Page 133

But Kelter takes the silver blade of Eli’s knife—the one that I held to his heart, the one that cut my clothes and spilled blood from his chest—and with a firm grip on the handle and a quick step forward, he slashes Eli’s throat. Straight across, deep into his amber-brown skin.

Lightning sears the sky, the angry roar of thunder following.

Thick black blood flows down Eli’s front. His eyes bulge with shock, and for a moment, the wind dies too, perfectly still and silent, not believing.

“It’s…it’s black,” Poett mutters.

“What the fuck?” Rayde releases Eli’s arms and jumps back, leaving him gurgling and choking on the blood as he collapses on the wet stone.

I’m struck from every direction. A hole drills through my heart. I turn away, twisting in Jace’s grasp. Gusts of wind lash against my wet skin. Nausea coils in my gut, and I retch, dry heaving from my empty stomach.

“You’re both gross.” Jace holds me at a distance.

Kelter is frozen, bloody knife in hand, black liquid washing down his arm with the rain.

I don’t know if I’m breathing, if my heart is beating. Eli is in a heap on the ground, lifeless. The man who left me notes and drummed his way into my heart, the man who knows death better than me, the man who cares toseeme—dead. Gone.

The pain and loss of every vision of death stacked up can’t compare to this, to the way my chest aches as though my heart were pushing right through the walls, tearing me open and falling to the ground. I harden inside. My veins turn to glass, my nerves to stone, but I still feel every agonizing moment.

“Come, dear.” My murderous mother takes my arm, pulling me away from Jace, her eyes locked on the black mess spilling from Eli. “Take that knife and restrain him,” she says to Poett, pointing at Kelter. She hisses in my ear, “Ready to say goodbye to your memories, love?”

But Eli’s gone. Memories are all I have left. And now I’ll lose them, and it’ll kill me. Without my memories, I’ll cease to exist. Cam will be gone, my forest, every sunrise with Kelter, every dark look from Eli…every touch. Every blink. Gone forever.

The world is suspended around me. Time quits.

I weep. Tears of tiny moments that will be washed away. Tears of love and loss, of life and death. Of me before, wanting to forget it all, and me now, wanting to hold on to every moment. I cry for Eli and Cam and the Kelter I lost when that knife took a life—and for myself.

“Why do you have to take them?”

She lifts my chin, her voice sweeter than vengeance. “Why does it matter if you won’t remember the reason?” Her hand smoothes my wind-swept hair, reminding me of the mother I never had.

“How can you say you’re my mother and still do this to me?”

“When you’re a mother, you’ll know there are no limits when it comes to your child. You defy gods. You cross realms. You kill, you lie and you bleed for them.” She holds my cheek. “And you expect them to do the same for you.”

“None of what you do is for me.”

“I’ve done all of that for you and more…if you only knew. I’ve risked everything to save the land from total destruction and give us the future we deserve. You think it hasn’t cost me? Why isn’t everyone lining up to thank me? You of all people should be grateful.”

I can almost see past her glassy black eyes and stone face. To the broken mind inside. “What are you going to do with my essence?”

The Centress turns me around, pressing my back to her chest, and wraps her arms around me. She speaks over the fierce wind that pierces my skin. “I need it to see your father again. The only way to get it out without killing you is by taking your memories. I’m saving your life, Everielle. And after, we won’t have to worry about the loss of magic or the worsening weather anymore because we’ll be safe with your father.”

My father.

Maybe I’ll get to meet him after I’m erased.

The wind whips at my baggy shirt and pants, flapping and snapping them around my exhausted limbs, and my mind shifts, building a shield around itself and blocking the fear that coils and tightens and strangles.

Erased.

I won’t have to hurt inside anymore, won’t have to miss anyone. I’ll be beyond numb, beyond forgetting, beyond the risk of remembering. No more memories of rejection and cruelty, of thousands of deaths, no more trying to escape. No more hurting over Eli or blood spilling down his neck and chest. An empty mind in a purple haze. Oblivion.

“No! You can’t hurt her!” Kelter charges forward, but Poett rips his arms back.

You’re too late, Kelter.

“Ugh.” The Centress huffs at the three guards. “Kill that one too and get out of here.”