Page 312 of May: Bloom & Bane

“… She did scowl at Damon.” A warmth moves through our chest. “She has excellent instincts.”

Nook settles around its new weight—one more heartbeat under this roof than it has ever held before. The vines woven over the walls have all turned, slowly, through the evening, until every leaf in the room faces the girls. My shadows pooled beneath them hours ago and refuse to be recalled.

“Three thousand years,” I say, at last. “Twelve times they cut the wings from our back. A curse built to destroy us. And she undid all of it in eight months.”

“She undid it the first morning she opened her eyes,” Sage says quietly. “Everything since has just been the curse learning what we already knew.”

Vaelína sighs in her sleep. Her shadow, small and drowsy, rises from the petals and drifts to her mother’s resting hand. It curls around Eden’s smallest finger.

“Do you remember,” Sage whispers, “when we believed we were meant to be separate?”

“I remember,” I murmur. “We would have missed all of this.”

Our wings—one green, one bone—fold forward, stretching slowly over the nest until the two of them sleep beneath the whole span of what they gave back to us. For the first time, in three lifetimes, life and death are finally at ease.

“Dova’Saevúra en vaelira. Eth ves duvai. Ael’bela. Aelvasha. Bela kai’vesha.”

There are twelve soulbonds written across lifetimes. Ours is the second. The bloom. The bane. And every clover in between.

epilogue

—EDEN

Two Months later⁠—

The afternoon sun is bright. Andrik and Lumi’s snow-draped cabin looks like something out of a storybook, every eave glittering like it’s been dipped in sugar. I tug Vaelína’s hat down over her ears. She blinks up at me with one violet eye and one black.

“You ready to see Uncle Grumpy again, sweetpea?” I murmur to her. “He’s very large. Try not to stare this time.”

“I heard that,” comes Lumi’s laugh from the doorway behind me, Eirlys balanced on her hip. “He’s a marshmallow. A nine-foot marshmallow.”

“A marshmallow who once threatened to remove Sage’s spine through his nose,” I say.

“That was one time, and Sage started it.”

We step out onto the wide porch and breathe in the fresh air, my sister beside me, the sun warming our skin. The impossible ordinariness of it is all I could have ever asked for.

A cheerful giggle drifts up from the snow-lined path and draws our attention. Walking toward the cabin is a woman whose mere presence seems to make the winter chill back off a few degrees. She has a stunning, heart-shaped face framed by a halo of rich, voluminous chestnut hair. Her warm eyes crinkle with kindness. But it’s her outfit that makes me smile. Defying the dreary winter neutrals, she’s wearing an oversized, cozy lilac sweater patterned with bright neon-green alien heads, paired with a sweeping chartreuse skirt. She’s like a little fairy.

“Am I interrupting?” she calls.

“No!” Lumi yells back. “I’m so glad you could make it. You get to meet my sister and niece.”

She climbs the porch steps in a swish of fabric, and up close she’s even lovelier.

“Oh, it’s an absolute honor,” she says, setting her bag down on the bench. She bends at the waist, hands on her knees, to beam at Vaelína. “I’m Miss Honey. But please, call me Posey.”

“It’s so nice to meet you,” I say, shifting Vaelína so she can see Posey. “I’m Eden.”

“Eden. What a beautiful name for a beautiful mama.” She wiggles her fingers, the neon alien heads on her sleeve dancing with the movement, catching Vaelína’s attention. “And who is this little angel?”

“This is Vaelína,” I murmur, a soft smile tugging at my lips as my daughter lets out a tiny coo.

“Vaelína,” she repeats, softening the syllables until they sound like music. “Oh, look at those eyes. One violet, one black? You are going to spend your whole life having people fall into them, aren’t you?”

Vaelína gives her a gummy, drooling smile.

“She’s got your whole heart already, hasn’t she?” Posey says, watching Vaelína track the bobbing aliens on her sleeve. “Just a couple months old and already running the household, I’d bet.”