63. Henry
HENRY
T his day has been ten years in the making—the fuel that has carried me through every dark moment since my sister died. I’ve dreamt of the peace I would feel having finally avenged Holly, watching Harrick Carrenwell know he’s lost, and ensuring that no one else will suffer for his ambition.
I should feel relieved that he’s gone—satisfied to see violent justice done. Instead, I feel haunted by the betrayal in my wife’s eyes as she said, “Stars.”
Harlow didn’t use her safe word on our wedding night, or later when I was hunting her and fucking her into the forest floor. She used it when she found out I lied to her.
Of course she did. It was monumentally stupid to think I could hide this forever. I was just hoping?—
I scrub a hand down my face in frustration. I was just hoping to trap her at the fort with me so I could contain her when she found out. And how would that make me any less monstrous than her family? How much more manipulative could I be?
The vision of her lips brushing over my scarred chest so tenderly—like she was trying to will away my grief and heal it over with affection—haunts me. My life has been full of people with Divine blessings, but I’d never seen true magic until I watched her kiss a wish into a wound .
I stare up at the statue of Asher. His face looks eerie, lit from below by sunstone, which is probably the point. People in Lunameade have so little respect for the Divine of Endings. Foolish, since his power will be what delivers them from the calculating rule of the Carrenwells.
But that’s not necessary now. Liza and Harrick Carrenwell weren’t brought down by rebels. They were brought down by their own daughter.
My friends move around the courtyard in preparation for the day’s events.
Bryce tightens the laces on his boots while Carter checks the blade on his dagger.
Naima, who came on this trip in the event that any of our allies were wounded, checks a series of glass vials and wound dressings in her apothecary bag.
The initial plan was to finally reveal the Carrenwells’ corruption. My friends are aware that plan has changed, but not why.
I spent the morning explaining each sibling’s magic and what Harlow told me about the tunnel. We’re as ready as we can be to counteract what they might throw at us, but I still feel so restless.
“Are you sure you’re up for this?” Bryce asks, tying his copper hair back at the nape of his neck. “You seem out of sorts.”
“I’m fine,” I snap.
Bryce flinches. “Don’t bite my head off. What’s with you? You’re not hungry, are you?”
I glower at him.
“I still don’t understand why the instructions changed at the last minute. Something feels off,” Carter says, looking at the note in his hand.
The new instructions, straight from Rochelli himself, were left in a mailbox for us this morning. For better or worse, today is the day the rebel leader will finally be unmasked.
While we were expecting a few last-minute instructions, we weren’t expecting a deviation from the plan we’ve been refining for months. I did wonder how it might change with the sabotage the Carrenwells set into motion for Rafe. And, of course, considering my wife murdered her parents yesterday.
“I think I know what happened,” I say quietly.
They continue checking their weapons, only partly paying attention.
I rub my hand over the back of my neck. “I can see color.”
All three of them stop and turn to face me .
“Come again,” Carter says, a hint of a smirk on his lips.
I point at him. “Do not smile. I can see color. It’s not a big deal?—”
“Not a big deal!” Bryce practically shrieks. “You fell in love with your wife—with our enemy—and that’s not a big deal?”
“Harlow is not our enemy. There’s—fuck!” I scrub my hand down my face.
“There is a lot that we didn’t know. About why things are so tense between her and her parents, and it’s not my story to share.
That said, she has a very strong reason to be angry at them.
They have done some truly unforgivable things to their own children. ”
Bryce shakes his head and laughs indignantly. “I can’t believe it. She’s got to you.”
“No, she didn’t.”
“She did. I didn’t think it was possible, but she’s done it,” Bryce says. “Next thing we know, you’ll be saying Harrick doesn’t have to die.”
“Well, Harrick doesn’t have to die because he’s already dead,” I say.
“How?” Carter asks.
“Harlow killed him, along with her mother,” I say.
“Did you see the bodies?” Bryce asks.
I shake my head. “No, but considering my wife is a serial killer who murders abusers, it’s not a stretch to believe that she would take care of the ones in her own life.”
They all quiet. Carter and Bryce exchange a look.
“I saw her afterward,” I say. “She’s not that good of an actress. She just lost it yesterday. Broke down in the garden and then destroyed Harrick’s study with a fire poker.”
