Chapter 27

Aurora's eyes close,her voice trailing off. Liam stares down at her. "Unbelievable. She might have led Randy right to us."

"She needs to be here," I say. "The healing has started to revert."

"Why didn't she tell me?"

"Pride? Not wanting to worry you? She's your damn sister."

Liam sighs. "That's just like her. But we don't have enough salttain for both of them."

"I can search for more out here after we bring them inside."

"No." Liam scans the broad expanse of engraved rock. "What if Randy can sense when you summon it, even within the warded areas? What if he's figured a way to weaken them? Maybe that's been his plan all along. We're going in together. We'll figure something out once we're inside."

I stare at the seamless brick barrier of the Garden walls. "How the hell do we get in?"

Liam reaches for my hand and cradles it in his, then turns it over, palm up. In the milky light, the etched symbol on my skin seems to be lit from within. He pulls away and turns his own palms over to reveal matching symbols. Trembling, I try not to show how his touch sends bright sparks fizzing through my bloodstream.

"I wasn't sure about bringing you here," Liam whispers. "But Lila insisted you belong among us—that the Garden will allow you in."

My heart pounds faster. "And if it doesn't?"

He releases my hand, brow furrowed. "We can turn around and forget the whole thing. Or we can take a chance."

I chew my lip and stare at Evan. If I chicken out, he'll be dead in a matter of hours. "No. Let"s do it. But do we just leave them there?"

Liam glances back at the two still forms, "They'll be alright for now."

Removing my sneakers, I place them beside Evan and Aurora and follow him, my bare feet absorbing the current. I'm sweaty, charged up with jittery energy and useless want, as we stop a few feet from the impassable brick. Vibration leaks from within, pulsing so hard inside my head and ribcage, it steals my breath.

"Rosalie," Liam says, eyes shiny with an emotion I can't place. This isn't Liam the Sphinx. Or the seal. Or even the Siren. This is someone new, the person behind that careful mask he wears. This Liam is scared. "If—if Lila's wrong, this may not go well. Despite everything, the Garden could still reject you. It alone decides who it will admit."

I swallow hard, my legs wobbling. "What will happen?"

"Lila's rarely wrong," he says, "but if she is, you'll burn to cinders where you stand. For all I know, it'll kill me, too. Then Evan will be left to die here alone. And Aurora…I don't know what will become of her."

I gasp, a sharp intake of air, as Liam leans in, closing the distance between us. His breath quickens, warm and sweet on my face. He places a hand behind my neck and draws me closer, my heart hammering violently in response. If I am going to die, then please let me kiss him first.

"Rosalie," he whispers, "it's the most devious part of the curse. I'm forbidden to… We can't be together. But you have no idea how much I want to be."

Hearing him admit it aloud sends a bolt of desire through me. "What…what would the Council do to you?"

Liam's gaze is fixed on mine, the heat of it burning me to my core. "I don't care," he murmurs, eyes closing. "I just want to know how this feels, at least once."

Our lips meet. The shock of it is electric, reducing me to power in its purest form. Voracious hunger rips through me. We melt into a universe of raw need, sinking to the ground with our limbs intertwined.

Until Liam wrenches free.

"Shit," he says, "I didn't mean for it to…we can't do that again. Ever. Forgive me."

I'm shaking and weak. Confused. "Forgiven," I say, choking on it.

He stares back at me, his expression bleak. "Believe me, if there was a way that didn't endanger you, I'd give my last day on earth to be with you."

I want to tell him that I don't care if he spends most of his life as a seal. The hell with the curse. We'll figure out a way to defeat it. I'm not letting love slip through my fingers again. I want to yell at him not to give up, to fight for being with me if that's what he wants. But now is not the time.

With more willpower than I knew I possessed, I stab my focus into the heart of the matter—the reason we're here in the first place.

"Let's do this," I say, my tone clipped. Though I'm petrified of what will happen if we fail—and what will become of Evan and Aurora if we're burned to cinders—I offer him my hand.

