Chapter 20: The Light Comes Home

The second stroke of twelve rang out over the lake.

Rook's wings opened behind him.

They were huge, white-gold, and wider than the dock, and the light off them turned the whole shore to noon.

The neighbors cried out and covered their eyes.

"By the old law," Rook said, "the sentence of unmaking stands, because the price was never paid."

"You were paid!" Mom shouted from the sand.

"The price was a lie. So I take the debt in full."

He swung the knife.

The third stroke rang.

Cassian did not move.

He stood on the end of the dock with his arms at his sides, and he looked at the old man.

He wasn't afraid.

He had decided something, and I knew what it was.

He thought he had earned it.

"No," I said.

I didn't remember crossing the boards.

I only knew that my back was against Cassian's chest and my arms were out.

The knife was an inch from my face.

"Linnet, get out of the way."

"No."

"Child," said Rook. "Stand aside. Your debt ends tonight with the rest."

"My debt ended when you lied."

The fourth stroke rang.

Something moved in me.

I felt it start in the black lines under my skin.

It ran along my arms and my ribs and my throat.

They were glowing.

They had gone from black to gray, and from gray to a thin hot white.

It was the Light.

It was seven years of it.

Every day the Wane took from me, it had stored away, drop by drop.

Rook had meant to drink it at the end.

The bargain was void.

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