Send Me Their Souls (Bring Me Their Hearts #3) - Sara Wolf Page 0,70

frown grim.

“Fione?” the prince asks, as if begging her to contradict his bodyguard.

She lets out a sigh. “I can’t lie to you, Lucien. It’s a possibility.”

Lucien’s dark eyes snap to me, and I try a smile. The memory of the dream, that ominous fear I had of Varia’s touch—

“They’re right, Lucien. It’s…it might be a thing. And if it is, then I’m a threat to you—”

“You’re not,” he argues instantly. “You never will be.”

“I’ve always been,” I say softly.

“I know—” He clenches his working fist, reflection warbling in the valkerax blood puddle he stands in. “I know you’d never hurt me. Magic or not, you’re strong. Stronger than anything or anyone I know. You’d never succumb to something like that. Gods—you made Weeping real. You did it all on your own. If that isn’t—if that isn’t proof…”

I walk hesitantly up to his side, taking his limp hand in mine. His whole body’s shaking enough to vibrate his inactive fingers, to make the bones and tendons move when they clearly can’t anymore. The old pain comes welling up like ink, like mud. I’m a threat.

we are his death in the night.

The possibility is there, even if my mind is unwilling to consider it. Even if my mind isn’t willing to turn on my friends, the hunger is. I’ve felt firsthand how strong the Bone Tree is. I’ve seen it—dug deep in the marrow of Evlorasin’s very being. I won’t have a choice.

I’m not a valkerax. But I have six eyes when I Weep. I can see Varia in my dreams. I can see through her eyes, like we’re one. Because she has the Bone Tree in her. And the only creatures in Arathess tied to that tree are the valkerax. I don’t know what I am, anymore. But I know—sadly—that it’s not human. It’s maybe not even pure Heartless. Fione’s words at the fire the other night ring in my empty chest.

Whatever I am, however I’m shaped, whatever parts of me are here or not here, I’m still me.

“Whatever I am, Lucien,” I start softly. “Whatever strength I have, I’m going to use it to stop Varia.”

His onyx eyes flash—not quite betrayed, but something deeper than that. His hand darts to his breast pocket, pulling out the sack stitched with the word Heart. My real heart.

“Hold still,” he says, terse. “I’m going to put it back.”

“Luc—” Malachite starts.

“Lucien, no.” I stagger back. “That’s not how—that’s not what I want.”

“I’m not going to let my sister use you anymore,” the prince barks. “I won’t let anyone use you. Not her, not the Bone Tree. You’re not a tool, you don’t have to live like one—”

“Stop.”

My voice goes hard, and Lucien’s fades. The quiet is overwhelming, my words spilling out in neat, too-perfect rows. Rows that have had time to organize themselves. Nothing but time.

“These things you’re saying.” I look him dead in the eyes. “I know them now. All of them. But it wasn’t easy. I had to meet you to really get it. And you—” I look to Fione, Malachite. “And you. The road I had to walk to get here, to who I am now—it was long. But it’s not over. Not in the godsdamn slightest.”

Lucien straightens, his gaze sparking. I reach out and rest my palm against the bag, against his hand, against my heart, feeling the organ contract softly. All my memories of my human life. All my burning desires to be whole again.

I push the bag away.

“No matter what, from now on, every choice I make is mine. I choose to fight Varia. I choose to continue. I choose whether or not I’m Heartless.”

I put my hand on my unheart and look up at him. At all of them.

“I choose.”

15

THE OCEAN

My words make Fione smile and Malachite shake his head and exhale wearily. They make Lucien watch me intently until, finally, he nods.

“I understand.”

Just those two words. Simple, but far from easy, and said with steel pride. In me, in my convictions. He believes in me, and I hear it in every inch of his voice.

Malachite’s the first to start walking, and we trail behind him. We leave the valkerax corpse behind and come across more. Dozens of them. I glance up every so often, the floating landmass waning away behind and above our heads, and then one more glance, and it’s gone. No sign of the smoke, or the blackened edges, or the roots hanging from the bottom. All of it. Gone. I close my