Liam takes it and, covering it with his own, places my palm against the brick of the garden wall. The surface is cool and rough. I bite my lip, willing my heart to slow.

Light rims our splayed hands and spills out in a blinding glare. Liam pushes and the bricks pull apart, opening an entrance in the once-continuous wall.

I breathe out. Yep. Still alive.

"I'll be damned," he mutters. "If I had any doubts, now I'm sure. You're truly one of us."

We gape at each other. Then Liam's face breaks into a glorious smile. I return it and, without another word, we carry Evan, then Aurora, inside and lay them on the feather-soft grass.

A steady hum rises up through my bare feet as the wall closes behind us. I stumble as the unmistakable power of the place zings up my legs and surges through me with concussive force. Within the brick walls, the air is sweet and humid, almost tropical. Breathless from exertion, I take a moment to marvel at the wonder of it all.

The interior of the walled garden is elastic, broadening to a vista that defies its appearance from the outside. Midnight Lady Skirts glow on the climbing vines that cover the walls, illuminating the Garden with shimmering light. Trees drip with lush blossoms of glowing white, lurid pink, and deep violet. Neon-bright butterflies and hummingbirds flit from bloom to bloom.

In a clearing, an ornate marble fountain burbles. Just beyond, a massive fruit tree with thick, gnarled roots towers above us, its crown of leaves swaying in the moonlight. Tiny, brilliant-hued birds perch on the waxy flowers that droop from its branches. Their fragrance is intoxicating.

Peering up through its leaves, I vow to return with the remains of Tyler's globe and bury them under this tree. His charm thrums with heat against my breastbone, but I'm not ready to part with that. Maybe here, his soul can find peace at last.

There's something familiar about the towering tree. I gaze up at the heart-shaped fruit that dangles from its branches, then pluck one. When I press the seam that runs down its center, the fruit splits open to reveal a glistening red pit in the shape of a human heart.

This is the Oak Heart Tree from Aunt Millie's stories.

I press my ear to the bark. There's a garbled vibration, distinct from the current that runs through the ground beneath me. I can almost understand it. But not quite.

My tranquility is interrupted by a spasm of choking from Evan. It's anyone's guess how much the healing from our scant supply of salttain will be amplified in here. And if it will be enough to save Evan, let alone help Aurora.

"We should do the healing under this tree," Liam says, coming up behind me. "It has meaning for him."

"Evan's been in here before?"

"No," Liam says. "Evan was born of two Landsiders…technically, an Outsider. I never admitted the Garden's existence to him; it was forbidden. But he always knew. The punishment for bringing him here now could be…" He holds his hands out, palms up, as if it's too much to put into words. "But this is his only chance."

Without another word, he heads over to where Aurora lies in a bed of tiny flowers. With a slight wave of his hand, he summons a thin vine from the dirt. It coils above us, serpentine, as if the vine is a snake and Liam its master. The plant bends and wraps its tentacles around Aurora, encasing her in a silky web, and hefts her limp form off the ground, cradling her like an oversized seedpod.

"What the hell?" Though it's no longer a shock to witness the strange things that happen on this island, I rub my eyes.

"Narcovine," Liam says. "A handy accessory. It'll keep her condition from deteriorating further. My abilities are intensified in here. Yours should be, too."

Mine?Does he mean my ability to call and heal with the salttain?

We carry Evan to the massive tree and set him down beside its roots. At once, he begins to cough and thrash his head against the ground.

"Maybe this isn't a good place for him," I say.

"It's the best place." Liam crouches beside Evan so his mouth is next to his ear. "Do you know your da is in there?" he asks in a soft voice.

Evan blinks and continues to thrash.

"Stop it. You're upsetting him."

"Did you know about your da and my mother, Evan?" Liam presses, ignoring me.

Evan's eyes open, his gaze skidding. His throat bobs, his lips trying to form words, but no sounds come.

"Liam, please. We didn't bring him here to interrogate him. This is cruel."

"I'm not trying to upset him. I'm trying to comfort him."

"You've got a pretty strange approach."

