“Hey,” I said softly, smiling through my tears and silently thanking Nyx for this miracle. “Are you really okay?”
He looked down at his chest. “Weird burn, but besides feeling like I’ve been run over by five elements, I think I’m fine.”
“You scared me,” I said.
“I scared myself,” he said.
“Warrior, when you pledge yourself to the service of a High Priestess, the goal is not to frighten her to death but to protect your lady from death,” Darius said as he offered Stark his hand.
Stark took it, and stood, slowly and painfully. “Well,” he said with that cocky smile I loved so much, “serving this lady might be cause for a whole new book of rules to be written.”
“You’re telling us?” Erik said.
“Yeah, not something we don’t already know,” Heath said.
“Well, hell,” I said, shaking my head at all of my boys.
“Zoeybird! Look up!” my grandma called to me. I glanced up and drew a deep, wondering breath.
The clouds had completely dissipated, leaving the sky clear to expose a brilliant crescent moon that shone so bright it burned away any lingering confusion and sadness Kalona had planted in my heart.
Sister Mary Angela joined me. She, too, was gazing up, but her face was turned to the statue of Mary, on which the moon had cast a single, beautiful beam of light.
“It isn’t finished with him or with her yet, you know,” she said softly, for my ears alone.
“I know,” I said. “But whatever happens, my Goddess will be with me.”
“As will your friends, child. As will your friends.”