Because this, as it turned out, was her destiny. Not to be the powerful sorceress her people had been waiting for, not to be the ruthless killer the assassins needed. Her destiny was to save one person at a time, change things one tiny step after another.
It still hurt, a tinge of loss. Her life wouldn’t be grand, or dramatic, or momentous. There would be no great choices to make, no moments when everything would change. It would make a dull story if she was ever called upon to tell it.
It hurt, yes. But it was also something of a relief.
“I think Cyn will help us,” Evin said.
“So do I,” Ileni said, though she wasn’t entirely sure. And then, with more certainty: “Lis will, too.”
Evin frowned doubtfully . . . but he didn’t know Lis as well as he thought he did. And more crucially, he didn’t know that Ileni had something to hold over Lis’s head.
Ileni took a deep breath. “All right,” she said. “Let’s take it one person at a time. For now.”
Evin smiled at her brilliantly, a smile so laden with hope that she looked away. Something inside her stirred, but it was something she wasn’t quite ready for. Not yet.
Evin extended his hand to her, and her heart leaped unexpectedly. A smile spread across her face, and she bit her lip. Maybe she would be ready sooner than she thought.
She walked across the ledge toward him. His eyes brightened, and he took her hand in his.
She knew Evin thought she had chosen because of him. Because somewhere, deep down, she loved him. And maybe someday—if she did end up loving him—she would tell him the truth.
That it hadn’t been about love.
It had, in the end, been about death. About who needed it, and who was ashamed of it, and who celebrated it. About who might, someday, move past it.
She leaned against Evin and closed her eyes, shutting out the precipitous drop below them and the vast sky above. And for a while, she concentrated on the sunlight on her face and his solidness at her back, and she didn’t think about the Empire or the assassins or anything at all having to do with death.