He touched the marks. “‘Let me die?’”

“Don’t worry. That’s not…” I paused. “It’s not me. Just a dream voice. Is Millie still asleep?”

“Yeah. Lariel’s awake, though. I think she’s trying to find a way to break out of her room. Not very successfully, at this stage.”

“I’m sorry I asked you to carry her.”

“She only tried to have me executed. No big deal.” He sat on the edge of my bed. “Besides, you were right. She’s Millie’s best chance of survival.”

I returned my gaze to the rain. The outpost cottage hunkered in the woods to the west of the main Moon House complex, concealed by a wall of dense foliage. Reverend Cyde had left us here and promised to return as soon as she could—she needed to send word back to Ceyrun. I wanted to trust her. If she had coveted the Renewer’s power, she could easily have taken it by now; my lace had run dry in my effort to break the Pillar. She could have cut me apart right there in the clearing. After what I had done, that might even have been justified.

“Did I make the right choice?” I asked, without looking around.

Silence. My breath left a cloud of condensation on the glass pane. I could, if I concentrated, sense the island descending. The other Pillars strained to stop Aytrium’s fall, but they weren’t enough. Five hundred years of history, and I had torn it all down in an instant.

“It was brave,” Finn said quietly. “And kind of noble, I think. I just don’t know what will happen now.”

“Aytrium falls.” I traced circles on the misted glass. “Although if they martyr me, they could still fix it. Raise us back up. Maybe that would be better.”

I started as Finn’s arms closed around my shoulders. He hadn’t made a sound crossing the room. He hugged me from behind.

“No,” he whispered. “It wouldn’t be.”

I swallowed hard. “You say that now.”

“I’ll say it every day, for as long as it takes for you to believe me. Don’t speak that way, El.”

I leaned back against him and shut my eyes.

“You’re cold,” I murmured.

“You know, that’s been mentioned a few times.”

“Hm.”

He smoothed my hair. “Do you remember when we were kids, and you swore you were going to run away from home? Because if you stayed, they would turn you into a Sister?”

I shook my head. I didn’t remember.

“I think you must have been about eleven. It was late in the afternoon, and we were sitting on the stairs outside my parents’ house.” He continued gently combing back my hair. “For months afterwards, I was terrified that my best friend was going to disappear. You had sounded so sure of yourself.”

I remembered wanting to run away, fantasising about escaping to somewhere remote and secure, a place where no one would know I was a Sister. I just couldn’t remember ever telling Finn about it.