Radiant Shadows (Wicked Lovely 4)

“Your cooperation or not?”

So Rae had made her choice. When Devlin woke, she’d stayed silent. Knowing his future was a gift and a burden.

Years later, she begged him to spare Ani. She’d threatened to return to her mortal body. She’d threatened to expose herself—and him—to Sorcha.

“You are hiding something from me.” Devlin faced her in the cave. “The Hound isn’t anyone to you.”

“She is,” Rae insisted. “I ask one thing. You promised me years ago that I could have three wishes. I asked to be allowed to share your flesh; I asked to be kept safe. This is the last I will ask of you.”

“You would ask me to disobey my queen? If she were to ever know…” Devlin crouched at Rae’s feet. “Don’t ask this of me, Rae.”

Rae stretched out her hands, laying them atop his as if she could truly touch him. “She matters more than I can tell you. I need you to do this one last thing.”

“Don’t ask me to be foresworn. My honor. My vows… Don’t ask this.”

“You promised me.” Rae felt tears slip down her cheeks. As insubstantial as she was, the tears vanished into air as they slid off her face. “Please, Devlin. This is my last wish.”

“I cannot keep my vow to you and to my queen.” He stood and looked down at her. “Don’t ask me to choose.”

She hated herself for doing the very thing that his sisters had done to him, but she lifted her gaze and said, “I am asking you to choose.”

After he left, they hadn’t spoken for months. He didn’t come to her, didn’t let her possess him. In time, he’d returned, but they’d never spoken of it without discord. She hated the secrecy, hated the Eolas for creating the conflict, and hated herself for not knowing a solution.

Without him, she would be alone in Faerie, ethereal without respite, never to have physical sensation again. She’d considered the possibility. It was impractical to ignore it.

Now the future that the High Queen had tried to stop was upon them, and Rae had to help assure that it came to pass as it was meant to be.

Without violating the Eolas’ restriction.

With a fear she couldn’t repress, Rae closed her eyes and let herself drift toward Devlin. She’d never told him she could visit dreams in the mortal world. Aside from Ani’s dreams, she hadn’t done so

, but she could find Devlin anywhere. Following his threads was how she’d found Ani that first time: his emotions had cried out at the thought of killing Ani, at the choice Rae had foisted upon him. Without meaning to, Rae had gone to him, racing over some whisper-thin trail she hadn’t known existed, but had been too afraid to slip into his mind. His rejection would be only slightly less awful than his death. Either would mean losing him.

But she couldn’t sit and do nothing. She wasn’t powerless in dreams. There she had voice and strength—so she slipped into the dream he was having far away from her in the mortal world.

“Rae? What are you doing?” Devlin watched Rae walk into his dream calmly—as if nothing were amiss. “Are you mad? You can’t be here.”

Instead of being cowed by his words, she smiled reassuringly. “It’s not like I’ve never stepped into your dreams before.”

“In Faerie. Not here.” He took her hands in his. “Are you in danger?”

He studied Rae, but no signs of distress were obvious. In truth, she looked as lovely as she did in her true mortal form. Oddly, though, she was wearing the plain dress her mortal body wore. Her hair was as long as it was in reality, tightly bound in the long braid he’d woven it into.

“I’m fine.”

“What are you doing?” He didn’t let go of her hands. “What if dreamwalking here is fatal? What if being here means you return to your body?”

She paused. “I needed to see you.”

“Rae…” He took one step back and caught her gaze. “Is that it? Is your body failing? Did you feel it? Some sickness? I can go to it—”

“No. I just needed to talk to you.” She looked wistful and lost for a moment. Hesitantly, she asked, “Can I see it? My body?”

Devlin re-created the cave where she’d fallen asleep so long ago. Behind her, a glass and silver coffin appeared. It took no concentration to fashion the details with precision: he’d made it himself. Every mortal year he opened it and checked on her body, which remained in a state of stasis since she’d stepped out of it. She’d lived in Faerie for over a mortal century, and as a spectral being within Faerie, she seemed able to live without aging. Her body, without her dream self inside of it, did not age, but if she returned to her body, all of the years she’d lived would become real, and her body would age—and die.

“I look the same,” she murmured, “but the cave has changed a bit.”

“I added some stabilizing beams. It was logical.” Devlin didn’t look behind him. He visited the real thing often enough that seeing the image of her body encased in glass was unnecessary. “I think the dress is still looking fine.”