Standing at Celestine's grave, the wind whistles through my hair and settles that familiar tightening in my core. I have to tell her. I have to tell Silas. I have to inform the people I love the most that they will not see the people they care about ever again. And the brutal fashion in which they revealed will have to be revealed, too.

The only thing giving me the courage to stand here and stare out at the ocean is Binx at my side. I'm not alone in this, and a sickly part of me hopes Dalis recognizes what the silence means. It won't be that easy, I'll have to tell her, anyway. But I don't want to. I spent days preparing myself for this, yet that provision wasn't enough. Not for this. Nothing will prepare me for this.

Sunlight twinkles like diamonds over the ocean's surface. It doesn't take long for Dalis to turn to me, staring at the side of my face. "How was the capital?" she asks. Not wanting to know outright but wishing to have some semblance of the truth handed to her.

I can tell her the capital was cold and dark, filled with familiar death and the reek of blood. It smelled of crime and the fighting pits were bathed in guts. I won't tell her that. All these little pieces of information are not what she cares to know, she focuses only on Mills. If I discovered anything about him while we were inside the castle.

Little did I know, it didn't take us getting inside the castle to know what happened to him. A shiver snakes up my spine at the reminder of where he is now, and possibly where the remainder is. Gone. Destroyed. Burnt to a crisp. His head is likely the only thing that remains. That is damaged beyond repair; the crows had a field day with a fresh meal.

"The capital was...the capital," I say blandly. "It was as cruel and heartless as it was the last time I saw it."

Dalis nose. She crosses her arms over her chest to protect herself from the cold breeze in the air. This never bothered Celestine, precisely why I chose this spot to bury her. She loved the ocean breeze; it was one of her favorite weather patterns, and often, she stood out here and spread her arms wide. She tipped her chin towards the sky and relished in the beauty of the salty wind encasing her.

Making her feel free.

She didn't have to travel very far to achieve the sense of freedom. I have been to this entire kingdom and back and still don't know what I'm searching for. Every instance I think I've found it, that comfort slips through my grasp and is replaced by a hollow, dark corner in my heart that I can't access without diving too deep into my fears.

"You know what I mean." Dalis's voice is edged with desperation. "Tell me if you saw anything."

I don't tear my eyes away from the ocean. I can't. I can't meet Dalis's eye and tell her what happened. It'll break me further than I've already shattered, and...I'm exhausted. My body wants to collapse, my mind begs to blow out like a candle, my power pushes me down and tells me to achieve this relief so I can use it in case I must.

"Roux, tell me." Dalis's voice cracks.

The words are on the tip of my tongue, and for a second, I hope Binx will say it so I don't have to. Mills is dead. The king spiked his heads on the gates, likely to unnerve us when we returned to rescue Silas; if we'd ever come at all.

No. How can I say that?

"Mills," I begin, licking my dry lips. I rock back and forth on my heels.

"Roux, if you don't spit it out." Her eyes are already glossed with tears.

It rips apart my last shred of sanity, but I say it. "Mills didn't make it," I blurt.

A shaken, shuddering breath leaves Dalis's throat. I squeeze my eyes shut at the sound of it. Although I can barely hear that whimper, the sound is as curdling as the dagger being removed from Celestine's chest. I wasn't there to hear that. Bren put his hands over my ears to keep me from listening as he rocked me back and forth on the kitchen floor.

This is unavoidable.

A tear rolls down Dalis's cheek, stopping at her strong jaw, and drips onto her shirt. "What?" she croaks.

"Unless you wish to know the specifics, that is all I'll give you." I swallow the thick rock in my throat. Why must the world be so cruel? Why must death occur to those that are short on time already? Mills, the kindest man in the castle, didn't deserve what the king gave him after many faithful years of service. In the end, he transitioned for the betterment of the kingdom, but he never deserved death.

A mortal shouldn't have to face death earlier than their life is ready to expend by itself. But people die. Whether mortal or immortal, I can't stop it. I have forced myself to come to terms with it.

"What...what do you mean he didn't make it?" Dalis sniffles. "Is he—he's not there? What?"

