by Sarra Cannon
“Mary Krista’s in her room. Connery and Silas are in the library looking at books and trying to come up with a different plan,” I said. “But other than that, we have the house to ourselves.”
“Sounds promising,” he said, wrapping his arms around me. “What would you like to do?”
“No more talk of plans for tonight,” I said. “We can figure out our next steps tomorrow. Let’s make tonight about us.”
I knew we were running out of time, but we’d already gone through all the possible solutions. We’d talked them through until our brains hurt, and we weren’t any closer to a way out.
If this was my last night in his arms, I wanted to spend it being with him, not talking about death or curses. I wanted this one last chance to just be us. To feel one last time what a lifetime together might have been.
He answered me with a kiss, pulling me tighter against his body and lowering his lips to mine.
I let everything else fall away in that moment. All the worries. All the danger. It faded to nothingness there in his arms.
This was the only place I wanted to be, and I surrendered to it with my whole heart.
Without a word, he lifted me into his arms and carried me into the house. I nuzzled against his warm chest as he took me up the steps and into his bedroom.
We went slowly, as if we had all the time in the world. As if time had ceased to exist entirely.
I undressed him, running my hands across every inch of his naked body. Memorizing every scar. Every ridge of every muscle. The curve of his jaw. His neck.
I pushed all thoughts of what was to come away, focusing only on him and what we had together here, in this moment. This body was still mine, and I refused to let the Mother Crow have any piece of this for herself.
Tonight belonged to us, and us alone.
I teased him, making this last, bringing him to the edge and letting go. I was testing his control, but this time, I was not afraid of him. I trusted him with every fiber of my being, and I knew that he would never hurt me.
We’d come so far since that first night together when he’d struggled against the vampire inside that threatened to devour me.
Now, we loved each other so completely, there was nothing between us but light. The darkness could no longer find us when we were wrapped around each other.
There was no fear now, like there was that first time. There was only pure desire.
I took him in my hands, and he made a low sound in his throat as I brought him to the edge over and over, watching his face as he tensed and lost himself to pleasure.
And when I’d pushed him to the limit, he took control.
He took my wrists in his hands and flipped me over on the bed, taking my clothes off one piece at a time.
He kept my wrists bound over my head as he toyed with me, running his fingertips gently across my skin. Teasing my body the way I’d teased his. Lingering in all the right places but refusing to give me the satisfaction I longed for.
I closed my eyes as he explored me with his hands and his mouth, and I surrendered to the feel of his touch.
It was torturous, but it was heaven.
“I need you,” I whispered when his lips found mine again.
I threaded my fingers through his hair, pulling his mouth down harder against my own.
He moved on top of me, and I opened my legs to invite him in, wrapping myself around him.
He entered me slowly, and I gasped, shuddering as our bodies joined. He kissed me again, his hands moving across my face, cupping my breasts as he moved in and out gently.
But I wanted more. I needed more.
I pulled away from his mouth, needing to breathe as the intensity between us built.
He moved his lips to my neck and kissed me, the heat of his breath against my skin warming my entire body. And still, I did not fear him.
For so long, he had held back, both of us afraid of what might be, but now that the only fear was being parted from each other against our will, there was only surrender and trust. The need to say with our bodies what could not be said with words.
I lifted my body to meet the movement of his hips, and he joined me, pushing harder and faster, filling me completely.
And still, it wasn't enough.
I moaned and dug into the skin of his arms, pulling him toward me as our bodies moved in rhythm. I was desperate with need, wanting more.
But then he slowed and lifted his eyes to mine. Tears formed in an instant, falling down my cheeks as I gasped.
They were not tears of regret or sorrow.
They were the kind of tears that came from opening up and letting go. From truly giving your whole self to someone who was willing to give the same in return.
My heart had never been so completely open. So unafraid and unguarded.
He held my gaze as he began to move again, taking me higher with each stroke until we finally reached the point of complete surrender, our bodies trembling with release.
We made love like that all night, giving ourselves to each other more than we ever had before.
And when the morning came, we walked outside and sat on the edge of the cliff to watch the sunrise together, both of us knowing, deep down, that it might be our last.
The Last Day
Rend
I held her body close to mine inside the blanket and wished with all my heart I never had to let her go.
I had never, in centuries of life, felt so connected to another person. So understood.
So fully loved, despite the things I’d done.
If these were the final moments of my life, I was grateful for them.
Her love was a gift I had never deserved.
A gift I would repay the only way I knew how.
She rested her head on my shoulder and sighed. “It’s beautiful here,” she said. “I spent so much of my life in the city, hardly noticing the beauty of the world. And now that I finally see it…”
Her voice trailed off, and I pulled her closer, kissing her cheek.
“You’re going to live to enjoy many more sunrises,” I said. “I promise.”
