Page 187 of Vicious Is My Throne

And still, the roaring never stopped.

Until everything went black.

I woke to that same blackness, as impenetrable as Corvus’s cave, and fear shuddered through me, swift as a cold river current.

“You are safe,” Tavion murmured, pulling me against his soft shirt. He smelled clean, like sunshine. “You’re in the Keep. You’ve been here for three days, recovering.”

I burst up and he held me down with a dark chuckle. “Slow down, mate. You burned yourself out. None of us could break whatever…bullshite cycle you were trapped inside until your body gave out. You sit up too fast, wife, and Raziel will add another week of bedrest. Not that I’d mind a bit.”

Never one to miss an opportunity, he nibbled at my throat.

“You scared the fucking shite out of me, Anaria. I swear to the gods, if you ever do that again…”

“What happened?” I felt like I was made out of air. Like my bones were hollow and if Tavion let me go, I’d float away.

“You jump started the entire fucking world, that’s what happened. Tristan just returned from his last recon flight over Caladrius and the forest is resprouting, or whatever the fuck you want to call this. So far, the green reaches all the way to Tempeste and as far south as that bumfuck little witch village…Mysthaven or whatever it’s called.”

I felt his shudder all the way to my soul. “Everything you said you’d do…You kept your word, Anaria. And maybe this isn’t the time, but…fuck, I’m proud to be yours.”

I let the words sink in, letting them tether me to the now.

“Really? You’re not just telling me this to make me feel better?”

“Come and look for yourself.” Tavion’s words, his expression, were so tender, I blinked. And this time he let me sit up—slowly—helped me to the window and pulled the heavy drapes apart.

I blinked against the blazing light, let my eyes recover, and then…

Beneath a brilliant cerulean sky, pure white snow dazzled on those high peaks, steep slopes dropping into swathes of dark pine forests edging pale green meadows dancing with blues and pinks and yellows.

A brand-new, perfect world.

“All of this is you, Anaria,” Tavion’s voice was thick. “Everything is alive because of you. In a few days, Coz expects the blight will be gone completely. There won’t be a single trace Corvus or Gelvira ever existed.”

I gripped the windowsill, willing myself not to sink to my knees.

After all the plotting and lying, bluffing and wicked, wicked things we’d done to get to this point…After all the mistakes, I couldn’t believe we’d succeeded.

Couldn’t believe we were all still alive.

Magic pulsed inside me like a heartbeat, as if I was soul bound to this world.

I tasted power in the air, thrumming through me like the blood in my veins. When I closed my eyes, I felt the trees growing, tasted every wind current, sensed the warmth on the south facing mountain slopes like the sun on my shoulders.

I sucked in a guttering breath, tears pricking at my eyes.

“How dark are our marks now?” I didn’t have the courage to reach down, to check how twisted mine was. Nor could I stand to see Tavion’s.

Because that was the cost.

That had always been the cost.

And even thought I’d fought and schemed to avoid paying that steep price, in the end, there had been no other choice.

With a soft smile, Tavion pulled his shirt back and everything inside my head went silent.

I reached out and ran my fingertips over the pale, faint mark on his chest, not a single hint of black.

“You didn’t only heal the world, princess. You healed us.”

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