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Though I seize the witchlight and swing it wildly toward his face, he captures my wrist and twists. Just like Filippa’s, my fingers crack and break in a fiery explosion of pain. He pries the stone from my hand with ease. It falls to the ground with a clatter—spinning in all directions, disorienting,blinding—and skitters toward the water’s edge, where—where—

My eyes widen.

Where an alabaster hand thrusts through the waves and crashes upon the shore.

A bloody and broken Michal follows.

He climbs from the sea with straining limbs, and my heart swells, stutters in disbelief at the sight of him. Even the sea cannot cleanse the blood still streaming from his chest. It sluices down his front in a macabre torrent of scarlet, staining his shirt, the rock, the witchlight itself. He shouldn’t be alive. Hecan’tbe alive, yet he still drags himself forward with a guttural, “Célie—”

Above me, Frederic hesitates with his carving knife raised. I seize his wrist with newfound strength, newfoundhope, and his face twists in shock as he turns and spots Michal. “What the—?”

With both hands, I push against him with all my might, and he relinquishes an inch or two, distracted before whirling back to face me. He bares his teeth. I have been around vampires toolong, however, to cower at the sight of him now. Though my arms tremble with the effort, I hold him at bay. Filippa wouldn’t have stopped fighting, and neither will I. Until my dying breath, I willfight, and even after that too—

In the next second, the scent of magic explodes through the cavern.

The water behind us retreats in response, parting like the Red Sea for Moses to reveal Lou on the opposite shore. Her own arms strain with the effort to hold the waves at a distance. With a roar of fury, Jean Luc sprints toward us along the path on the seafloor, followed by Reid and Coco and Beau. Behind them, Dimitri has cornered Babette, and Odessa pulls on his arm in urgency.

They’re here.

I think the words even as Frederic seizes my hair, as a detached part of my mind realizes the distance between us is too great. When he wrenches my head upright and forces it over the bowl, I still thrash and claw at his wrist, however. I still buck and kick and thrust upward with both knees.

Though I shriek Michal’s name, he doesn’t answer. Hecannotanswer because he is dying too.

Just like the training yard, I think desperately, twisting my body, arching it, my heels slipping frantically against the glass. I refuse to give up. I refuse to cease fighting, and I refuse to allow Frederic to win.Eyes, ears, nose, and groin.

I repeat the words like a mantra in my head. Each second I say them is a second I live.

Eyes ears nose groin eyes ears nose—

This isn’t the training yard, however, and when my knee finally connects with Frederic’s stomach, he smashes my head into theside of the coffin. Pain explodes through my skull in a blinding wave, and hot, sickening blood trickles from my ear. It mutes the sounds of my friends’ shouts, of Michal’s gasp as Frederic kicks him away, until all I can hear is high-pitched ringing. The edges of my vision blur. Though I scrabble to right myself, I can’t find purchase, and Frederic—

A flash of silver. A searing pain. Though I try to cry out, darkness descends as I choke on something thick and wet, and the ringing in my ears reaches a pinnacle, growing louder and louder until I can no longer think, no longerbreathe—

And everything ends in white.

Chapter Fifty-Two

A Golden Light

As a child, I liked summer least of all the seasons. I never particularly enjoyed the heat, but sometimes—very early in the morning—I would climb into the tree outside my nursery window to watch the sunrise. I would lift my cheeks to that golden light, and I would bask in its gentle warmth. I would watch my neighbors open their windows, hear their first laughter of the day, and know a profound sense of peace.

Deep in the cavern, golden light breaks across the water.

Instinctively, I sense this isn’t the same as my childhood memory. This isn’t the sun, and I no longer sit in the tree outside my nursery. This is something different. Something... better. The longer I look at this golden light, the brighter it seems to glow, but I cannot quite name the feeling that emanates from within it. I cannot quite feel anything at all.

Though my breath mists as I drift in this nameless place, I no longer feel the cold.Odd.I no longer feel any pain either, and the ringing in my ears has fallen silent. Frowning, I peer down at my fingers, examining the dark liquid there. It paints my palms. It ruins the sleeves of my scarlet gown and stains the beautiful lacework black.

“Célie.”

Startled, I turn to find Mila watching me with a forlornexpression. I must’ve inadvertently slipped through the veil somehow, but that doesn’t explain the inexplicable tears in her eyes. “I’m so sorry,” she whispers. “This wasn’t supposed to happen. When the Necromancer attacked, I—I couldn’t help you, so I raced to warn the bird instead. Animals can sometimes sense spirits, even if we can’t truly communicate.”

“What are you talking about?”

Her gaze drifts below us, and I follow it to the barren islet that rises from the sea—smaller now with the tide, but no less familiar. Frederic leans over one of two glass coffins in the center. With one hand, he lifts the dark head of a pale young woman. In the other, he holds a large stone bowl, and even as we watch, it fills to the very brim with blood.

When he straightens, hurrying toward the second coffin, towardFilippa, my stomach twists with a profound sense of perversion—because my body still lies in that first coffin.Istill lie in that first coffin, and blood bathes my hands and throat until I cannot tell where it ends and my gown begins. Though breath still rattles in my chest, my eyes stare upward without seeing.

They stare straight at me.