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I gulped in a lungful of air, and another one. My chest hurt like hellfire. More than anything, I wanted to crawl into his arms and bury my face in his chest until I could wrap my mind around these mad games of space and time … but Lyn came trotting towards us with eyes that were making powerful attempts to escape their sockets, and Tared followed close behind, a leather travelling flask in his hand.

He did not look happy.

Alarm flared through me, and Creon’s hand stiffened halfway to my knee. His wings shifted slightly, hiding his signs from the audience behind him.Cactus …

The exhausted look in his eyes said enough – was this really the moment to worry about the opinions of angry alves?

‘We talked about this,’ I managed on a choked whisper. Five nights ago – an eternity ago – and yet for him it had to be mere hours. ‘Not here. Not now. Please.’

A shadow seemed to cross his face, but he nodded, folding in his wing again. If not for the small twitch at his sharp jaw, I may have thought him in full agreement. Now that minuscule hint cracking through his polished shield of indifference told me an entirely different story – that it took every little bit of self-restraint not to jump up and pull me back into his embrace, where we both knew I wanted to be.

Perhaps I had underestimated just how much he despised this, having to be some stone-hearted murderer when what I needed was the opposite. Zera’s voice drifted back into my mind –Love doesn’t like to be taken for granted …

Is that what I’m doing?I almost blurted out, the words aching on my lips now that he was suddenly right before me again, every inch the male I loved.Taking you for granted? Testing your devotion too much with these stupid fears of mine?But I was going to tell Tared, I really was. Just not when he was looking like this, thoughts of blades sharpening his every glance at Creon, not when it may be minutes until we were dragged into battle.

This wasn’t the moment for even more ill-timed doubts. Once this mission was over and we could return to the Underground, there would be more time to talk.

So I swallowed my questions and said, ‘I’m fine,’ which was a lie, but at least a constructive one. My smile at Lyn felt weak and watery; she didn’t look reassured in the slightest. ‘Just … just a lot to take in at once.’

‘Here,’ Tared said, chucking the leather flask into my lap before he sank down on the porch beside me. ‘Might help. Unless you didn’t eat anything for those four days, in which case honey mead may not be the best place to start.’

I managed a chuckle and pulled the cork from the bottle. The pungent smell of liquor made my eyes tear up, and my small sip scorched its way down my throat like a mouthful of burning oil. But my shoulders relaxed even as my stomach objected, and some of the whirlwind in my mind died down at the shock of that vile, fiery taste.

I handed the flask back to him and buried my face in my hands, trying to figure out where to start.I nearly died. I drank a goddess’s blood. I saw your deepest fears and hurts – of each and every one of you.

Maybe not there.

‘Should we conclude that you found her, Em?’ Lyn said, her voice too high. ‘Zera?’

‘It was the tree at the heart of the temple.’ I didn’t lift my head from my palms. Stringing four days of memories into comprehensible sentences was enough of a challenge already. ‘It split open – became a portal to her. The forest is hiding her, you see, keeping her alive even though she lost her magic, so …’

‘And what was the thing about time?’

It took three jumbled attempts to clarify the thing about time, and several more cautious questions to pull the rest of the story from me – the refusals, the bag, the godsworn magic. I didn’t tell them about the doves. Didn’t bring up any of what Zera had taught me about my own motivations, about my parents and their mistakes, about choosing between people you love. The only person who would hear that part of the story was Creon – but later, when the battles had been fought and everyone else had vanished.

‘So you can … bind people?’ Lyn finally concluded, and there was a caution to her young voice that made my heart squeeze in unpleasant ways. Zera hadn't been the only one who disliked the power in any hands, even in mine.

‘Technically,’ I muttered.

‘Good gods.’ She rubbed a stubborn curl from her eyes and repeated, more breathlessly now, ‘Good gods.’

‘Well,’ Tared said, with a chuckle that couldn’t conceal the slight feebleness below the word, ‘it’s more or less what we were aiming for, isn’t it?’

More or less– except that none of them had known, or even suspected, that it would take magic this powerful to stand a chance of destroying the Mother’s bindings. I glanced at Creon, who had barely signed a single word so far – afraid, for a moment, that even his expression would suddenly reveal that unwilling edge of caution.

But the smile with which he studied me, sitting cross-legged in the grass, rather glowed with …pride?

‘What are you thinking?’ I said weakly.

He shrugged, smile quirking into an unburdened expression of satisfaction.Wondering if you’d beat me in a duel.

Even my doubts faltered in surprise. ‘What?’

‘Is your invincible track record really the point of importance here, Hytherion?’ Tared snapped – some of that sharpness probably thanks to his own defeat at Creon’s hands, which had to be a fresh wound of the previous day for him. ‘We’re dealing with powers none of us have ever dealt with before here, and—’

I spent centuries dealing with powers no one has dealt with before, Creon interrupted him with a shrug.You’re both worrying about the wrong things. If a damn goddess trusted Em with this magic, then why exactly are you doubting that decision? Even I’m not that much of a heathen.

A snort-like laugh escaped me. Signs aimed at the other two, but I knew they’d been meant for me just as much –stop doubting yourself.