Chapter 33 #2
Evangeline stares at Niko before her gaze falls to me. Niko’s face softens, looking upon his wife with love so pure, I can’t look away. There is so much she’s not saying, but I see the despair written plainly across her face. I would do anything to take that away from her.
I want to go to her, hold her, do something to ground her back in her body, but I don’t. I can’t. She’s standing too still. Like if anyone touches her, she’ll shatter. She’s barely hanging on as it is, and the first tear that rolls down her cheek nearly puts me into a fit of rage.
“We try the tonic,” I say at last, definitive. “What do you need?”
“Five days,” Lady Thalia says. “Rare ingredients. But I can make it. I’m certain I have most of what I need, and what I don’t have, I’ll find or substitute.”
“And then what?” Finnick asks. “Someone still has to deliver it to the well.”
“I’ll do it,” I say immediately. “If it’s just a delivery, I’ll go and come straight home. I can take—”
Before I can finish, Lady Thalia shakes her head. “The well won’t accept the tonic from you.”
“Then Finnick will go—”
“Oh no,” Finnick says, already backing up. “I am far too pretty to die.”
“He can’t go either.” She shakes her head. “According to what I read, the person who administers it must be human. That leaves Evangeline.”
“No,” Niko snaps. “Absolutely not.”
“She can’t,” I say at the same time. “There are guards, and I doubt they would leave the well unprotected. You said there were Nephilim, Evangeline. How many?”
“A dozen,” she says. “Maybe more. They look coordinated and ready for battle.”
“I don’t want to send her any more than you do, but if we want a chance at slowing the curse, then this is what must be done.
If nothing happens, Evangeline and the rest of the kingdom’s lives will be in danger.
Doing nothing will mean certain death. It is also her choice,” Lady Thalia reminds us, and I have to grit my teeth from snapping at her.
Silence settles in the room as her words echo around us.
Godsdamn, she’s right, but I still can’t accept it.
This isn’t fair to her. She signed a contract to be here, but that doesn’t mean she understood the gravity of it.
Niko simmers silently next to me, but I think he understands we have very little choice left.
Still, it doesn’t mean she has to risk herself alone.
“We’re not sending her in alone,” I say. “I’ll go with her, and I’ll call in favors. Malix should help. The wolves too. They can both spare some of their people for this.”
“I’ll go with her too,” Niko says, trying to rise again.
I hold back a humorless laugh, but only just. “You’re barely standing,” I bite back. “You’re in no condition to travel, and you’ll only slow us down. You’re not going.”
“I’ll go in your place if I don’t have to go alone,” Finnick pipes in. “As long as staying alive is an option.”
“Fine, Finnick can go.” Then to Lady Thalia, I say, “Are you certain Evangeline has to go? That she has to be the one to pour in the tonic?”
“Zephyr.” Evangeline’s voice is suddenly sharp. She’s shaking, but her eyes burn. “You can’t keep me from this. I saw the well for a reason. The Nephilim showed it to me. I don’t know why—but maybe that means something.”
“It means they’re trying to get you killed,” I snap, unable to suppress my anger—and fear—any longer.
“No. It means they’re warning us.” Her hands ball into fists, small frame shaking.
“Maybe this curse isn’t just about Niko or the kingdom.
Maybe it’s bigger than that. It’s not going to get better.
” She keeps my gaze for a moment longer before discarding me and turning to Thalia. “Will the tonic really work?”
“It will buy time,” she says. “Probably a few weeks at most. There’s no way to say for certain. These are uncharted waters we’re in.”
Lady Thalia’s words don’t reassure me, but Evangeline nods. “Then I’ll go.”
Niko looks like she stabbed him. “You said you didn’t want to die.”
“I don’t,” she says, voice shaking now. “That’s why I’m going. So you don’t have to. So none of us have to.”
A suffocating silence blankets the room once more.
No one knows what to say—what can be said—when someone volunteers to walk into danger for all of us.
The air feels heavy, like we’re standing on the edge of something we can’t see but know is coming.
It feels too much like an end to a book I’m not done reading.
“I’ll go,” Evangeline repeats, quieter now, but there’s no doubt in her voice.
It’s not bravado or stubbornness; it’s conviction.
I hate her for it. Gods help me, I do. Because I know that look.
It’s the same one Niko wore when he stood in front of me the night we agreed to take Ender up on his deal to bring in a human mate.
“I’ll go with you. You will not be alone,” I say again, my voice low, rough. She doesn’t answer, just gives me a small nod, acknowledging me but not agreeing. That might be the worst part, but I’ll be damned if she thinks she’s going without me.
“I want a day,” Niko says suddenly, the weight of his words pulling all our attention. “Just one after you’ve prepared to leave. Before anything happens. Before she goes. I want one day where we don’t talk about curses or death or ancient magic. Just… one day with her. With you both.”
He doesn’t say it, but we all hear what he means. One last day. In case the tonic fails. In case we don't come back.
Evangeline’s hand trembles where it hangs at her side. She nods slowly, tears threatening again but not falling this time. “Okay,” she whispers, doing her best to smile at him. It looks more like a painful grimace.
I close my eyes, dragging in a breath to calm the raging storm inside me. Everything in me screams to refuse. To find another way, and to throw the book in the fire and say consequences be damned. But we’re running out of choices and out of time.
Lady Thalia gathers the book, already thinking ahead. Her jaw is set, her expression hard. “I’ll start the tonic. Prepare yourselves.”
She leaves without another word. Finnick follows her out, giving the three of us space.
Evangeline finally looks at me, and this time, I step forward.
My hands find hers. I press my forehead to hers, a thousand unspoken things between us.
I want to promise I’ll protect her. That I’ll bring her back.
That she’ll be safe. But I can’t lie to her like that because I don’t know what’s in store for us when we leave this castle.
“I’m scared,” she breathes.
“I know.” I squeeze her hand, and because I can’t lie to her, I say, “Me too.”
And godsdamn me, but part of me is already mourning her. Even as I vow not to let her go.