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“Lil?” I heard Adrian’s voice exploding all around me. I blinked heavily. The bright light blinded me. I had to close my eyes. I felt like I was still floating, then I was lowered onto a soft, comfortable bed. When I finally opened my eyes again, I recognized the witch’s cottage. I jerked to get up, but Adrian’s hand pushed me back down.

“Don’t get up,” he told me tenderly. “You need to rest.”

I looked around. “Why are we here?”

He inhaled deeply. “It’s a long story… but first, how do you feel?”

I thought about it for a moment or two. “I’m fine… I think.”

“Are you in any pain?” he asked, looking at me with a concerned expression on his face.

“No,” I shook my head. “I feel fine. I’m just…”

“Just what?” he jumped.

“I had the strangest dream,” I revealed. “Cass and I were little girls… I dreamt something that really happened, but it was different in my dream. Cass knew everything that happened.”

He hesitated before replying. “Are you sure it was a dream?”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Well…” he paused before continuing, as if he was trying to find the right words. “I don’t know what happened exactly, but it seemed to me that you stopped breathing for a few moments.”

I gasped. “You mean… I was dead!?”

He nodded. “I gave you this potion to drink, because Luke told me—”

“You listened to Luke!?” she exclaimed incredulously. “But he betrayed us!”

“I know,” he clarified. “But he saved me. And by telling me about this potion, he saved you as well.”

I couldn’t believe that. “But.. he was with the witch. He was helping her.”

“He was,” Adrian confirmed. “But he repented at the last minute, and he paid for it with his life. He died so we could live.”

I swallowed heavily, feeling the weight of this realization wash over me.

“He said he was very sorry, that he loved your sister. He said that the witch tricked him, that she told him no one would get hurt…”

He kept telling me everything, until there was nothing else to say. I listened intently, incredulous at everything that had happened, that we were both alive.

“Did he tell you that we—”

“He did,” he interrupted me. “He told me that yours was an arranged marriage.”

“That was what I wanted to tell you all along, because I saw you felt bad, thinking we were doing something behind Luke’s back,” I continued.

“I did feel bad,” he confessed, taking my hand into his. “But I also couldn’t keep away from you, no matter how hard I tried. And trust me, I really tried.”

“I know,” I smiled. “You… you don’t have to do that any longer.”

“Lilith…” he began softly, his voice tinged with emotion. “I can’t keep it from you any longer. I don’t want to keep it from you any longer. I love you. I’ve loved you from the first moment I saw you at the cemetery.”

“You saved me,” I reminded him with a smile.

“You said you could have handled yourself without me,” he teased.

“You knew the truth,” I blushed.