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And there he is.

I can see him in my mind’s eye, riding towards the ruins of another temple.

“South,” I choke out as Eamonn trots down the road. “He’s moving south.”

We make it to the dock, and I keep my gaze deliberately averted from the ships looming just beyond my periphery, the ropes twisted around masts, sails hanging slack, patched and stained.

But one ship draws my attention despite my best efforts, and I snap my gaze away as Eamonn immediately breaks into a canter, and then a gallop. I hold tight to his mane, squeezing with my thighs as I relive every moment with Calysian over and over again, searching for some way this could have ended differently.

Memories flash through me—the stark look in his eyes last night in front of the inn. The way his hands shook when he cupped my face so tenderly the last time he sank inside me. The feel of his arms around me, holding me close.

Eamonn takes a right, and the waves crash against the shore as we leave through the southern gates and onto the main road leading south.

I duck my head, leaning low over Eamonn.

“Despite Calysian’s loss of memories, I’ve seen the way his instincts have whispered to him that you are his,” Eamonn says. “The grimoire must have tightened its hold on him—he would never have left you otherwise.”

“We’re going to lose him.” The words are out before I’m aware I’ve said them, and Eamonn tosses his head. His gallop is relentless, the ground rushing beneath us in a blur of roots and mud.

“No, we’re not.” Eamonn’s voice is grim. “If he does manage to take the second grimoire, you know what to do.”

Steal the link to the third grimoire.

“It will never work.”

“It will. Did you never wonder just how you were able to wield Calysian’s power so easily? It’s because it’syourpower too. You’re the other half of his soul.”

“But…I couldn’t feel this grimoire.”

“And why do you think that is?” His voice is breathless from his gallop, a sheen of sweat forming across his neck.

“I’m sure you have a theory.” My words are icy and Eamonn lets out a nicker that sounds suspiciously like a laugh.

“I think you becamefrightened.” He says the word as if fear is somehow beneath me, his voice dripping with disdain. “You saw how the grimoire overtook him, and subconsciously rejected any ties to Calysian’s power. By doing that, you rejected Calysian the man.”

“You say that like you’re disappointed,” I snap. “You don’t even like me.”

Eamonn veers to the right, galloping just close enough to a tree for the leaves of a low-hanging branch hit me in the face.

I spit a leaf from my mouth with a low growl. “Seriously?”

“Can you imagine what it was like, Madinia? For me to know who you were to my brother? To know that because I was too late, tooslow, he lost you?”

“Yes, I’m sure that experience was really painful foryou,” I mutter, my memory presenting me with the feeling of cold steel sliding into my heart.

And yet Idoremember the horror in Eamonn’s eyes. The self-loathing.

“You want to save your precious world?” Eamonn snarls. “Open yourself fully to your soulmate.”

“I thought I did that last night.”

“You cracked open a window. You need to throw open the door.”

“That sounds very…permanent.”

“I wasn’t aware you had so many other men lining up, ready to love and protect you for the rest of your days.”

“You don’t know me at all if you think that’s what I want.”