I spend the rest of the day in the chamber down below weak and delirious. The candle casts dancing shadows on the ceiling above me. Like sinister manifestations of the madness overtaking me. With every hour that brings me closer to Eve, I’m dragged deeper and deeper into an unending darkness.
Oblivion.
I don’t notice I’ve moaned until the sound bounces off the walls. My fingers scrape at the stone beneath me. I barely feel the abrasions caused by the rough, grainy surface
For the hundredth time, my mind slips from this world. I’m caught in another real-like dream, replaying my life in snippets of color and sound.
“Jump!” Eve calls out.
You’ll get me killed, I reply.
“I’ll be here to make sure that doesn’t happen. Live a little, Bree.”
Squealing, I leap from the rock and into the churning white water. It pulls me under, its currents pounding into me and sweeping my body down the roaring river. Eve is there at the fringes, ready to jump in in case my willpower isn’t enough to sustain us both.
I don’t let her take over. I need to prove myself. My pride depends on it.
I push the panic back and cut through the water with furious strokes and kicks. I break the surface, gulping in air and laughing at the same time.
Not bad, Eve says.
I grin, warming under her praise.
The dream ends abruptly. A sob escapes my mouth. Being like this is torture. I can’t block or evade the thoughts assaulting my mind. I can’t stop thinking about all of the things I’ve lost, and the things I’ll lose when I’m gone.
I can’t stop thinking about Henry. About that jar of blood.
Then the worst of it starts. It begins with that pressure in my chest I know so well, only now it feels like twice the weight.
Eve, I manage. I want to tell her to go back, to leave me alone before she extinguishes me, but I can’t. The force pushing at me has doubled. I’m clinging to life by the tips of my fingers.
She sees my memories; she understands her presence is killing me. But she does nothing, says nothing. Even after everything, her lack of regard shocks me.
What do you expect me to do? Her words flash through my core, betraying the things she’s hiding from me. They sound stressed, as if she’s struggling to hold on, too.
It’s me or you, Bree.
How can you be so cruel? Anger gives me just a little bit of leverage. Barely.
I’m looking out for myself—as you’ve always looked out for yourself.
I shove back against the heaviness, but it’s futile.
Stop fighting the inevitable, she says. You’ll only make this more painful for yourself. I meant what I said. You don’t deserve this body. You haven’t done anything to earn it.
No.It’s my body. I’ve earned it simply by existing.
I won’t go down with you, she says.
Just as in my memory-dream, I feel submerged in the violent river, struggling against currents stronger than me. But I’ve triumphed before. I swam hard and fought my way to the surface.
Don’t make this harder than it already is, Eve says. Let me live and I’ll do all of the things you failed to do. I’ll avenge Henry by killing Maxwell. I’ll kill Ashin, too. I promise to do this if you’ll stop fighting me.
I gather my thoughts into a coherent message. It’s not . . . enough.
Then you will die anyway, without any last reassurances to comfort you.
Why does she want me dead so much? What have I ever done to her?
I don’t want you dead. I want to live. And I can’t live with you.
I don’t . . . want to die. The admission shatters me like glass. I don’t want to die.
Eve shoves herself up. She stumbles over to a wall and leans against it. She’s too exhausted to pace. Stop making this so difficult! What do you want me to do? Die along with you? Are you that selfish?
Another shroud of darkness falls over me. When it lifts, I’m disoriented. I don’t know how much longer I can hold on. Why can’t I do something to save myself? What good is being able to influence the world if I can’t control what’s inside me?
Unless.
Instead of pushing back against the boulder that’s Eve, I picture myself piercing through it. I imagine I’m wielding a sharp-tipped spear, and I imagine the surface of the boulder is like sand. With one powerful attack, I stab forward.
The tip and half of the spear sink through Eve’s consciousness. She screams and bends over in half. This little victory lessens the pressure on me. But it’s not enough.
What are you doing?
Saving myself from you. If only one of us will make it through this, it can’t be her.
I fill my mind with thoughts of Henry. His memory strengthens me.
This is for my brother. I will avenge him. Not her. I might not have earned the right to live, but I have more to live for than she does.
She slams a fist into a wall. It leaves a deep dent. I feel her gathering her willpower, but I’m still not prepared when she floods me with it. I’ve heard descriptions of a hurricane that hit Rakoshan once. The powerful gusts of wind. The towering waves of the ocean, destroying everything in their path.
Eve is that hurricane.
The darkness behind my eyes overshadows the candlelight and for one horrific moment, I think it’s all over.
I’m given another chance. As soon as the fog clears, I attack again.