"He's dead, Dalis," I say softly. "The king killed him."

It no longer feels right to stare out at the ocean. Instead, I cast my eyes down to the ground and the lip of the cliff sides breaking off into the ocean. I wonder if I should jump off and avoid this conversation, and the next.

"How do you know?" Dalis's words come fast. They're hardly discernable behind her tears. "Did you hear a rumor? Did...did you see it?"

I nod.

"I asked you a question."

"I saw it."

Then, silence. She's debating in her mind whether she wants to know how it happened, whether he suffered or not, and I'm preparing myself to hand over that information when she asks for it. I want to blurt it, scream it to the world so someone else shares this secret, but Dalis doesn't speak.

She swallows, her throat bobbing, and a single shuddered breath is left behind. Dragging a dark hand down her face, she catches tears and wipes them away in one smooth motion. It never should've been her, or him. Neither of them should've come face to face with this. That first time I asked her for help was the downfall of both.

Dalis wasn't supposed to be involved. She wasn't supposed to become a rebel and her father wasn't supposed to stay in the castle. It makes me sick to think of the torture he might've gone through, and I highly doubt the king gave him the relief of a swift death. It never happens that way, not with him. Mills was likely a test dummy for a new soldier he converted.

I don't ask Binx to take over when my knees become weak.

"Tell me how," Dalis demands.

The moment I was hoping to avoid is finally here. I recall what I saw; the heads spiked on the gates. Mills, Mani, Piper, Darius. Those names are a chant in my mind. In my sleep, I see them. Just their heads, not their bodies, and always unmoving. In one indirect way or another, I did this. I'm responsible for their deaths.

"Along with Mani, Darius, and Piper, Mills was beheaded," I inform. My voice is steadier than I'd like it to be. More comfortable expressing death. "Then, to prove he had nothing to lose, the king spiked their heads on the gates."

The air is stale around us. As if the world is holding its breath and waiting for Dalis to erupt, the wind stops. I look down at Celestine's grave, to the pale, flat slab of dirt, and remember her smiling face. That memory is the only thing capable of getting me through the next few minutes.

"I'm sorry," I mumble. "I'm sorry for allowing this to happen to Mills, and I'm sorry for involving you."

Dalis breaks. Crumbles is a better word for it. She drops to her knees on the cliff sides, burying her face in her hands, and sobs. I don't know what to do, what to say, so I stand there and keep my eyes cast down. Now I'm really considering jumping off these cliffs so I can swim in the ocean and forget, just for a little while, how my life has turned.

Mills, Mani, Piper, Darius.

Tears well in my eyes and I clench down as hard as I can to avoid crying. I've done plenty of that over Celestine's death, and although it has been a while since she passed, I don't want to cry anymore. It's exhausting and draining, and we don't have time for that. What I wish for it the ability to go back and play games with Alaric's sanity. Anything to avoid standing here.

He hasn't moved from his spot at my side during the entire conversation, but Binx steps around me and kneels at Dalis's side. He presses his hand onto her back and rubs back and forth, whispering something that makes Dalis shake her head.

There's nothing else I can do here. I gave her news; I broke Dalis's heart and shattered pieces of my own. I stand at their side, unmoving and empty until Binx looks up at me and jerks his chin back to the village, silently telling me to get the sleep I longed for since arriving at Arego merely an hour ago.

I don't object. I offer Dalis one final apology and she cries into her hands, umber skin damp with tears. The walk back to the village takes longer than I'd like and her gasping sobs don't leave my mind until I'm within the streets again and the wind can't carry the shrill sound to remind me what I've done.

Renit is waiting for me when I arrive back at our residence. He notices the tears on my face and offers a smile of sympathy, but what I don't expect is Silas sitting on the floor, going through the ancient book we stole from Luna. He looks over his shoulder at me and waves me over, pointing at a spell he remembers from a lesson as a child.

I absorb that information, but I don't really hear it. I sit down in front of him and take his hands in my own. Immediately, Silas recognizes my tears and allows me to wipe them off with the best smile I can plaster on my face.

I might as well get this over with. "Silas, there's something I need to tell you."