Page 117

Luna doesn’t look at me when she says fine, but I feel it anyway, the weight of her words, the way they settle beneath my ribs like something permanent, something inevitable.
She does not yield. She does not bend. She decides.
And I, who has watched Sin-Binders rise and fall, who has known what it means to be taken, to be used, to be nothing more than a blade to be wielded, I see her for what she is.
She is not like them.
Branwen did not ask. She took.
Branwen did not love. She owned.
Branwen did not share. She chose.
But Luna does not choose just one of us. She walks among us like she was always meant to be here, like she was carved from the same dark matter that made us, and I do not know what to do with that. She does not pick a favorite. Does not demand loyalty through force, does not rip power from us like a starving god desperate for her offerings.
She is nothing like Branwen. She is nothing like the ones before her.
She is something else entirely. And perhaps that should frighten me. But as she stands there, shoulders squared, gaze unshaken, I am not afraid.
I am ruined by her.
By the way she holds us all at once, without unraveling. By the way she lets us be what we are, without asking us to shrink, to become something easier, something smaller.
By the way she looks at me.
Sees me. She doesn’t know. Gods, she doesn’t know. What it would mean if she bound me. What I would become for her.
What I already am.
She doesn’t understand what Luna Evernight means to the rest of us.
But I do.
And I will not be the one to tell her. That if she ever reached for me, truly reached, I would let her take me whole.
Elias stretches out on the nearest half-broken pillar like it’s a chaise lounge, hands folded behind his head, ankles crossed. Completely unbothered for a man who just learned two of ours are missing.
“So,” he says, dragging out the word like he’s about to ruin someone’s life, “are we gonna talk about the fact that Caspian and Ambrose went missing on our watch, or are we just gonna pretend we didn’t somehow lose two fully grown, horrifyinglycompetent men like a couple of unattended toddlers in a marketplace?”
Silas, sitting next to him, elbows propped on his knees, exhales hard. “Yeah, man, I don’t know. Maybe they wandered off into the void to find themselves. Go on a little spiritual retreat. Meditate in Severin’s hellscape.”
Elias nods solemnly. “You think they finally snapped and eloped?”
Silas considers it. “I mean, if I had to pick someone to run away and start a new life with, Caspian’s not a bad option. Real stable. Dependable.”
Elias hums. “Yeah, but Ambrose is hotter. If you’re gonna be trapped in some eternal tragic, exile-type romance, might as well be with someone pretty.”
“True, true.” Silas strokes his chin like he’s deep in thought. “Maybe they’ll come back with matching tattoos and a joint bank account.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose. “They were taken.”
Elias waves a lazy hand. “Yeah, yeah, I know. I’m just saying, if anyone could get kidnapped and make it seem like it was their idea, it’d be those two.”
Silas snorts. “Ambrose would be like, ‘Yeah, sure, I’ll come along, but you gotta let me drive.’”
Elias cackles, then deepens his voice into a perfect Caspian impression: “‘The hostage-taker is making some solid points. I think we should hear them out.”
Silas leans back, clutching his chest. “Gods, you’re so right. He’d start sympathizing with the enemy before we even got there.”