“I don’t think you can make that promise,” she said, looking up at me. “I know you want to, and I know you believe it, but I think it’s out of our hands now.”
I had nothing to say in response. I couldn’t tell her the plans I had made, and even with those plans, there was still no way to know for sure that it would work out the way I hoped.
She was right. The future was no longer ours to decide, and with that knowledge, part of the magic of our night together slipped away, revealing the harsh reality of this new day.
The last day.
Whatever moves were to be made, we would have to make them now. Time had given us the night, but the day had stolen it from us.
“I’m going to drink a potion, and then I’m going to take a shower,” she said, standing.
“I’ll go check on Silas and Connery. See if they’re awake and had any last-minute brilliant ideas,” I said. “Meet me downstairs when you’re ready?”
“I will,” she said.
She wrapped the blanket around her body and made her way back into the house.
I stood outside just a little longer, staring out at the view I’d admired for years. There were things to take care of before nightfall, but I found myself not quite ready to move.
As a demon, I was supposed to be able to choose the time of my own passing, but I’d never really given it much thought. I’d been in danger for so long, I hadn’t expected it to be left up to me. I thought I’d die in battle, fighting for what I believed in.
But now that I’d made my choice, I needed to find some level of peace in it.
I was doing the right thing—the only thing—but I’d wanted so much more time with her. Losing that broke my heart.
The only peace to be found was in knowing that she would live. I would leave the house to her, of course, and she could work at Venom with Azure and the others. This place w
ould be full of memories for her, but over time, I hoped they would bring her joy instead of the pain I knew she would feel at first.
I loved this place, and it had kept me safe for a very long time. I had to trust that Franki would be safe here, too. Happy.
She deserved that.
Reluctantly, I went back inside to find Silas and Connery.
Connery had fallen asleep on the small couch in the study, but Silas was still sitting there with his nose in a book. He’d taken one of my journals and filled it with notes.
“Find anything useful?” I asked, startling him.
He ran a hand over his face and shook his head.
“I’ve been writing down every idea that I can think of, desperate to figure something out,” he said. “I’ve played out every possible scenario from all-out-war to begging. Nothing seems to have much chance of working, Rend. I don’t know what to do. I feel responsible for all of this.”
I sat down in the chair opposite the desk.
“Don’t blame yourself,” I said. “You were trying to save your father and rid the world of a terrible evil. You couldn’t have known Franki would get mixed up in it.”
“I just wish I had thought it through. Seen it coming,” he said. “I underestimated the Mother Crow. And the Council. What are we going to do? We can’t just let her die.”
“We aren’t going to,” I said. “I have a plan, but I need to know you support me one-hundred-percent. No matter what.”
“Of course,” he said.
I leaned forward and met his eyes as I explained what I had planned for tonight.
He listened with his head lowered until I was done.
“We’ll need to create some kind of diversion,” he said. “The Council has to know by now that Mary Kathryn is gone. They’ll have to assume we rescued her, even if they can’t prove it, which means they’ll assume we’ve now learned the location of the crow village. They’ll be expecting us to go after the Mother Crow. If they intervene, it could mess up the entire plan.”
“So, what can we do?” I asked.
“We can attack on multiple levels. Try to keep their attention focused elsewhere until Franki and my father are both free,” he said. “But we’ll need to maintain deniability if the whole thing goes south.”
I glanced at Connery. “If the wolves will help, we can have them attack the castle,” I said. “They don’t actually have to attack or fight, but if they can surround the perimeter and get the attention of the Hollows enough so that they will inform the Council of an imminent threat, that might help.”
“Yes, but I think we need more than that,” Silas said.
“What else can we do?”
“If we could get enough people together, we could have different groups surround the homes of the Council members. They don’t have to act or put themselves in danger. They just need to draw some attention and appear to be a threat. We just need a few hours of distraction,” he said.
“I know my staff from Venom would help, but I don’t want to put their lives in danger,” I said.
“We could set up some kind of delayed spells, maybe,” he said. “Something that would go off a few hours before you head to the village to get their attention and make them believe they’re under attack.”
“Won’t they see through that?” I asked.
“Maybe, but it’s one way to make sure no one else is in danger,” he said. “And by the time they figure out the attack was faked, it will be too late for them to get to the crow village to stop you.”
I nodded. “Okay,” I said. “But who will set up the spells?”
“I’ll do it myself,” he said. “Then I’ll keep an eye on each of them in rotation. If they seem to be heading your way, I’ll do whatever I can to stop them.”
“Thank you,” I said. “And thank you for not trying to talk me out of this.”
“I wish I had a better idea, and believe me, I don’t want to lose you, but I understand why you need to do this,” he said. “I’ve never known the kind of love the two of you have, but I see it so clearly when you’re together. I don’t think you’d be the same person if you had to watch her die.”
