little dove,” Luc coaxed.
I bit my lip. “I don’t think I can.”
His thumbs grazed my eyes, the calluses on his fingers somehow soothing. He said nothing until I finally felt brave enough to open my eyes and look at the gentle smile on his face.
“Don’t be so nervous, dove,” he said. “I promised to protect you, didn’t I?”
I swallowed, mouth dry. “What’s going to happen?”
“To you? Nothing.”
“But Henrik said that the spirit world would open. What does that even mean? You and Henrik both—”
“Understand that reality is more than it seems,” Luc finished. His hands tightened around mine. “Henrik has been called by the spirit world for some time. He knows what he’s doing.”
“And you?” I asked. “What connection do you have?”
His eyes shimmered again, like the sun reflecting off the waves.
“When I lost my fiancée, I wondered if I could ever find her again,” he said. “In the depths of my grief, I searched for a pathto the afterlife to find a way to hear her speak one last time. I saw fortune tellers and psychics, priests and hypnotists.”
He stopped, licking his bottom lip. My heart pounded.
“Did you hear from her?” I asked, holding my breath.
He gave a light and empty smile, shaking his head.
“The dead are dead. They have their own realm, separated by bodies that can’t reach us here.” He raised his head a bit higher. “But, at the same time, I learned that there was a different world than our own. A world desperate to be connected again. Drowned out by man’s own ideas of morality and purpose, the spirit world has been lost and exiled. Do you know what happens when it’s connected again?”
I shook my head. He leaned forward, so close that I could smell the scent of rum and lime on his breath against my cheek.
“Redemption,” he whispered.
Something made my blood run hot as he said it. The word was familiar, like a form of nostalgia.
