The lengths to which he was willing to go to fight for her… She didn’t think she deserved it. “How’d you find out, anyway?”
“I was on my way to see Fulton when Penelope came out of her office in near-hysterical tears. It took a little gentle coaxing, but she told me everything: that she’d seen you and Brysden going down to Dovermere, that she knew you were a Tidecaller and had told Fulton.” His throat bobbed with emotion. “You scared me, Ainsleif. I thought the caves might take you this time.”
There was such anguish in his eyes it took Emory aback. “I’m fine. I made it out.” Barely. She rubbed absently at her arms, thinking of Penelope. “I don’t understand how she could have known. I never said anything to her, I swear.”
“Do you think she might have spied on you?”
Emory blew out a laugh. The idea was absurd. Except…
The grief in Penelope’s eyes after Lia’s body was found. The party she’d gone to that was so unlike her usual self. The vehemence in her words as she berated Emory for being such an uncaring friend.
And the book Penelope had been obsessed with, about a Darkbearer who would cloak herself in shadows to spy on people…
Maybe it wasn’t so far-fetched a thing. And it would serve Emory right—she had been a terrible friend to Penelope. Had set her eyes on the Selenic Order and nearly forgotten everything and everyone else in the process.
“I don’t know,” she said at last. “Possibly.”
The worry on Keiran’s face made Baz’s words ring in her ears. And though she didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of heeding his warning, she had to ask.
“Why did you get close to me? If it was to get some kind of revenge on Baz and Romie for what happened to your parents…” Keiran stilled, but she kept going: “Is that why you tapped Romie for initiation? You hoped Dovermere would take care of her so the Brysdens would hurt like you did?”
A loss for a loss.
“I can’t believe you’d think that.”
The hurt in his eyes made her want to take it all back.
“I got close to you because I saw you, Ains. I saw you at your most vulnerable when you washed up on that beach. I saw the pain and grief you came back with, the resilience it took to face everyone when your whole world had been ripped away. I see how incredible you are, and that is why I got close to you.”
Something in her broke then. The words came out in a sob. “I’m sorry. Everything is too much, and I just…”
“It’s all right.”
Keiran pulled her in, a light in the dark as he’d always been. She clung to him as whatever dam she’d built around her crumbled and everything came pouring out—everything that happened in Dovermere, the sleepscape, Jordyn. The only part she left out was her close call with her Collapsing, too scared and ashamed to admit to it.
And that kiss.
When she was done, Keiran tipped her chin up, hazel eyes searching hers. He wiped her tears, trapped her hands between his, and pressed them against his chest. “You’re safe. That’s all that matters.”
Safe. But at what cost? Penelope would have her memories taken. Baz was on academic probation and still liable for her secret—still at risk should something happen down the line. And she would have to keep the farce going, pretend to be a Healer for the rest of her life.
A small price to pay, Emory supposed, for keeping her magic and her place within the Order.
For so long she’d dreaded being found out and sent to the Regulators. She’d been scared to see her former self eclipsed by who she’d become, horrified at the idea of ever wearing the golden sunflower and dark moon of House Eclipse. But now, as she stared down at the untruth of her New Moon tattoo, the prospect of having to keep lying forever felt more daunting than anything else.
She’d discovered what it meant to have Eclipse magic, had started to imagine what it would be like to study in Obscura Hall, to belong to its house.
At least she had the Order, she thought, and perhaps that was where she truly belonged.
* * *
Baz wasn’t in the dining hall or the library or even the greenhouse when Emory went looking for him that night. To apologize. See what could be salvaged between them, if anything at all. She was on her way back to her room, defeated, when she finally glimpsed his lanky form slipping into Obscura Hall.
“Baz, wait!”
She followed him inside, catching him in front of the elevator.
“Professor Selandyn filled me in on everything,” Baz said in a clipped tone. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“Baz, I’m so sorry.”
His jaw was a hard line, and his eyes… There was no softness there. Nothing of the boy who’d kissed her on the beach, of the friend who’d kept her from shattering time and again this past month.
“You’re angry with me.”
Baz pressed the button to call the elevator. “I’m angry at myself.”
His voice was barely above a whisper, and that made it so much worse.
“I should never have agreed to any of it. Helping you, keeping your secret. It was reckless. Foolish.” His throat worked. “Ever since you came into my life, it’s been nothing but near-misses and inexplicable deaths, and it’s too much, Emory. I can’t do it anymore.”
Guilt threatened to choke her. “What about Romie?”
“We’re no closer to finding out how to bring her back.”
“So you’re just giving up?”
“I’m asking you to give up. Us going to Dovermere… It was a mistake.” The rickety elevator dinged as it reached the top, and Baz stepped inside. He couldn’t look at her as he said, “Everything you touch crumbles to dust.”
An ocean of words rose in her throat, but none of them came out. All she could think was that she’d done exactly what Kai thought she would: betrayed Baz’s trust, his loyalty. She’d fucked it all up.
“Did you tell Keiran you almost Collapsed?”
She couldn’t respond.
Baz nodded tightly as the door began to shut. “I hope you know what you’re doing, because I won’t be there to save you next time.”
Baz disappeared, and Emory left, trying to keep from breaking down into angry tears. His words crawled over her, seeping into every corner of her mind. He was right. Everything was her fault. Travers and Lia, called to their deaths by her proximity to Dovermere. Jordyn’s soul devoured by the umbrae. Romie stranded in a place that would not let her go. Penelope driven to such grief and resentment that she had outed her to the dean. And Baz, who couldn’t even look at her anymore.
It all came back to her, the source of everyone’s suffering.
She was a suffocator. A stormy sea leaving only ruin in her wake.
Emory should never have come back to Aldryn. Should have stayed home after the summer, safely tucked away in her father’s lighthouse, with no other soul for miles around. No one for her to damage.
Had she not followed Romie into the caves, she would still be a Healer, nothing more than mediocre, but none of this would have happened, and she’d still have her friend at her side.
Emory had dared to reach for it all, everything that wasn’t hers to take. Everything she’d felt entitled to, all in the name of finding herself, of becoming someone noteworthy.
And what was left, in the end?
Her feet led her right to Keiran’s doorstep. His face and hair were mussed from sleep when he opened the door. Torso bare. The smell of his aftershave wrapped around her, warm and inviting.
“Can I stay with you tonight?” she asked, not bothering to wipe the tears on her cheeks.
He wordlessly pulled her to him, and in the circle of his arms, tucked under the warm covers of his bed, she found safety. Comfort. She pressed a kiss to the side of his mouth, cupped his face in her hand. His cheek dug into the heat of her palm. She ran her other hand through his supple hair, let it fall to the back of his neck, trailed it down his shoulder.
Keiran’s eyes fluttered shut. “What do you want, Ains?”
“I want…”