“I don’t think I would either,” I said. “Just promise me you’ll be there for her when I’m gone. Help her get back on her feet. Help her learn to forgive me over time.”
“I will, Rend. I promise I’ll keep her safe,” he said.
“It’s decided, then,” I said, as if pronouncing my own death sentence. “Let’s run through the plan one more time and then we can start putting everything in place. And we’ll need to come up with a fake plan that we can explain to Franki. Let her think that we’re going to attack and force the Mother Crow into releasing her. I don’t want her to know the truth, and if we don’t come up with something, she’s going to know we’re hiding it from her.”
Silas nodded and jotted a few notes in his journal.
I woke Connery, and together, we went over the plan again until it was solid in our minds.
One wrong move, and the whole thing would fall apart.
But if we managed to pull it off, both Solomon and Franki would be free by the time the sun rose again.
This Will Destroy Him
Franki
I stood outside the door to the study, my entire body shaking.
I’d come to ask Rend a simple question and to say good morning to the others, but I’d never expected to hear the words that had come out of his mouth.
I shifted to smoke and flew back to the bedroom, collapsing into tears the moment the door was closed.
Rend was going to sacrifice himself to save my life. He hadn’t even planned on telling me the truth until it was too late to stop him.
I sobbed until my body ached from sorrow, then slowly picked myself up, resolved to do what had to be done.
It had all been leading to this from the beginning, like a train that couldn’t be stopped.
Neither one of us was willing to let the other die, but there was no solution that kept us both alive.
I turned on the shower and slipped off my clothes, letting the hot water run across my skin. I tried to imagine a life without him in it and found that I couldn’t.
I thought of all the people that depended on him. The staff at Venom. Harper and Jackson. Thousands more who relied on his potions and elixirs to keep their businesses running and their lives free from the Order of Shadows.
Even the Brotherhood of Darkness needed him as their ruler. With the Mother Crow dead, Solomon would be free, and the Council would be disbanded. Silas, Rend, and my father could rebuild the Brotherhood the way my father had dreamed it could be.
How many lives would that save? How many witches would be spared when the rules of the Brotherhood changed?
An entire army of vampires could join together in the fight to defeat the Order of Shadows.
I could not deny the power Rend would have if he were allowed to lead the Brotherhood. He was a natural leader in a way that Silas was not, and he could lead them to a new future.
The world needed him, and I would not let him give his life for mine. I couldn’t.
I cried my tears, washing them away so they would never be seen, and then I dressed and got ready for the day.
I would have to stay strong. I couldn’t let him know that I knew the truth, or he would do whatever he could to stop me from acting on my own.
But I also couldn’t do this alone.
Unlike me, Rend didn’t need to sleep. But I needed him to sleep tonight so that I could sneak away unseen. And for that, I would need help.
Which meant there was only one person I could trust now.
The one person in this world who loved Rend as much as I did.
I found Azure at Venom, cleaning from the night before and setting things up for the night to come. She glanced up as I walked through the door, her eyes growing wide in surprise.
“Franki, what are you doing here?” she asked.
“I can’t stay. Ren
d doesn’t know I’ve come,” I said. “But I need to talk to you.”
She swallowed and looked away. “He told you what he’s planning to do?”
“No, but I overheard him talking about it when he thought I was in the shower,” I said. “Did he tell you?”
“Not exactly, but I know it isn’t good,” she said. “Not for him.”
“Then you know why I’m here,” I said.
I reached over the top of the bar, grabbed the bottle full of green liquid, and poured myself a shot of Lady Luck. I needed all the confidence I could get right now.
“I know you love him just as much as I do,” I said. “And neither one of us wants to watch him die.”
“Go on.” She crossed her arms and leaned back against the wall behind her.
I downed the shot and poured a second one.
“I need a potion that will make him sleep, and I can’t very well ask him to make it for me,” I said. “Can you help me?”
“Franki—”
“I’m not going to let him sacrifice himself for me,” I said, holding back tears. “And with me gone, you’ll have him all to yourself again. I’m sure that will make you happy.”
I hadn’t meant to sound so bitter, but the thought of her being the one left to comfort him in my absence made me feel a whole new level of pain.
“It won’t make me happy to watch you die, if that’s what you mean,” she said.
“Maybe not, but if you had to choose between spending the next hundred years with me by your side or him, who would you choose?” I asked, one eyebrow raised.
She sighed. “That’s not a choice I want to be responsible for making.”
“Unfortunately, it’s the choice we’re all having to make right now,” I said. “I need to get back to the house before he realizes I’m gone. Will you help me or not?”
She stared at me for a moment, then turned and unlocked the wooden box where Rend kept all of his rarest ingredients.
She mixed up a simple potion, put it in a tiny vial, and corked the top.
She handed it to me, and I rolled it between my fingers.