Evan's gaze tracks uselessly, but his breaths steady as Liam leans in closer to him.

"You always knew, didn't you, brother?" Liam whispers. "You always knew why your mother hated me. That your da loved Lila more than he loved Clarice. But I didn't ask to be born…"

Shock reverberates through me. I look from Evan to Liam, searching for the resemblance—and find it. It's there, in the curve of their lips, the gentle slant of their eyes. Evan's build is slender, taller, and more fragile. Sorrow overcomes me when I think of their connection…of their shared grief. "You and Evan are brothers."

Liam turns to look at me, his eyes a flash of steel in the moonlight. "Half-brothers—sons of the same doomed man—Charles Bailey. As Sirens, we're forbidden from loving Outsiders, but the Council looked away until Randy caught Lila and Charles in the act. Thus, our curse. The Council would be furious that we bent the rules of this place by bringing Evan here. But what more can they do to us?"

"The Council. They control everything on this island, don't they? I'm so sorry."

Liam, focused on Evan, ignores me again. "Lila put your da's soul in here so she could visit and be with him always. I brought you here to rest beside him, brother, if that is what you choose."

I reach to push the dark curls out of Liam's eyes, but he pulls back. Of course. "Seven years ago, we realized Evan was starting to sicken, just like his father had. That's why Lila and Charles were so desperate to gather as much of the salttain as they could: to heal Charles. But our father didn't live long enough for the illness to kill him—or for the salttain to save him. Instead, he was murdered by poachers just as the scales began to manifest. Lila found him, his throat cut. We concealed his murder so no one wouldn't blame us, let everyone think he fell in a bog-hole—even his wife—and brought his body here. No one has seen the weed since…until you came along."

I hug my arms around my chest. "Do you think Randy killed him?"

"We have no tangible proof. But that's how it always is with Randy. You say the Council is in charge here, but Randy has them completely under his thumb. This corrosive sickness that's killing Evan…it's not unheard of for Outsiders to grow ill—to transform. There's a corruption in the magic that consumes those who stay too long. I still haven't figured out if Randy is the reason behind it, or if it's simply the island trying to protect itself by feeding on intruders."

I shiver with revulsion. Is that what happened to Aunt Millie? I'm baffled, because as my relative, she wasn't an Outsider. But I hold my questions as Liam pauses to gaze at Evan, his bloodshot, unseeing eyes finally closed. My heart fills and breaks for them both.

Liam turns to look at me, the sharp edge back in his voice. "Maybe now you can understand why I've risked everything, even my shrinking time on land, to stop Randy Lambert."

He turns to Evan and, running his fingers through his brother's lank hair, speaks softly. "You've been begging me to bring you here since the first lesion appeared. We both knew what it was, but I refused to give up. I tried everything else to hold back the inevitable. But you always said it was a waste of time, since I couldn't even break my own curse. You thought the Garden was your only hope. And now it's too late."

I bite my lip, my heart thumping with sorrow and rage. "You never believed bringing him here would cure him, did you?"

Liam looks up. "No. But I want to give him the chance to die in peace. To lie beside our father."

"Liam," I say. "You saw what I was able to do for your sister. Let me at least try and help him to live."

Liam heaves out a long sigh. "If you insist."

He removes a stalk of salttain from his bundle, chops it, and crushes it into a thick paste with his pocketknife. "Let's hope this is enough to ease his pain. But I don't want to promise him life when his only real option is death."

"What are you saying?"

Liam's face goes still, composed as a marble sculpture with diamond-bright eyes. "I'm saying that I will finish the job if you can't. No one, not even your Aunt Millie, was able to stop this sickness."

"You—you're going to kill him?"

"He should die in his own body, not as a monstrosity."

Ashen and pale, Evan labors for breath, eyes roving, wild and unfocused. I look from him to Aurora, dangling from the Narcovine plant. "I'll do my best to heal him, so he doesn't have to die at all," I say, my tone acid. "But what if we don't have enough salttain left for your sister?"

