THIRTY-THREE LUNARIA
THIRTY-THREE
LUNARIA
Lunaria was still standing in the pavilion entrance, watching the gate settle shut behind Marguerite, when she heard the soft tap of a cane on stone.
Sue Tidewell crossed the garden path at the pace of a woman who had never been in a hurry in her life and never intended to start.
She was ancient—well past a century, if the rumors were true—and she moved as if the weight of time had simply passed through her rather than settling onto her shoulders.
Her eyes, when they met Lunaria’s, were sharp and dark and entirely unsurprised.
“Took her long enough,” the old woman said, jerking her chin toward the gate. “I’ve been watching Marguerite Sable carry that secret since before you were born. Wondered if she’d crack before or after the Convergence.”
“Elder Tidewell.” Lunaria stepped aside. “Were you listening?”
“Old ears. Not as keen as they once were.” Sue smiled, which meant nothing; the woman missed nothing. She crossed to the orrery and studied it with the unhurried attention of someone greeting an old friend. “I trained with Deia for eleven years. I know every stone in this pavilion.”
“Then why didn’t you—”
“Do what Marguerite didn’t?” Sue’s voice was dry.
“I tried, child. The Hollow King’s compulsion is thorough.
Deia’s death silenced me the same way it silenced Georgia—I couldn’t speak about what I’d seen without the words turning to ash in my mouth.
” She paused by the orrery’s central console, one knotted hand resting lightly on the stone.
“But I could prepare. I could wait. I could make sure that when the right person arrived, they’d have what they needed. ”
Lunaria thought of Georgia’s box. The ring. The journals that had been waiting, perfectly preserved, as if someone had made very sure the preservation wards would hold.
“The wards in the cellar. That was you.”
Sue didn’t confirm or deny. Just looked at the orrery with an expression Lunaria had no name for—grief and pride and the bone-deep satisfaction of a very long wait reaching its end.
“He’s most vulnerable in the crossing window,” the old woman said.
“Deia figured it out. Forty seconds—maybe fifty—when the Hollow King is neither fully in our realm nor still anchored to the void. After it, he’s too solid to burn.
” Her dark eyes found Lunaria’s. “You’ll have one shot.
Don’t waste it trying to be certain. Certainty is a luxury the crossing window doesn’t offer. ”
“Forty seconds.”
“Give or take.” Sue straightened, pulled her cane from where she’d leaned it against the console. “Deia died with that knowledge in her head and no one to tell it to. Sixty years it’s been stuck in mine.” She moved toward the door. “Don’t make me carry it for sixty more.”
She left without waiting for a response, her cane tapping across the stone and fading into the evening garden.
Lunaria stood alone in the pavilion, the orrery humming around her, the ring warm on her finger.
Forty seconds. One shot.
She could work with that.
The cottage was dark when Lunaria made her way home.
Her body ached with exhaustion—hours of magical work on the orrery, followed by hours of interrogating Marguerite, followed by everything Sue had left in her hands. She wanted nothing more than a hot bath and twelve hours of unconsciousness.
But the lights were on in the bedroom. And through the window, she could see movement.
Hux.
He’d let himself in with the key she’d given him—an act of permanence that still made something flutter in her chest. Years of never giving anyone a key, of keeping her bags packed and her exits clear. And now a lion shifter had unrestricted access to her home, her bed, her life.
She climbed the porch steps, pushed open the door, and found him in the kitchen. He’d apparently decided that waiting for her required food—something that smelled incredible was simmering on the stove, and he was chopping vegetables with the focused precision he brought to everything.
“You’re late,” he said without turning around. “I was starting to worry.”
“Marguerite came to see me.” Lunaria dropped her bag by the door and crossed to him, wrapping her arms around his waist from behind. He was warm and solid and hers—a word she was still getting used to thinking. “We had a conversation.”
He set down the knife. Turned in her arms so he could see her face.
“A conversation.” His eyes—amber, beautiful, seeing far more than she usually let anyone see—searched her expression. “You look like you’ve been through a battle.”
“A different kind of battle.” She leaned into him, letting his strength support her. “She told me everything. The binding. The anchors. How to break it for good.”
“And?”
“And...” She pulled back just enough to look up at him.
To see the face she’d grown to love over the past weeks, the man she’d chosen despite every instinct screaming at her to run.
“Your father was right. The Hollow King can’t consume what was never fated—it has no power over love that’s deliberately chosen. ”
His lungs seized. “Luna—”
“I love you.”
The words hung in the air between them. She’d been dancing around them for days, afraid to say them out loud, afraid that naming the feeling would somehow jinx it. But Junie was right. The time was never right. You just had to say it.
“I love you,” she repeated, her voice steadier now.
“Not because the stars said I should. Not because some cosmic force decided we were fated. I love you because you’re infuriating and competent, and you make me want to stay in a way I haven’t wanted anything in longer than I can remember.
I love you because you look at me like I’m worth keeping. ”
He kissed her.
Not soft. Not gentle. The kiss of a man who’d been starving his whole life and just found sustenance. His hands fisted in her hair, tilting her head back. His body pressed hers against the kitchen counter. His lion rumbled beneath his skin, possessive and satisfied and home.
When they came up for air, his forehead rested against hers.
“I love you too.” His voice was rough, undone, full of everything he’d been afraid to want.
“I’ve loved you since the night on the cliffs when you held a light for me in the dark and didn’t flinch at what it showed.
I loved you when you saved my life with starlight.
I’ve loved you every moment since, even when I was too afraid to admit it. ”
She laughed—a wet, slightly hysterical sound. “We’re both terrible at this.”
“Terrible at admitting feelings. Excellent at everything else.” He kissed her again, softer this time. “Soon.”
“Soon,” she agreed. “And then we destroy an ancient void entity and break a century-old curse and live happily ever after.”
“Is that the plan?”
“That’s the plan.”
He smiled against her lips. “I like it. Very optimistic.”
“I’m a very optimistic person.”
“You’re a chronic pessimist who makes jokes at funerals.”
“Same thing. Optimists expect the worst so they can be pleasantly surprised.”
His laughter rumbled through both of them. He pulled her closer, and she let herself be held—let herself believe, for one perfect moment, that everything was going to be okay.
The Convergence was coming. She could feel it—the ley lines restless beneath the garden, the stars straining against the dark.
She had Deia’s weapon, Marguerite’s knowledge, Sue’s forty-second window, and the man she loved. She still didn’t know if it would be enough.
But for the first time, she wasn’t facing it alone.