These Hollow Vows (These Hollow Vows 1)

“I hope someday I get to experience that.” I’m surprised by how much my feelings about being bonded have changed, but I mean it. I just want to be there with him—to be past everything else so I can. I might never have that. When I said I’d take tonight if it was all I could have, I meant it.

“It is my greatest wish.” He presses a kiss to the top of my head. “Until then . . . stay close. I’ll protect you.”

He holds me tighter, and I realize he thinks I’m worried that death will come between us. Soon he’ll understand that my secrets will tear us apart faster than the threat of a Banshee call ever could.

* * *

I don’t close my eyes again. When I’m sure Sebastian is in a deep sleep, I slip out from under his arm and climb out of bed.

I pull on my silky pajama pants and the matching top my maids packed. Everything else they sent has a skirt, and I’ll need to be able to move as freely as possible.

Every time I close my eyes, I see that ghostly woman in her tattered white dress, her hair floating around her. Even with my eyes open, I hear her. The sound of my name in her voice is a macabre song stuck in my head.

Sebastian fell asleep holding me. He wants to protect me, but I can’t allow him to stay close enough to try. A ticking clock clangs in my head right alongside the Banshee’s song.

I know what I need to do, and I have never been more terrified.

Now more than ever, it’s tempting to put Jas’s fate in Sebastian’s hands. If he could get someone to kill Mordeus, his men would be able to retrieve Jas. I want to believe he can get it done—but now I know that the Seelie cannot harm the Unseelie, and too much time has passed for me to not act.

I hate that my actions might take Sebastian’s mother from him, but I feel no remorse over what my actions will do to the queen beyond her son’s grief. She tortures and enslaves an entire race of faeries. Her curse is the root cause of the sale and murder of countless humans, all because one male broke her heart. Sebastian will grieve, and for that I am sorry, but I know what I have to do.

I unwrap the mirror from my shadows, returning it to its solid form, and take it into my hand. “Show me Jasalyn.” I need to see her. I need the reminder of why I’m betraying Sebastian. Why I’m undoubtedly heading to my own death.

I see my sister laid out on a stone floor, her head lolling to the side in sleep, her lips chapped. I grip the mirror tighter, and the image ripples like a reflection in a pond. When it clears, it shows Jas tucked into a big bed. She’s sleeping on her side, draped in fluffy blankets, her arms curled around one pillow while her head rests on another.

Which image is real? Which can I trust?

Either way, I need that book. I tuck the mirror away and slip into the shadows to head to the library. If I’m lucky, I’ll be back before Sebastian wakes, and I’ll be able to pretend I didn’t have anything to do with the book’s disappearance. If I’m unlucky, I’ll understand the Banshee’s call soon enough.

I sneak out of my room and past the sentries guarding the end of the hall. My mind goes over my plan again and again. Please don’t suspect me, Sebastian. And when you find out the truth, please forgive me.

The library doors are closed, locked, and no doubt warded, but I slip past them as shadow and into the library. Does Sebastian know I can do this? Will he realize it had to be me when he finds the book is gone and the doors still locked?

Moonlight casts a cool glow across the beautiful space. I can’t hear the pixies singing here, but if I close my eyes, I know I’ll be able to remember the sound of the library pixies at the Golden Palace and what it felt like to have Sebastian hold me in his arms and sway to the angelic melody.

I don’t close my eyes.

I don’t let myself remember.

I head straight to the book.

Before I can second-guess myself, I reach out and place my hands on the open pages, aware of Sebastian’s warning. I feel nothing. No magical jolt in my blood and no danger. Carefully, I close the book with a soft thwap. I’ll tuck it into shadow and go to Mordeus.

But the moment I lift the book off the pedestal, it shifts in my hands—squirming and twisting. I nearly drop it out of instinct alone.