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He just looks steadily at me. “You and I have a similar heart,” he says. “In my place, you would do the same.”

In spite of everything, I feel an indescribable sadness for him. I take a step closer, bracing myself for him to lash out at me, take me by the neck as he’d wanted me to do to the other gods, claim my soul for himself in order to find another way to exploit the power within me. Or maybe he fears me now. Maybe he knows that, if I touch him, I could claim his soul just as readily as I took Thorn’s.

But he just watches me in silence as I stop before him.

“You want to undo all the evils of the world,” I say. “To prevent them from happening, because you’ve seen the absolute worst of mortals, know what darkness we are capable of. But you can’t. God or not. No one can predict the future, what humanity will do.”

His eyes gleam in the gray light. “If only you could understand,” he says quietly.

“Release me,” I say.

He bows his head to me, just as he does in my dream. “No,” he says.

Behind him, Étienne’s faded figure appears through the smoke.

I think of what he’d said about the power in my soul. The ability to make and unmake gods.

I had unmade Thorn.

But I can also give Étienne back his soul. I can remake him.

My gaze turns up to Raven. “I am not yours to command.”

Then I suddenly whirl away from him and lunge toward Étienne.

Raven bares his teeth and lashes out at me—but he’s too late. I reach Étienne’s bound figure—my hand touches his chest. I reach up to his bowed head, then press my lips against his and kiss him deeply.

An electric shock races through my system—the unlocking of something within me, the unfurling of a thread of light so powerful, so potent, that for an instant I feel like I am burning alive from the inside out. I want to scream, but I can’t. My body is locked against Étienne’s, our lips linked, the warmth of his soul curling around my own until it feels as if we are one.

Through that link, I feel the coiled energy of an immortal soul awakening, coming to life as the power of my soul feeds it, a Regent who has stepped into the role of a god. And with the birth of this new immortal comes a reverberation deep in my chest, an eternal name, a symbol of what he cared for during his life, of his reverence of the mortal world. I think of his bracelet, his Artifact, the gift from his mother before he severed all ties with his family.

Silk.

He stirs.

Against my hand, I feel his chest suddenly rise, filling with a breath of air.

His eyes open.

I break our kiss and push away, mesmerized. I cannot see his pupils or irises at all—they glow with a blinding light, the presence of something beyond mortality that has stirred to life within him. It is the thread that had passed to him from Thorn, the everlasting presence of a power that has existed since the beginning of time, now permeating his body and transforming his appearance into something different, something more. It turns him so radiant that I can hardly look at him.

It latches on to the thread of light in my soul, as if drawing strength from me. The feeling is almost too much to bear, and instinctively, I want to pull away from him, even as I am desperate to stay.

He turns his glowing eyes to me, and in this moment, I am bathed in light.

Then he looks at Raven. His eyes narrow. His fists clench.

And in one move, the god of Lies shatters his chains.

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When they shatter, everything does.

I’m thrown backward across the floor. Raven vanishes, along with the smoke. Everything is gone in an instant, and I have no idea where I am or what has happened.

It is only the feeling of cold marble beneath my body that brings me back to reality. Gone is the strange, ethereal world within the Eternal Tree. Gone is the garden behind Willow’s compound. I find myself lying on the floor of the atrium in Raven’s estate.

My hand goes to my chest. There is no arrow, no wound.