“I know.” I turned to kiss him. Waking up in Kion beside him felt like an eternity ago. “But there are still so many questions. Who used the Blight on Garindor’s assistant? Was our presence the trigger? Vernasha gave no hints as to what the rune itself looks like, only the Delving to find it on someone else!”

“I think you’ll agree with me when I say we should prepare our own food and drinks from now on. I make excellent baba ghanoush.”

“I’m serious, Kalen.”

“So am I.” He gathered my face in his hands. “What can I do to help you?” He pressed his forehead against mine. “Are you still having nightmares?”

“I had one when we left Kion,” I admitted. “A waking nightmare, on the azi. I turned and saw the city in flames.”

He frowned. “Has it happened again?”

“Not since arriving here, no. And my heartsglass has been clean for nearly two weeks. I’ve seen no specks of black. Do you think…perhaps I’ve…?”

“It’s possible. You’ve been taking better care of yourself and drawing in less of the Dark might have been the simplest solution all along.” He kissed me again, long and sweet. “Trust yourself a little more than you trust me, Tea.”

“That would be impossible, love,” I whispered back.

• • •

I burned.

I was flames and carnage. Howling, all the more terrible for how human it sounded, emanated from the thick of smoke. Fires sprouted around me, the air and screaming all the nourishment they needed.

But I felt no heat. The searing pyres bowed their pointed heads at me, a grotesque parody of genuflecting, and crackled their names. I expected them to pirouette out of my way like loyal dogs, but they brushed against my hua and lingered, ringing fire across my back like wings. There were silhouettes against the bonfires, figures in the ember. I approached.

Althy lay on the ground before me, dead. Her face was smeared with blood, and a knife pinned her to the ground, the hilt buried in her stomach. Likh was beside her, his legs folded unnaturally beneath him like a broken marionette, his graceful face upturned for a kiss that would never come. I saw the unmoving figures of other corpses in shadowed relief. Bodies lay atop each other, eviscerated and sharing the same shadow. Empty heartsglass watched me pass.

A figure staggered out of the darkness and tangled itself in my dress. My sister, Daisy. Her blood-soaked face stared back at me. “Why?” she whispered. I looked down and saw that my hand was buried inside her chest, staining my hua red.

No, I thought. Despite the smells of death, enough light filtered through the darkness to shine on my senses. This isn’t real. This isn’t real.