My eyes were drawn irresistibly back to the pyre. In response to a hidden signal, four of the Judicial Affairs officers turned in unison to face the platform. They raised their hands and the fire guttered out instantly, drowned in a complex web of lace. Smoke obscured the dais; through the shifting haze, I traced the edges of the smouldering wood, the blackened beam, the manacles, until finally I was staring at the tortured husk bound to the pole.

It wasn’t Finn. That split, charcoal skin was not his. The peeling flesh and scorched limbs, the blood and the smoke, that wasn’t him. I needed to tell Osan there had been a mistake, but I could not seem to form the words. He wrapped his other arm around me, turning me away from the pyre. Stop it, I meant to say, stop it, I have to see, I have to find Finn. Osan held me tightly.

I made a sound, and it was swallowed by Osan’s body, my face pressed to his chest. This could not be real, this could not be happening. I struggled against him, and I was screaming, obscenities pouring from my mouth, fuck him and fuck Rhyanon and fuck the Sisterhood, they had already taken everything from me, they could not do this, they could not have him too, they could not have Finn. My best friend, my refuge, the one person I could not live without, the one person who had loved me without caring about the consequences, the person who had loved me even as I failed him over and over again. They could not have Finn. They could not have Finn. They could not—

The strength in my legs deserted me, and I slumped against Osan. A few people were starting to look toward us—the latest spectacle, the next act in the show. Let them burn. Let the pyre consume them all. The walls glowed like amber in sunlight.

“El, don’t,” said Osan urgently.

Finn laughing, his whole face lit up and animated. Finn, his hair falling in front of his eyes as he concentrated. And then Finn burning, fire raging across his skin. Below, I heard exclamations. The walls shone brighter.

Someone else screamed, and Osan stopped short.

The woman’s voice cut through the hum of whispers.

“He’s not dead! He moved!”

I wrenched free, running back to the railing. Hope flared wildly inside my chest. For a moment, everything fell quiet, and we all stared at the body tied to the stake. There was no way he could still be alive, but I desperately searched the wreckage of Finn’s face all the same.

His head rose slightly, he lifted his sightless eyes toward the rooftops and his chest fluttered. From the back of his throat, he produced a quiet moan.

Impossible.

Below us, noise built up in a wave, the tide of a hundred voices rising in disbelief.

“Finn?” I whispered.