Page 282 of Mother of Death and Dawn

And that, I realized, was the cruelest truth of all. He could not save me. I could not save him.

“Together,” I choked out. “We go together.”

“Your story deserved a better end.”

I kissed him, and it was there, on the precipice of life and death, I felt the final shift in his resolve.

“Nothing ever truly ends,” I whispered.

We looked at the power between us—the means to create, to destroy, to alter, so powerful that no mortal ever should have wielded them. How many wars were fought over this? How many lives lost?

They were the only thing strong enough to heal the tears that they had opened. The only weapon that could be used against itself.

Caduan took my hands. Together, we stitched the world's wounds closed. Together, we gave the life we were about to leave behind one more chance.

CHAPTERONE HUNDRED TWENTY-ONE

TISAANAH

Ifelt it all fall apart. I looked up and saw the sky in shreds of light above me.

I had made a horrible mistake. I had failed, and I had handed Aefe—Reshaye—everything she needed to end the world.

I slipped from consciousness with this final thought, draped over Max’s unmoving body.

But then—

The stirring in the layers of magic beneath me kept the darkness from taking me fully. A strange magic reached for me—like a healing, beckoning hand, gently shaking me awake. There was no sight here, no sound, no voices, but I knew it was Aefe.

I felt her magic struggling to contain it—struggling to hold everything together.

I could have wept with relief.

“Max,” I breathed.

I could barely feel my own body. I shook him. His breaths were weak and shallow.

“Help me,” I whispered in his ear. “We’re almost done. It’s almost over.”

Gods, I prayed it would be true.

Faintly, he squeezed my hand.

I opened my palm, and then his, and then I pressed our hands together. I reached into the mind I knew so well, deep into his magic.

Together, we let ourselves fall, fall, fall, to the furthest layers of this power. I offered Aefe everything we had. One final push, to reshape the world, from all three types of magic—Valtain, Solarie, Fey.

The last thing I thought:

This is either how the world ends, or how it begins.

CHAPTERONE HUNDRED TWENTY-TWO

AEFE

Death is a door.

In the darkness, I watch Caduan’s silhouette stand at its threshold. I cannot see what lies beyond it, but I know that there is something there.

---