“But you’d be alive,” he said.

“Alive is not the same as living,” I whispered. “How long until you’d have grown to hate me? And, feeling your emotions every hour of every day, how long until I’d have grown to hate myself? Don’t for a moment believe that our happiness factored into his plans.”

“I shouldn’t have bonded you.”

The words were a knife to my gut, which made them a knife to his, and Marc flinched. “I don’t blame you,” I said, digging my nails into my palms. “Yours has always been the greater sacrifice.”

“Not bonding you would’ve been the sacrifice!” The room trembled, his emotions seeking an outlet in his magic. “You think that I was selfless to bond you, but it was selfishness. All I wanted was to be with you, to live my life with you, and so don’t for one heartbeat believe that I did it solely to save your life. I did it for myself. Because I love you. Because I need you. And because of that, you’re lying here dying.”

All the hate for my father and what he’d done abruptly rushed from my heart, and it felt to me like the greatest of burdens had been lifted from my shoulders. “You’re right,” I said. “If not for you, I wouldn’t be here at all. Perhaps I’d be dead by my father’s hand. Or more likely, living in fear in my family’s home, suffering his abuse while all hope of a better future was stripped away from me.”

“But at least you’d have a future.”

“A future of misery!” The outburst left me gasping for breath. “I’ve been happier in my time with you than in all my life. Because of you, so much of what I dreamed of and hoped for became my reality, and I refuse to regret that. I believe that a short life lived is better than endless years of merely enduring, and given the same circumstances, the same choice, I’d choose you and life and love all over again.”

Exhaustion fell over me, my magic struggling to repair my broken body, but faltering and failing like fingers that couldn’t quite grasp an elusive bit of sand. My heart fluttered, and it hurt enough that tears flooded my eyes.

“Pénélope, please don’t leave me.” His voice was strangled and desperate, and his arms wrapped around me, pulling my body against his. I clung to him with what strength I had, my fingers curving around the back of his head as he kissed me, tasting the salt of his tears. Then he pressed his cheek against mine and said, “All my life I’ve loved you. You’re the only one who made me believe that I was good enough as I am. That I was worth wanting. That I wasn’t just a broken thing better off in the shadows. What will I be without you?”

“Yourself.” It hurt, it hurt. “A man more good and kind and loyal than any I’ve known.”