The pillar of valkerax bends at the midpoint, falling through the air and toward us, toward the mountain, with screaming velocity. A bridge. It’s going to form a bridge—right at Varia’s feet. I feel Varia’s blazing magic stutter for a split second, a streak of panic in her as it flares out of her control, and she unhands me, her fingers going dark as she tries desperately to rein it back in.

“No!” she snarls up at the falling pillar. “Not yet!”

But the valkerax don’t care. They’re coming, plummeting to earth like fallen birds, growing bigger and bigger. My Weeping is almost gone, the peaceful void growing smaller and smaller.

It’s now or never.

she is safer. The hunger tries one last, desperate, honest attempt. you know what she’ll do to you. but him…you have no idea. unsafe, chaos, a gamble, a danger—

I’ve been afraid. I’ve fought a valkerax, I’ve lived among a human court who’d love nothing more than to burn me alive. I’ve fought off the first mercenary from Nightsinger’s woods, shaking and clutching my sword. Fear never means nothing—not even when you’re immortal. There’s always the fear of pain. Without death, the fear of pain is the only thing you have left. The only thing that anchors you to the world, to the cycle of life and death like everyone else. One foot in agony, the other in the never-grave.

Fear means everything.

Fear is all I have.

I’ve never, in my entire life, been more afraid than the moment the words tumble from my lips.

“Laughing Daughter!”

2

2

HEARTS
BENEATH SNOW

If there’s one thing I’ve learned in this wide world, it’s that time is the rebellious child. Like yours truly. It doesn’t act like you want it to, especially in crisis. Short moments feel long, long moments go by quickly, everything fragments and spins and comes in as feelings, scents, sounds when it should just be clear, concise thought.

The moment I say Varia’s witch name, the rebellious child tears apart the world.

I know for certain that two things happen: her incredibly dense magic tries to clench down on me one last time and then instantly lets go. Freefall. An iron hand, choking me one second and gone the next. I hear her scream, frantic in a way the crown princess of Cavanos has never once been.

“No, no no—Lucien, give her back!” she yells. “She’ll be your undoing! I know it! I can protect you from her—”

A tendril of her power shoots through my heart like an arrow, grasping. Searching. I gasp, choking on the feeling, but it’s short-lived. Something not-me pushes the tendril out instantly, resistant and insistent and hard in its decision. Final.

Lucien’s smirk is nearly too exhausted to exist, but he tries. A tinge of sadness there, almost.