I took a slow breath to calm my churning mind. I couldn’t answer, not when the love decades dead was standing not five yards away staring at me. Without a word, I turned and left the glade, back into the mist-shrouded hollow and the silence of my own thoughts. I felt Ariel a’s eyes on me as I left, but she did not follow.
Alone, I stood in the place where Ariel a died, the great wyvern skeleton curled around the edge, and tried to process all that had happened.
She was alive. All this time, she had been alive, knowing I was out there, watching, yet unable to contact to me. She had been alone for so long. It must have been horrible for her. If the situation had been reversed, and I was the one watching, knowing she would fall for another, it would have driven me insane. I wondered if she had waited for this day, the day I finally returned to this spot, hoping that we could be together again.
But there was someone else now. Someone who waited for me, who knew my True Name and commanded my loyalty. Someone I’d made a promise to.
I felt Puck’s presence at my back but didn’t turn around. “This is crazy, isn’t it?” he muttered, coming to stand beside me. “Who would’ve thought she was here all this time? If I had known…” He sighed, crossing his arms to his chest, letting his voice trail off. “Things sure would’ve turned out differently, wouldn’t they?”
“How did you know?” I asked without turning around, and felt his confused frown at my back. “How did you know I wouldn’t kill you?”
“I didn’t,” Puck said with forced cheerfulness. “I was really, really hoping you wouldn’t. That would’ve sucked a lot, I think.” He stepped closer, joining me in staring at the dead wyvern. His next words, when they came, were very soft. “So, is this thing between us finally over?” 88/387
I didn’t look at him. “Ariel a’s alive,” I murmured. “I think that dissolves the oath—I no longer have to avenge her death. So, if that’s true, then…
yes.” I paused, waiting to see if the words felt right, if I could say what I’d wanted to say for decades. If the words were a lie, I would not be able to speak them. “It’s over.”
It’s over.
Puck let out a sigh and let his head fall back, running his hands through his hair, a relieved grin crossing his face. I shot him a sideways glance.
“That doesn’t mean we’re all right,” I warned, mostly out of habit. “Just because I’m not sworn to kill you anymore doesn’t mean I won’t.” But it was an empty threat, and we both knew it. The relief of not having to kill Puck, being free from an oath I never wanted, was too great. I wasn’t failing anyone by letting him live. For now, the Unseelie demon inside me had been sated.
Though I’d spoken the truth when I’d said we weren’t all right. There was still too much fighting, too much anger and hate and bad blood between us.
We both had years of words and actions we regretted, old wounds that went too deep. “Puck,” I said without moving, “this changes nothing between us. Don’t get too comfortable, thinking I won’t put a sword through your heart. We’re still enemies. It can’t ever be the way it was.”
“If you say so, prince.” Puck smirked, then surprised me by turning completely serious. “But right now, I think you have larger issues to 89/387
deal with.” He glanced back at the glade, frowning. “Meghan and Ariel a—that’s a choice I’d never want to make. What are you going to do?” Meghan and Ariel a. Both alive. Both waiting for me. The whole situation was completely surreal. Meghan was the Iron Queen, far beyond my reach.
Ariel a—alive, unchanged and whole—waited just a few yards away.
Possibilities and whatifs swam through my head. For just a moment, I wondered what would happen if I just stayed here, with Ariel a, forever.
The pain was swift and immediate. It wasn’t stabbing, or fiery, or unbearable. More like a fraying of my inner self, a few threads tearing away, vanishing into the ether. I winced and stif led a gasp, instantly abandoning that train of thought. My vow, my promise to Meghan, was woven into my very essence, and breaking it would unravel me, as well.
“My promise still stands,” I said quietly, and the glimmering threads of pain vanished as swiftly as they’d come. “It doesn’t matter what I want, I can’t give up now. I have to keep going.”
“Promises aside, then.” Puck’s voice was harder now, disapproving. “If there was no promise, Ash, no oath that bound you, would you keep going?
What would you do right now, if you were free?”
“I…” I hesitated, thinking about the paths that had brought me here, the impossible choices, and the two lives that meant everything to me.
“I…don’t know. I can’t answer that right now.” 90/387
“Well, you’d better figure it out quick, prince.” Puck narrowed his eyes, his voice firm. “We’ve screwed both their lives up pretty bad. At least you can make it right for one of them. But you can’t have it both ways, you know. Pretty soon, you’re gonna have to make a choice.”