She collapses on her knees and doubles over. An anguished howl rings out. “Why can’t you be like the others? Leave me alone!” She lets out a sob. “Stop this. Stop hurting me.”
I’m slipping back into oblivion. As long as she’s here, I won’t stop drowning, coming undone. But her mental block has fallen away and knowing what she feels makes it impossible to continue fighting back. Her despair consumes us both.
How far will I go?
Eve desires life as much as I do. Maybe more. She’ll bear the burden of my death if it means she’ll make it out of here.
She isn’t selfless. That doesn’t surprise me. But I’m not her. I’ve always known, deep down, that if I ever pitied Eve, I’d never be able to kill her.
More than empathy, I feel sadness. A deep sense of loss. She’s my sister, for better or worse. And I’ve already lost one sibling.
I can’t kill another so that I’ll live.
I’m your friend, Eve said to me the day we met. I want you to be my friend, too. We’ll always be together.
I never stopped thinking of her as my friend.
You were right, Eve. I’ve never done anything for you.
My strength is fading. I strain to be heard, because this is too important. I’m giving you the chance to live . . . for everything you’ve ever done for me. Don’t forget me.
I let go.
#
I don’t know how much time passes. It seems like forever, but it also feels like mere heartbeats. It ends eventually. The pressure is still there, but it’s not the only thing I feel. I’m enveloped by something warm and soft, cushioning my frayed edges. It keeps me afloat in the crashing waves of the storm.
Don’t play the martyr, Eve says. It’s very annoying.
This force around me, cocooning me against death—it’s her.
It’s Eve.
Even she doesn’t fully understand why she’s helping me. She’s confused, angry at me and at herself. But she feels something stronger than the anger. Fear. Not for herself.
She’s afraid for me.
Why? I don’t know what else to say.
She seems to have the same problem. At first. But she finds a way.
I want freedom more than you could ever imagine. It’s so easy to look out for myself, but when I consider what it’d be like—living with your death—I can’t go through with it. I can’t . . . I can’t do nothing.
Self-loathing permeates my cocoon. It comes from her. She thinks she’s flawed for holding onto me, but she’s wrong. It takes a lot of strength and courage to sacrifice what she wants for me, someone who has, wittingly or not, caused her a lifetime of misery.
I know she feels my gratitude, but I want to express it into words.
I don’t get the chance.
Pain overtakes me. It’s everywhere, bubbling in my blood and raking through my insides. Eve feels it too. Gasping, she curls up on the floor and draws her knees into her chest. The force shoving at me has returned. Only this time, it’s also pushing at me from the inside, and the pain makes it so much worse.
What’s happening?
I don’t know, Eve responds.
It’s not coming from her. But it’s not me either.
Even with Eve on my side, will I still die?
She flips onto her back and throws her head back, moaning. She has it much worse than I do. Her hold is weakening and pretty soon she won’t be able to even hold on to it.
Stop it, Bree. You’re killing me.
I’m not. Or maybe I am and I just don’t know it. Through the white agony engulfing me, I reach out for Eve to protect her the way she protected me. I fold myself around her like the wings of a bird, trying to shield her from whatever is assaulting us both.
It’s not working. She’s slipping away, like water trickling out of my hands. I can’t hold onto her.
Help me.
A cold streak of fear runs through me. I’ve never heard her so scared.
The thought of a lifetime without Eve suddenly frightens me. I made a mistake. I don’t want to lose her. She has been with me for so long that I can’t imagine moving on without her. If she dies I’ll lose a part of myself. I can’t let that happen.
But no matter how much I wish I could, I can’t save her.
The physical pain takes over. It feels like my body is purging itself of Eve. I groan, my throat already raw from her earlier screams. I’m fighting to stay awake. To cling to life.
Don’t die, don’t die, don’t die. I don’t know which of us is speaking anymore.
An explosion of pain and light, so intense I lose myself in it.
And then it’s over. A curtain of quiet falls over me. My body is raw, aches throbbing everywhere. But whatever Maxwell did to me is gone, and I’m steady again. In control.
Alone.
Eve?
Nothing.
I swallow a whimper. Eve. Say something. Please.
Nothing.
I can’t feel her. She’s really gone.
I’ve lost her.
I blink up at the shadows on the ceiling. Something that sounds like a gasp and a sob erupts from my mouth. I can’t breathe through the ache in my chest. It feels so lonely without her. So empty, like there’s too much room inside me and I’m lost in it.
I want to take back every wish I ever made to be alone. Every time I resented her. Every word of hostility. I wish I told her that, all these years, I’ve never stopped loving her.
It’s my fault she’s dead. It must be, and this digs deep into my heart.
