She gripped his arm, digging her nails into his flesh. “Simon,” she said, her voice cracking. “Oh, God…”

“Say my name again.” His lips were hot at her ear, his own voice strained. “Please, love.”

She did, again and again, until she could no longer speak, for the sounds he made as he moved in her were too delicious, too animal and passionate, and her skin was a prickling wash of fire. He pressed his face against her neck, his arms tightening around her. He kissed her throat, her jaw, and then laughed a little, the sound fevered.

“You’re beautiful,” he said hoarsely. “You’re exquisite. My God, look at you.”

Then he guided her head back to his, bringing her flush against his body, and kissed her, murmuring her name against her cheek, her lips. And the tenderness of it, the damp strands of his hair against his forehead, the steadiness of his hands, made her chest ache with the beginnings of a terrible loss.

Soon, they would try the impossible.

Soon, she could lose him. She could lose all of them.

“Harder,” she whispered, thrilling when he immediately complied. “Faster, Simon.” He would drive it out of her; he would make her come apart a second time and wash the building grief from her heart. She gathered her breasts in her hands, sighing and twisting in his arms, smiling a little when he swore against her neck.

He tightened his grip on her, obeying her every whispered command. She tried to say his name once more, but just then her pleasure crested sharply, and the word broke off in her throat as she fell apart in his arms with a soft cry. The sound seemed to push Simon over the edge. He pulled her back hard against him, his fingers digging into her hips, gasping her name, his voice harsh and frayed. He said it again, and again, whispering it into her hair. After long minutes, when they lay trembling in each other’s arms, and Eliana’s racing heart had calmed enough that she could think once more, she turned around to face him.

He smiled at her, heavy-lidded. He was so dazzling in his happiness that it pained her, like looking too long at a bright sky.

“Hello there,” he said roughly. “You’re glorious. Did you know that? You look thoroughly kissed.”

But she could not manage a smile and hated herself for it. Even after his touch and his kisses, her earlier fear remained. That terrible, hot sadness had lodged in her chest, and she could not shake it.

She touched his mouth, memorizing its shape.

“What is it?” he asked, his expression shifting to one of concern.

The words were there on her tongue, ready to be said: this was an awful mistake.

Because now, if and when she did lose him, the loss would cut deeper.

Except, of course, it wouldn’t cut at all. If they managed to do this thing and stop her mother, if they rewrote the course of history so that the Blood Queen never fell and the Empire died before it could begin, none of this would have ever happened. She would never have been Remy’s sister, or known Harkan, or killed Rozen.

She would never have fallen in love with Simon.

It was the first time she had said the words to herself, and she felt punched by them, knocked breathless and spinning. But they were true, as true as the fact that if she lost Simon, if she lost this life and this future, and everyone inside it, there would be no loss at all. There would be only an erasure.

And that, she decided, was the worst thing she could imagine. Not to lose a beloved thing, but to have it taken from you, to have the experience of it ripped from your heart, leaving no memory behind. To be ignorant of the loss entirely.

“Eliana.” Simon smoothed her tangled hair back from her face. “Tell me what’s wrong. I see a million worries in your eyes.”

“You know exactly what my worries are,” she said, and then, before he could respond, she pressed her face against his chest, her arms tucked between them, and whispered, “Stay with me. Please. Stay with me all night.”

He was still for a moment, and then drew the blankets up over them, tucking them around her shivering body. He hooked his leg over hers, and the kiss he pressed to her forehead pulled tears from her eyes.

“I’m right here,” he said, his hands soft in her hair. “Don’t think about anything else but that. Not tonight.”

“And tomorrow?” she whispered, unable to contain the question.

He turned up her face to his and kissed her so gently that her heart felt ready to burst.

“Don’t think of it,” he told her. “Tonight is all that matters right now.”

“Tonight,” she said, gazing up at him, “we’re together.”

The expression on his face was open and tender, so unlike the Wolf she had first met months ago in Orline—and yet so familiar, as if she had been looking at him all her life—that she had no choice but to kiss him.

And this time, when they moved together, she faced him, letting his solid weight press her into the bed. Their gazes locked, his hands cradling her face, and she watched him until she couldn’t, until the pleasure of his touch pulled her under. She clung to him, trembling, her hands fisted in his hair. She listened to his voice break against her neck and prayed furiously—to the saints, to the empirium, to her own unthinkable power—that they would wake in the morning to find that someone else had come to save the world, allowing them to rest at last.

41

   Rielle

“‘When you feel a prickling on the back of your neck,’ said the good witch Tahti, ‘even when it isn’t cold; when you feel that someone is watching you, even when you’re alone; when you feel that the strange road you are walking is one you have walked before, in a dream or in a fever. These are the moments, little one. Listen closely to them. These are the moments telling you one of your deaths has been born. They are many, and some are kind, and some are cruel. They wander the world, blind, with fingers deft and clever. Someday, one of your deaths will find you. Someday, one of them will claim you in the name of an ending.’”

—Black Wood, White Sky a collection of Borsvall children’s stories

Rielle sat in a vast, treeless field dusted with snow.

Barefoot, clad only in a thin nightgown, she shivered, holding her knees to her chest. In silence she waited for the footsteps she knew would come, and when they did, crunching against the frosted grass, she smiled to herself but did not turn to face him.

“Why have you brought me here?” she asked.

Corien circled her, hands clasped behind his back. He wore a long dark coat and a fur-trimmed cloak that trailed through the snow.

She did not look at him. She would not look at him.

“Because you wanted me to,” he replied.