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Ziola’s eyes shifted to her feet before turning to look out over the ocean. But Bryony’s never left me and she gave me a sharp nod.

“May your blood restore what was broken, my goddess,” she said before turning to give me the privacy of dying in peace.

I let out a long, trembling breath and forced my mind into stillness as I raised the knife to my throat with an unsteady hand.

Beneath all the guilt and darkness inside me, I wanted to live. Not just for myself, but for the people I loved.

Once, I had been an ornament beside a throne—something polished, silent, and useful only so long as I obeyed.

Now I would die upon one. The thought settled through me with a terrible kind of peace.

“For the ones I love,” I whispered, my voice barely carrying through the hollow temple. “For the kingdoms I broke. For every life caught beneath the ruin I made.”

My fingers tightened around the hilt.

“I give back what I took.”

The cold bite of the blade touched my throat.

For one suspended heartbeat, the entire world seemed to hold its breath with me. The sea stopped crashing against the shore, the wind stopped twirling through my hair, even the rot pulsing beneath my feet seemed to still.

I pressed harder, swallowing a hiss of pain as I started to drag the blade across the sensitive flesh of my neck.

Pain flashed bright and immediate, but it was nothing compared to the ache already living inside my chest.

“Forgive me.”

Chapter Forty-Seven

Consequence of Love

Helion

Elysium grew closer on the horizon with the unnatural wind filling our sails. My knuckles had long since turned white from my grip on the wheel.

Waking up to find my wife gone after she admitted she wanted me? After sharing her? Well, it had broken my heart after it had just learnt how to beat again.

What was she thinking⁠—

Pain slid across my neck, stinging like the sharp caress of a knife. I sucked in a breath, my hand snapping to the sting. Warmth slicked my fingertips.

Blood.

“Fuck.”

I released the wheel of the ship, letting it wrench against the pull of the tide I had been fighting.

“Aldric! Man the helm!”

The prince dropped the bundle of ropes in his hands and ran towards the wheel.

The ship lurched violently as a wave smashed against its side, but I barely noticed. I staggered for the stairs, one hand catching the railing.

Rythos stood on the prow of the ship, empty blood bags scattered at his feet while his teeth tore into another.

I ran past Cerilla, the witch a pale, trembling form of herself from forcing wind into our sails.

“Rythos!”