I gazed up at him. “You weren’t ruthless tonight. You could’ve let Jack die twice.”

He stopped in the middle of the hall. “I wanted to prove to you that I can be selfless.” He slid off his gauntlet to press his bare hand against my face. “I can be what you need.”

Those red lights illuminated his spellbinding face. When we were alone together, I felt like I was supposed to be with him. He would understand me better than Jack ever could. Aric knew my real history, what I’d really been like. And still, he wanted me.

But was I already too far gone for Jack?

“Release the mortal, Empress,” seductive Death said. “Deveaux will help the Archer heal. She’ll continue to be his perfect partner. Let them have each other with your blessing.”

Jack had murmured to Selena in French. I’d thought that had been our thing. And, God, could I be any more petty?

“Your eyes are green,” Aric observed. “Jealousy rules you.”

I glanced away. “I can’t control it.”

“If you could, I’d demand to know how. I’ve experienced jealousy all my life. Of men whose skin doesn’t kill. Of men who can cherish a wife and start a family with her. I have never known it like I do when I think of you and Deveaux together.”

“If it’s any consolation, I pictured you kissing someone else and felt just as jealous.”

Though my words seemed to please him, he said, “But there will be no one else.”

“By some quirk of fate it’s me you can touch. It could just as easily have been Selena or even Tess.”

“You think that’s all I see in you? I told you I was raised to be a warrior scholar; my match must be one as well. Quintessence might read alongside me, but she’s no warrior. Selena is all warrior, but no scholar.” His thumb stroked my cheekbone. “I didn’t want to fall in love with you, equating it to my own doom. I resisted with everything in me but was no match for your fierce courage and keen mind.”

“Fierce? I’m the one who doesn’t want to fight anymore.”

“But when forced to, you fight to win. When I captured you, you devised a brilliant impromptu plan to destroy me and my allies.”

“I lost.”

“Three Arcana narrowly won. I admired you then. Perhaps more than admired. Still I resisted, until one night in our study.”

I found myself leaning my face into his palm. So warm. Comforting. “What happened then?”

His amber irises lightened. “You were entranced with knowledge. You’ve a greedy intellect that must be fed. It called to my own, and I conceded defeat.” He gave a humorless laugh. “Can you truly imagine Selena reading with me? Or Quintessence taking off her thumb so she could take my head?”

Sweet, good-natured Tess would’ve bawled in that conflict. The Archer would’ve chafed in Death’s study, tossing her book away, demanding to go do shit.

Maybe Aric and I were perfect together.

Wait . . . “What’s this about my intellect?” I stepped back, narrowing my eyes up at him. “I thought you found my musings ‘banal and tedious.’”

He continued on, muttering, “Only when they were about Deveaux.”

“Do it now,” Selena bit out.

Jack glanced from her to the bowie knife he heated in a fire. Earlier, as they’d ridden together, he’d told her what he’d done to his own brand, and she would not be put off.

So we’d made camp in the same church, building a fire out of another pew.

Death and I sat on the other side of the flames. Selena had refused to look at him, acting as if he didn’t exist. With a shrug, he’d taken out those chronicles again.

All night, he’d remained close to me. In our search of the Shrine, we’d found medical supplies, more food stores, fuel, weapons and ammo. A Prepper’s wet dream. But no survivors.

Afterward he’d helped me wash in the rain, rinsing the blood from my hair and checking my healing injuries.

My body had mended, but my mind raced. And my emotions were going haywire.

Jealousy and guilt warred inside me. . . .

“The pain’s even worse than the first time,” Jack warned Selena, but I knew she’d still go through with it.

She’d been like a blank-eyed zombie—until she’d learned of a way to get rid of that brand. “I don’t give a shit. I might have to wear their icon”—she’d used her injured hand to claw at it—“but I don’t ever have to see this brand again.” She tugged down her shirt for Jack, baring her ravaged skin with her typical stoicism.

“All right, then.” He withdrew the blade from the flames, then knelt before her. Again, his position looked romantic. Again, I flushed with guilt that my thoughts had gone there.

Death paused his reading. —They’ve been through tortures that we will never know and can never understand.—

Jack and Selena had already been ideal for each other. Now they’d bonded in this. Both had survived the Lovers; both would wear matching scars.

With one hand, Jack brought the red-hot blade closer. He clamped his other hand over her shoulder. She never took her dark gaze from his as he scalded her, marking her forever. Binding the two of them for life.

Under his voice, Aric said, “Look at them, Empress.”

As if I could look at anything else.

In the three months I’d been away, Jack had changed so much. His heart could change. He wasn’t twenty yet! With me out of the picture, he could love the Archer.