Drink Deep - Chloe Neill [119]
It was over.
Mallory was unconscious, her prophecy having come true. She’d been bested by Catcher, the White City at risk no more.
And Ethan was gone for good.
I shook my head to keep the tears inside, refusing to give in to grief. She’d have created a monster, and there was no point in grieving for something that never should have existed in the first place. I’d rather have memories and grief than a perversion of who he was. I’d just have to get back to living the life I had accepted was mine.
“I can do this,” I whispered, the tears falling down my cheeks. I stood up, looking over at Catcher and Mallory. He was winding glowing strands of magic around her unconscious body as if to bind her when she awoke. Magical restraints, maybe. I didn’t know what the Order would do to her now, but I couldn’t imagine it was going to be nice.
I felt pressure at my elbow and glanced around. Jonah stood behind me, gaze scanning my face. “You’re bleeding again.”
“I’m fine. Just a little shrapnel. McKetrick’s gun exploded—he’s over there.”
Jonah nodded. “I’ll make sure the cops find him. Are you okay? I mean, aside from the bleeding?”
“I think so—” I began, but was interrupted by the crackle of a particularly loud bit of residual energy. I ducked a little as it flashed across the park before petering out and sending a prickle of magic through the air.
“Merit,” Jonah quietly said. “Look.”
I glanced up.
A dark figure moved through the blue haze across the Midway, approaching us. The hair at the back of my neck stood on end.
“Get back,” Catcher said, moving toward us. “That thing is walking evil. The spell was interrupted, which means that’s the remainder of magic.”
But I held out a hand. “Wait,” I said, the word falling from my lips even as I began moving toward the figure.
I was compelled forward. Without explanation, every atom in my body was intent on moving to meet whatever was emerging from the fog of falling ash. That move could have been deadly, but I didn’t care. I kept walking. And when the fog cleared, brilliant green eyes stared back at me.
Tears sprang to my eyes.
My knees suddenly trembling, I ran toward him.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
PHOENIX RISING
He wore the same clothes he’d had on when he’d been staked—dress pants, his House medal, a white button-up shirt, a tear in the fabric in the spot above his heart. Eyes wide, he drank in the sight of me.
I reached him, and we stared at each other for a moment, both afraid, perhaps, of what might come—and what had been.
“I saw the stake,” Ethan said. “I watched Celina throw the stake and felt it hit me.”
“She killed you,” I said. “Mallory . . . She worked magic to bring you back as a familiar. Catcher interrupted the spell. He thought it would create a monster, but you’re—you don’t seem like a monster.”
“I don’t feel like a monster,” he softly said. “I dreamed of you. I dreamed of you often. There was a storm. An eclipse.”
“You dissolved into sand,” I added, as his eyes widened in surprise. “I had the same dreams.”
Still frowning, he raised a hand to my face, as if unsure whether I was real. “Is this a dream?”
“I don’t think so.”
He smiled a little, and my heart tripped at the sight of it. It had been so long since I’d seen that teasing smile. I couldn’t help the new flood of tears, or the sob that escaped me.
He was here. He was alive. And most important, he seemed to be his own person, not some mindless servant, some black magic familiar of Mallory’s. I didn’t know what I’d done to deserve a chance at it, but he’d come back, and the gratitude—and shock—was nearly overwhelming.
“I don’t know what to say,” I told him.
“Then don’t,” he said, embracing me again. “Be still.”
A cool breeze crossed the Midway, and I closed my eyes, just for a moment, trying to take his advice, trying