“I’m sorry.” I turn over on my side and press my bruised forehead against the cool concrete. My eyes are rapidly filling with tears. I let out another sob. “Oh, Eve, I’m so sorry.”
Bree.
I freeze. That soft whisper. It must be my imagination, my desperation to fill the hole in me with her words, even if they’re not real.
“Bree.”
Shocked, I turn in the direction of the voice. I must be losing my mind. What else might explain the sight of the figure next to me, lying with its back turned to me?
I pull myself up on aching knees and crawl toward the candlelight. Pressing my back against the wall, I search the shadows until I make out the shape again.
The candlelight illuminates a leg, long and golden, sticking out of the darkness. I stiffen when I hear a groan. “Wh-who are you?”
The figure turns over. It’s a girl. A slender, naked girl. Her black hair hangs around her face. She lifts a slim hand to brush it back, and then looks up at me with unfocused dark eyes.
I let out a scream. She has my eyes. She has my face.
She looks as astonished as me. Her mouth drops open. “Bree?”
“Eve?”
Letting out a heavy sigh, she drops her head back on the floor. “You’re not dead. Thought I killed you.”
That makes two of us.
I crawl over to her side. I don’t know what to do. Whether I should touch her. Whether she’s real. What if this is all just a cruel dream?
“Can—can you give me your coat? The floor’s cold.”
Eve is shivering. I jerk off my coat and lower it over her. It doesn’t pass through her like she’s some kind of specter. She slips both arms through the sleeves and draws the coat tighter around herself. It’s long enough that it covers her to her knees.
“What happened?” I finally have the courage to ask. “H-how are you here?”
She grunts and closes her eyes again. “I don’t know. Don’t care much at the moment. Need to . . . sleep.”
Eve falls silent. Heart pounding, I return to my corner. I spend a long, long time staring at her sleeping figure.
#
From somewhere deep in my sleep, I hear humming. It’s an old tune my mother loved to hum while she worked in her garden and for a moment, I’m back there with her. Watching her flit from one flower plant to the next, her flowing dress unstained by blood.
But this humming voice is too youthful to be hers. It sounds just like mine.
When I open my eyes, my face is hovering in front of me. I jump and press my back against the wall. My heart begins to race all over again.
“That’s a shame,” Eve says, sitting back. “I was hoping for another scream.”
She looks impossibly like me. She even has the injuries I feel all over: the black-and-blue bruise on my cheekbone, the cut on my lip, the gash on my forehead. But it’s her body.
Eve’s alive and right in front of me.
“You’ll have to get used to me at some point.”
“How can you act so normal?” I ask her. “This is . . . unbelievable.”
She shrugs. The movement is small, yet so like her. “I had a few hours to get used to it while you slept. That story Maxwell told you about the twin princes must be true. He said the old witch-man cursed them to become one person, right? Maybe we became un-cursed.”
It sounds insane, but what it if it really happened? The curse began because the guilty prince didn’t want to confess to his sins. He was selfish, only looking out for his best interests. Protecting himself at the expense of his twin brother.
“Self-sacrifice,” I whisper. “That’s what breaks the Twice Born curse.”
I was willing to sacrifice myself for Eve. And after the initial clash between us, she would have done anything to save my life. Even place hers in danger.
All these years—all those Twice Born. None of them ever realized.
Tristan was more than happy to eclipse his twin, Lucan. And Celine didn’t even know she had any option besides letting hers die.
Judging by Eve’s expression, she understands, too. How close we came to losing our lives and each other, when the solution was right within our reach all along.
“What a stupid curse,” she says. “There aren’t many shadows who’d risk their lives for their twins.”
“But you did.”
It’s crazy that someone who looks exactly like me can be so different. That steel in her eyes—I know it’s not in mine.
“I came too close to making a different choice,” Eve says. “Your act of martyrdom diffused my anger. It allowed me to see past myself. If you hadn’t sacrificed yourself. . . .”
A chill travels up my spine. To think my aversion to killing did some good. I try to shake off the queasiness. “None of that matters anymore. We’re both here now.”
“Our troubles are far from over. We still need to get out of this room.”
More things to worry about. Just what we need after everything.
A corner of Eve’s mouth lifts. I get the feeling she knows my thoughts. I’m not surprised. She has spent long enough in my mind to be able to read me.
“Have some faith. I’ll get us out of here.” Her eyes harden. “I have to warn you though. I don’t plan to leave this place just yet. I’m not going anywhere until Maxwell is dead.”
“Because of Henry,” I say.
Her nod confirms it. She’s doing this for him—her one and final act as his sister.
For once, she and I are in complete agreement.