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With the sun rising golden, as ever oblivious to the chaos and death below, Oneira gathered her favorite blossoms and decorated the bier for the final time. As she laid herself upon it, she gazed up through the unending tears at the light spilling from above, just as she’d envisioned from the beginning.

It was a more difficult farewell than she’d imagined when she first arrived. But then, she’d gained companions, become a different person, fallen in love. She didn’t want to say goodbye to it all, but she could only take this one last step. She owed it to all the world.

Closing her eyes, remembering Govirinda as it had been, green and blossoming with life, Oneira stepped into the Dream and let go.

EPILOGUE

Long months later, in the short days of midwinter, Stearanos finally escaped the clawing demands of a fractured kingdom, at last making his way to the pink-pebbled shoreline of Oneira’s home. The beach had frosted over in the dark of the year, with its long nights and fractious seas.

Oneira’s wards were down, as he’d expected. She’d done as she promised in that last, brutally vivid dream, and taken Mirza out of the world forever, leaving only his unblemished body behind. She’d vanished, also, though Stearanos knew where she’d gone. He’d been half-afraid that her home would have crumbled in her absence, falling like her wards without her magic to power them, but she’d wrought well, building to last, and the white walls of her house stood like the memorial she’d wanted, shining pure against the gray and turbulent skies.

Snow and ice coated the winding steps up the cliff, and he used magic to clear and dry them as he went. No sense risking a fall and he rather thought Oneira would appreciate the housekeeping effort. Huge pawprints had melted into the snow and frozen there, giving evidence that her animals lived there still. Indeed, before Stearanos was more than halfway up, Bunny came racing down to greet him with slobbering enthusiasm.

They climbed together, Stearanos clearing the path Bunny and Moriah had made through the deepening snow that piled against the walls in gentle, pristine slopes. Knowing what he’d find within, Stearanos delayed a bit longer, detouring to the rosebed Oneira had dug and tended with her own hands. There, stark against the backdrop of winter white, the Veredian roses bloomed, midnight purple, gloriously fragrant—and exactly as Oneira had imagined for them in her dream.

Using no magic, he plucked a single blossom, pricking a finger in the process, a drop of bright red blood falling against the snow. Carrying the Veredian rose inside, he went to where he knew Oneira would be.

She lay on her bier, as cold and white as stone, the flowers beneath her withered and dried, her crimson hair spilling to the floor. Grief stabbed him through the heart, even though he’d grieved for her all this time. Coming close, he touched the still skin of her face. From a distance, she could seem to be sleeping, but no. She was gone.

Moriah rose from her curl beside the bier, nosing his hand. “She found her question and answer,” the black cat said in her low purring voice, surprising him that she spoke and then not. “Not everyone gets to choose the manner of their absolution.”

“True,” he granted, his voice choked with tears. He laid the rose on her breast, a final living blossom in tribute to her. “I wish she’d waited to see the roses bloom, however.”

“It was never about the roses,” Moriah said.

“I know.”

Bunny trotted up to him, something long carefully draped from his fangs. Stearanos took it, bemused by the color and texture until he realized what it was. A bit of yarn pierced a folded note attached to it. His eyes nearly too blurred with tears to read, he opened it, blinking furiously to focus.

My Dearest Em,

I knew you’d come and I’m glad you did, if only to receive this last note and gift, unlovely though the latter may be. I blameBunny, but a promise made is a promise kept—though weaving you a shirt turned out to be beyond my skills and the amount of available yarn. Instead you now own what I believe to be the onlyscáthcúscarf in existence. Wear it in good health.

The house is yours if you want it. If not, please take the roses to your garden and tend them in my memory. You always did have the prior and greater claim to them.

Thank you for healing my heart, for being both the question and answer.

Live well for me. Look for me in your dreams. I can only hope they’ll be sweet.

With infinite love,

Your Thief

Stearanos wiped the tears away and folded the note. “You won’t slip away from me so easily,” he informed her silent figure. “You’ve stolen my heart and I can’t live without it.”

With Bunny and Moriah observing, Stearanos laid himself beside Oneira on the bier, gathering her close, and laying his face on the pillow of her glorious hair, still a vivid crimson. Clearing his mind, he summoned all of his magic, and prepared to open a door with his teeth.

If anyone could survive the Dream, it was Oneira.

If anyone could find her, it was Stearanos.