Nora and Maeve huddled together, both pale as milk, but Maeve’s glare was gone—replaced by something closer to awe. I turned back to Catherine, willing her to see me, really see me, one last time.
"If you want to stay here," I said, voice breaking, "if you want this—" I waved at the ruin of the graveyard, the sisters, the bleeding priest at the edge of the world, "I’ll stay. I’ll die here if you need. But if you want to come with me, to whatever waits on the other side, we go now. Together."
The light flared, swallowing everything, but inside the circle it was calm—like the eye of a storm, quiet and infinite.
Mama Celeste spoke, words tumbling out between gasps. "Ritual’s almost done. Choose, Catherine. Choose now!"
At the edge of the circle, Declan propped himself up, one hand clamped to the hole in his side, blood gushing between his fingers. He fixed his eyes on Catherine and said, "Go! All of you! There's nothing left here for the living!"
Hale screamed then, a raw, wordless thing, and hurled himself against the circle. The blue-white fire caught him, lifted him, and burned the flesh from his hand in a single, perfect moment. He staggered back, stunned, and the rage in his eyes curdled to terror.
Scarlette’s voice cut through everything, clear and brittle. "Time's up, Cat. You stay, you die. You go, you never come back."
Nora started to cry, low and hopeless. Maeve did not move, did not even blink.
Catherine looked at me, then at her sisters, then at the world dissolving behind us. Her whole body shook. "I can't," she whispered.
“ All this, it’s for you, for them—so none of you have to be alone again,” I said.
She sobbed, and it broke something in me I didn’t know was there.
"Please," I said, "just tell me what you want. I’ll do it. I’ll do anything."
She reached up, cupped my face with both hands, and kissed me. It was soft, wet with tears, but it was real—more real than the world crumbling around us.
In the corner of my eye, the portal shimmered, a hole torn in the fabric of the world. It glowed, beckoning, alive with the promise of something beyond pain.
Mama Celeste’s hands fell away. Scarlette slumped to the ground, exhausted. The circle began to fade.
Hale screamed again, but this time he sounded lost, like a man realizing he’s already dead.
Catherine drew back from the kiss and met my eyes, green and wild and shining. "We go together," she said. "Or not at all."
I nodded. "Always."
She turned, took Nora’s hand, then Maeve’s. The sisters gripped each other tight. I reached for Scarlette, pulled her in. Moab, battered and bloody, crawled to the edge, eyes fixed on the portal like it was the only thing that ever mattered.
Together, we crawled, bled, and dragged each other into the light.
For one last moment, I looked back.
Declan smiled at me, blood on his lips, eyes gentle.
"You did good, Sullivan O’Toole," he said.
Then the world snapped.
We fell, all of us, through the blue-white singularity, into a place with no time, no pain, nothing but the hope that maybe, on the other side, love would be enough.
The last thing I saw was Catherine’s face, backlit by the promise of tomorrow.
Catherine
Iwoke gasping, my mouth packed with grit, the kiss of morning dew on my cheeks. For a heartbeat, the world was silent, cold—then a dog barked, sharp and real. I rolled onto my side, spat and hacked, tasting copper and dust, but when I wiped my lips, there was no blood—my skin was clean, unblemished. I coughed again; only air came, crisp as February wind through a cracked window.
I pried open my eyes. Flat, square headstones stretched in every direction, smooth as slate, their inscriptions too neat, too perfect. Names I’d never known, dates that didn’t belong: 2003, 1987, 2025. Some bore tiny photographs—strangers in cheap suits, women with helmet hair, all grinning like caricatures. The grass was impossibly green, the sky the yellowed shade of old paper, and though the sun hadn’t crested the treetops, I felt hope bloom in my chest.
I pushed myself up and looked around. There was Sully—he knelt a few feet off, hands pressed against his side, eyes locked on me with that fierce relief he only ever let me see when everything had gone wrong. Behind him, Maeve and Nora huddled together, shivering so hard their teeth rattled. Moab crouched guard over them, murmuring softly, his broad shoulders hunched against the cold dawn.