“I forgive you.”
“Tell them I tried.”
“Remember me.”
The words tumble over each other, a flood of grief finding release at last. The King’s form loses cohesion as each soldier speaks their truth and dissolves into light. Faces fade. Arms release their grip on each other. The throne of fused weapons begins to crumble.
And through it all, I stand at the center and bear witness. Not speaking. Not channeling. Listening as the dead say goodbye.
Drokhar’s hand finds my shoulder. Steadies me as the final surge of magic drains what little strength I have left.
“You did it.” His voice is rough with emotion I’ve never heard from him before. “Aradya. You saved them.”
“They saved themselves.” My knees threaten to buckle. “I gave them permission.”
The last soldier dissolves. The throne crumbles into dust. The Gravetide King—the composite entity that terrorized Blackreach, that raised an army of the forgotten dead, that demanded blood as payment for centuries of silence—becomes nothing more than light and memory.
The Battlefield Beyond the Veil begins to collapse around us.
The blood-red sky fades to gray, then to nothing. The endless fields of corpses dissolve into mist. The realm is unmade, taking with it every trace of the war dead who no longer need it to exist.
Drokhar catches me as I start to fall. His arms wrap around me—solid and alive in a place that has known nothing but death for centuries.
“The cost.” His words brush my ear. “What did it take from you?”
I reach for my magic. Find it depleted, gutted, drained to nearly nothing by the effort of releasing a hundred thousand souls.
But not gone. Not destroyed. Exhausted.
“Everything I had.” I lean into him. “But I’d do it again.”
“I know you would.” His hand cups my face. Tilts my chin up until I’m looking into gray eyes full of something I never expected to see there. “That’s why I love you.”
The words hit me harder than any magic I’ve channeled. I stare at him, blood still drying on my face, the realm dissolving around us, the dead finally at peace.
“You—”
“Don’t make me say it twice.” But his mouth curves. Slightly. “I’ve burned ten thousand bodies without flinching. Saying that once was hard enough.”
I laugh. It comes out as a sob, or maybe the sob comes out as a laugh—I can’t tell anymore. My hands find his armor, the leather over his heart, the mark that burns beneath.
“I love you too.” The words feel inadequate. “I love you, and you’re an idiot, and we’re going to die in a collapsing realm if you don’t?—”
He kisses me.
Not gentle. Not careful. A claim and a promise and a declaration all wrapped into one bruising press of lips. I taste blood—mine—and smoke—his—and something else. Hope. Future. The possibility of a life that isn’t defined by death.
His hands cup my face, thumbs tracing the dried blood on my cheeks. My fingers tangle in his hair, loosening the iron clasps that hold it back, feeling the gray at his temples beneath my touch. The realm shudders around us, but for this moment—this one perfect moment—I don’t care.
For this moment, we’re a man and a woman who found each other against impossible odds. A claimed pair. A mating that defies everything either of us believed about ourselves.
The realm shudders again. Harder. The Veil closes around us, pushing us up, out, back toward the world of the living.
Drokhar’s arms tighten. His mouth finds my ear.
“Hold on to me.”
I do. With everything I have. My face pressed into his neck, my arms locked around his shoulders, my body fitted against his like we were made for this. Made for each other.