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Then Alastair’s hands are on my wrists, loosening my embrace. He lies down on his side, curled up beneath the thick fog of brazier smoke. “Find me at the end of the salt season,” he murmurs. His features sharpen, feathers wreathe his head in a crown. Therion gazes up at me. “Go, now. I will keep him safe.”

Numbly, I get to my feet. The weight of sadness is like an anchor, dragging me under the surface of a depthless sea. Camille’s arm slips around my waist. We lean against each other as we walk. We go to the doorway, slow and reluctant. My hand is on the latch, but I cannot make myself draw it closed. Therion looks at me through the thickening smoke. “You must leave,” he urges. His voice is stern, commanding, reverberating through the chamber and out into the hall.

I shake my head. My eyes blur with helpless tears. Camille lays her hand over mine. Together we pull the door closed. I’m sobbing as the latch slides into place.

Leaving the mine is like a terrible dream. The lantern has burned out so we stumble through the dark. I’m drawn back to the surface as though by instinct, some deep-buried memory that lies within me from all the other times I’ve walked these halls. I clutch Camille’s handas we make our way upward. I wonder if this is how swans feel when they leave behind the winter and fly back to their natal home.

Behind us, the salt groans and shudders. The crystals spike and spiral out from the veins, until they’ve filled the corridors, sealing them tightly closed. I know it will protect Therion while he heals. But it’s a desolate thought, that there isn’t a way back into the depths. We cannot change our minds.

Soon, the light grows brighter. The entrance is ahead, framing a star-stitched sky. The moonlight is dazzling, bright as a flame after our time in the shadows. Fresh air spills over us, drying the tears on our cheeks and combing through our tangled hair. We stand together at the entrance to the mine, and Camille flings her arms around me.

I hold her tightly, feeling the frantic beat of her pulse in my own chest. She kisses me, the shared taste of our sorrow as bitter as the sea. I wish I could keep her this close forever, fold her inside the structure of my bones, tuck her safe beneath my heart.

“We need to make it real,” Camille says raggedly. “Make it look as though Therion—and Alastair—are truly gone.”

I nod, slowly, as my eyes linger on the rack of lanterns by the entrance, the scatter of dry tinder that’s been swept into the corridor from the wind, driftwood and dead grass and tumbleweeds. Then I look to the swan boat, still tethered to the pier. “I think I know what to do.”

I grab for the lanterns, taking one in each hand. The box of matches from the altar room is still in the pocket of my skirts. Camille watches me for a moment, then realization darkens her face. Squaring her shoulders in determination, she grabs two more of the lanterns and follows me to the pier. “Is there a way to get back without the boat?”

“Yes. There’s a ladder on the edge of the cliff.”

We hurry back and forth, gathering scraps of driftwood and handfuls of dried grass, anything that will burn. We load it into the boatuntil the space between the swan’s wings is full. From a distance, it looks like the huddled shape of an unmoving body.

One by one, we shatter the lamps, tipping the flammable salt-forged oil over the pile. I untie the sails, letting them billow free.

Then we both crouch on the pier as the waves thrash against the boards, soaking our skirts and jolting the boat as it strains against the tether rope. Camille lights the match, but it dies instantly. I cup my hands around hers as she strikes another, shielding the new flame from the wind.

The fire catches, slow at first, tracing a path through the oil and wood like a caress. Then the wind rises, and the fire draws upward, sparking and fierce.

With numb fingers I work the hitch knot undone and free the boat from the pier. Together, Camille and I give the swan boat a forceful push. It’s swept up by the current as the loosened sails begin to smolder. I watch as it drifts farther and farther away, until the swan with a pyre cradled between its wings is far from the shore.

“We have to go,” Camille says, pulling my arm as she urges me away from the pier. I follow her across the beach to the ladder. The simple boards are held into the stone with enormous rusted bolts. I climb, the scent of iron from the bolts like spilled blood, the wood slippery smooth beneath my palms.

Adrenaline drives me forward, my hands and feet moving automatically as we make our way over the side of the cliffs. Once we reach the top, I drag myself into the fields, too unsteady to walk. I collapse beneath a sprawl of oxeye daisies. Camille flings herself down beside me. I crawl to her, and we hold each other as we’re overtaken by sobs.

I can smell smoke from the sea. It smells like the brazier, and I think of Alastair and Therion, far below the earth. Falling into a torpor in the depths of the mine, healing, bringing themselves back from oblivion, cradled by new-grown salt.

Our sobs shudder into stillness. The sound of footsteps comes from the woods. Hugo crosses the field toward us. “He’s gone,” I tell him harshly and the grief that aches from me is real. “They’re both gone.”

He stands, staring helplessly down at the burning boat. “But how—why—?”

“Therion burned himself and Alastair, rather than be captured by you.”

Hugo’s mouth opens, but no words come. Camille pulls herself onto her knees, glaring up at him with her fists clenched. “Are you pleased now? You’ve gotten what you wanted.”

“I never wantedthis!” Hugo cries. Camille surges up and grabs the collar of his shirt, dragging him to the ground. He falls heavily beside her, and he doesn’t fight as she pulls him close, glowering furiously into his eyes. Hugo is crying silently, tears streaming down his cheeks, glimmering in the reflected light from the far-off flames.

“Camille, don’t hurt him.” I reach out to her, but she pushes my hand away.

“Ishouldhurt you,” she snarls at Hugo, her face pressed close to his. “I should throw you into the sea and let you drown. But you’re not worth it.”

With an angry exhalation, she releases Hugo and slumps back to her heels. I put my arm around her, and she presses her face against my shoulder, crying with harsh, fierce sobs. Hugo folds to the ground on my other side. And though I’m trembling with anger, I lay my hand in the space between us. Tentatively, he reaches out, and takes hold.

We sit together as tears stream over our cheeks, and we watch the burning boat sink beneath the waves.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONENow

Daybreak casts the woods in violet and umber, colors as darkly layered as the brushstrokes of a mural. And as we make our way back through the trees, it’s as though we’ve stepped insideThe Dusk of the Gods. As though we are vanishing into the shadows.