Liam swallows hard. "Well," he says, "you know that Aurora and I can't actually die. So, if you need to choose between healing her and helping Evan, stick with him."

I stare, aghast. "Isn't it cruel to leave her like that?"

"The curse is meant to be cruel," Liam says, his voice nearly inaudible. "Aurora will recover. Eventually."

"I'm sorry," is all I can muster, yet again. I am sorry. For Aurora. For him. For us both.

Not looking at me, Liam returns to chopping the salttain. "It's the life we lead." He pauses, mid-chop, then looks up at me, silver gaze burning under a flop of damp dark hair. "When we become seals, we keep our human skins with us. But it wasn't just Aurora's skin that was damaged, it was her mind. It would have taken years to heal without your intervention. She wouldn't be dead, but I'd hardly call that living. So quit apologizing."

I hold back yet another urge to apologize and instead, watch him work, the air hanging heavy between us as he gathers a dozen waxy leaves, which curl into cuplike containers that he assures me won't burn through. At his signal, I join him in mashing the remaining store of salttain and arrange the leaf pots. Then he ignites the small pots with a little bright bloom he informs me is a fireplant, and I reach for his hand.

At first, he wrenches it back, then grabs hold of mine and grips it tightly. Together, we chant, in that ancient language I shouldn't know, but somehow do. Voices murmur around us, joining our litany until they rise to a roar.

Liam's face twists in concentration, sweat trickling from his brow. I peek through the slits of my lashes down at Evan. His eyes have snapped open and stare out at nothing.

Heat collects in my hands. The voices shriek in my ears. A spiral of white-hot pain drills up my spine, invading every inch of my body. My eyes. I can't see. Can't hear. I think I'm screaming. My head is a glass bowl that is about to shatter into a million pieces.

It's a mistake, I think. It's killing him. Killing me.

But there's no turning back as the energy we've conjured obliterates the rest of my senses. Current envelops me in a concussive gust of blistering heat, the power multiplied tenfold in this place. We've started a fire we can't put out, I think as I begin to crumple in on myself.

Maybe this is the ‘getting burned to cinders' part. Maybe Liam just had the order wrong.

My vision blurs and doubles before I'm sucked into the vortex.

* * *

I travelin darkness to an empty, pain-wracked place, my blind eyes cold stones in my skull. My skin is as unyielding as bark, my bones ice. Only a scant stream of air scrapes through my solidifying chest cavity. The vague sound of murmuring and singing birds buzzes in my ears, but I'm too focused on drawing my next breath to care.

I am inside of Evan.

His attempts to breathe are growing futile. He's losing ground. Losing his humanity. Ready to let go of life with every fiber of his being.

Go away!he sobs when he senses me. Leave me alone! Or help me to die here, beside my father. Finish it!

I shout inside his mind. Is that really what you want? Let me try to save you first.

In the blackness, bright spots flicker. A transparent figure floats up from the majestic oak tree, arms stretched out like massive branches. Charles Bailey has come to greet his son.

No, I scream silently. Hold on, Evan.

I feel tiny pricks as root hairs sprout from the soles of Evan's feet and probe deep into the ground. Let it be done! he screams inside my head.

He wants release from his pain so badly that even an existence as a tree seems like a better option. My soul swells with pity, but I'm determined to get through to him and I have seconds to do it. Once it's done, it can't be undone. At least let me try to heal you.

There's a pause as his breaths hiss weaker, the beats of his calcified heart slowing. Please, Evan! I beg.

Do it. But if you fail, you have to kill me. Or cut me down.

Okay, I say, though I have no idea if I can deliver on my promises. The network of energy ripples beneath his prone form. I draw from it like water from a well.

First, I divert power to his brittle heart and lungs to soften them. Pain sears Evan's airways as they expand, as if he's inhaling fire, and he shrieks. Merciless, I ride his nervous system, then dive into the subcutaneous skin layer. One by one, I locate and uproot each lesion, then turn them to dust, leaving behind inflamed but normal skin.

Breathe, Evan. Let the healing take hold.

He lets loose one final scream and I'm catapulted into nothingness.