Carter steps forward. “If Harrick and Liza are dead, then who’s in charge?”
“Able, I suppose—assuming she hasn’t killed him by now,” I say.
“Weren’t you supposed to be watching her?” Naima asks.
I rub both hands down my face. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I fucked up. She saw the orange in my aura this morning before I was fully awake and she ran off and I don’t know where she went or what to do, and fuck?—”
I pace away from them, trying to ease the tension in my chest. I’m so angry at myself, I can barely breathe. The suffocating tightness in my chest slowly abates. I take three deep breaths and finally turn back to my friends .
“I can’t believe you can see color,” Bryce says.
“I knew it,” Naima says, beaming. “I saw you look at that woman and I knew it.” She points at Bryce. “You owe me a bottle of wine.”
Bryce groans and waves a dismissive hand at her. “Unbelievable. When did it happen?”
“Yesterday, during the whole fire-poker-in-the-study situation,” I say.
“That would get you going,” Carter says, rolling his eyes.
I run both hands through my hair, tugging at the ends. “I almost had her— really had her. And I can’t believe I fucked up so monumentally at such a critical moment.”
Back when we arrived in Lunameade, I was so certain this would be easy. I didn’t know then that a woman would rip out the seams of my life and I’d want to thank her for it.
Naima crosses the courtyard and pulls me into a hug. I don’t even bother fighting it.
I tried to be blind to it, but I always felt the discord in Harlow. Her parents wielded her like an assassin’s blade, so she made herself sharper. But beneath that cutting exterior, she is something else entirely.
Her almost-admission of love and the abject panic in her eyes are cemented in my brain.
I didn’t know I would find someone who understood grief like I do, who knows what it is to lose and to make that loss fuel. For ten years, I let my heart rot with anger, and not once did I consider it could be a liability.
There was no accounting for Harlow. I never imagined someone would crawl inside my chest, touch my rawest wound, and fall in love with the monster it made of me.
“So what happens now?” Bryce asks. “If we choose to believe that Liza and Harrick are dead… Where does the power shift?”
“Today is going to be about managing Rafe,” I say.
Bryce crosses his arms. “I thought we agreed he was not our problem.”
“That man killed my sister-in-law and almost killed my wife. I will have blood for blood,” I say.
“Beyond that, Harrick’s death creates a vacuum.
If we don’t put someone else in that place, Rafe will step in, and it will be much worse.
” I pause to let the reality set in for them.
“You can all judge me if you want, but things are going to get messy today, and if you don’t have the stomach for it, leave now. ”
I tighten the short swords at my hips, giving them a chance to all make eyes at each other.
“I didn’t come this far to not find out who Rochelli is,” Carter says quietly.
Bryce shrugs. “I’m not one to walk away from a fight.”
Naima laughs. “I’ve healed you up enough to know that’s right.
” She looks at me. “I’m in, but a word of warning.
Make sure that you’re not deciding something for Harlow that robs her of a chance to have his blood for herself.
It’s okay to want to protect her, but only if she wants protecting.
That’s something you Deathless struggle with, but if you want forgiveness, you need to humble yourself. ”
“I hate to break this up, but we have to get out there and take our places,” Carter says.
He ushers us back through the bar and out into the street. We’re only two blocks from the center of town, and the frenetic energy of celebration is everywhere.
The streets are lined with luminary jars, candles burning brightly inside. They’re meant to light the way to truth, and that feels very appropriate for this final day of the festival.
Starred garlands hang between buildings and every house and business is adorned with the sigil of Stellaria—some made of vibrant florals, some heavy iron work, and some rudimentary children’s drawings—but all welcome the Divine of Stars and Darkness into their homes.
I’m overwhelmed by the colors of the world as the crowd is already building up ahead of us. The women wear dresses and bright floral crowns, marigolds and sunflowers interspersed with white Stellarium Blossoms.
Our plan is a smooth transition of power to prevent violence toward those without magic.
Given that the original plan was to assassinate Harrick and Liza and temporarily leave Rafe in place, killing him is going to create an even larger power vacuum.
I’m not sure who else would try to step into it, but I’m trusting that the part of the plan I don’t know—the part my father assured me would be seamless—will go off without any issues.