Amara’s eyes went out of focus, then back. She gave Selene a cynical smile accompanied by a guttural laugh. “I wasn’t watching my surroundings. Just another one of my failings.” Then she pulled her hand away from her chest, exposing a gushing wound above her heart.

42

No . . .” Selene whispered, her eyes pinned to the wound. “This can’t be.” But the evidence was there before her. Someone had found Amara’s physical body and stabbed her. And now she was manifesting in the dream world what her real body was going through. “Please, no. Amara.”

Amara crumpled to the ground and stared up at the sky. “I guess you won, Selene.”

Selene knelt down and placed her sister’s head on her knees. Since she was not in the same room as Amara, she couldn’t see who had delivered the blow. But if Amara was indeed next to Damien’s bed, most likely it was Taegis.

No, I can’t think about that now. She stared at the spreading stain around the hole in Amara’s tunic. There’s no time.

Using her power of will, Selene blocked out the panic and grief threatening to overwhelm her. Instead, she brushed the short curls around Amara’s face, wondering for a moment when her sister had cut her hair. Was that one of the sacrifices she had mentioned? “I never wanted this.” Selene caressed her sister’s head. “I never wanted to fight you. I’d hoped that one day we would serve our people together, with our gift.”

“I don’t think it would have worked.” Amara coughed and blood spluttered out of her mouth.

Selene bit back a sob. “I think it would have, if we used our gift to inspire our people. Let me show you what I’ve discovered so far.” She placed her hand on her sister’s forehead, then closed her eyes.

Images flashed from her mind to Amara’s: visions of the first time she saw Damien’s soul, and the overwhelming desire to carry such a light. The times she visited Damien’s dreams and soothed his mind. The day of the Festival of Light when he showed her how he used his power to worship the Light.

Then she shared her own dreams and desires: to use their gift to help people, all people. To bring peace through their link to the dreamscape. To inspire the weary and the broken.

As the images sped between the sisters, Selene realized something. Every image, every memory pointed back toward the Light. Her desires, her dreams, her gift. Like Damien’s worship, she began with her gift, and it ended with the Light.

Even now, she was using her gift to point her sister to the Light, without even meaning to.

Amara coughed again, and Selene opened her eyes, disconnecting their thoughts.

“I don’t know . . . what to say,” Amara said, her gaze growing duller by the moment. “It reminds me of some of the things Breven said.”

Breven?

Before she could ask, Amara struggled beneath Selene’s hand. “Don’t—Don’t let Opheliana die. Or be taken by House Friere. She’s all I’ve ever cared about.”