I stood beside the bed for a moment, wondering at the luxuries we were now afforded, and realizing that they changed nothing. We still needed each other. And we still had secrets.

I lifted the heavy covers and slipped beneath them, letting them fall around us once more, blanketing us, shielding us from all else. Instinctively, my feet reached across the downy mattress we lay upon, seeking out my sister’s warmth, just like I used to do before I was a queen. . . . and she a princess. When we were just sisters, sharing a bed.

I’d planned to wake her slowly, before asking for her help. But the instant my skin touched hers, I felt her body spasm—her eyes shot wide, and her expression glazed as she gaped at me, startled. “What are you doing here?” I felt her shift farther from me, distancing herself. “Can’t you just leave us alone?”

I frowned. “It’s me, Angelina. Charlie.” My skin flushed, and I could both feel and see the glow coming off it now. A glow that had all but vanished over the past several weeks. Now intensified by Angelina’s presence.

Her blue eyes squeezed tightly shut as she blinked at me. When they reopened her gaze was clear again, focused. “What—what are you doing here, Charlie?” she asked again, sounding confused and small, unaware of her initial reaction to me.

I relaxed. She hadn’t realized it was me, I told myself. I’d merely surprised her. “I need you,” I practically begged, afraid I already knew what her response would be. “Please. Just try again.”

In the light shimmering from my skin, I could see the tears in her lucent blue eyes. If only it would stay that way. If only it wasn’t losing its strength. Then I wouldn’t be here right now, begging my little sister for help.

The glow, I believed, was what held Sabara at bay . . . and only Angelina could bring it back.

“I already tried, Charlie. It didn’t work,” she whimpered, and I was reminded that she was not even five years old yet. Too young to be burdened with my problems.

I reached across the sheets and gripped her hands tightly in mine. This time she didn’t flinch away, and I squeezed her small fists, relishing the feel of the potential I knew she held. The power she wielded, not yet fully realized. I didn’t want her to know how badly I needed this. I couldn’t tell her why it was so important, although I feared she already knew. “Please, Angelina. For me.” Parshon slipped from my mouth, feeling strange on my tongue, but I was desperate.

She sighed, her narrow shoulders sagging with the weight of my request. I could see her reluctance, but she pulled her hands from mine and gingerly laid a small palm on each one of my cheeks. She inhaled and closed her eyes, a look of peace settling over her beautiful little face. I shouldn’t be asking this of her, I reprimanded myself.

Healing, that was what I needed from Angelina. I needed her to fix me. I needed her to make everything right. To make me better.

Heat surged from Angelina’s fingertips. I jerked back, recoiling from the very thing I sought. But she held on, staying with me, her touch insistent and warm and healing all at the same time.

My arms locked stiffly at my sides, as a ripple of revulsion flared within me. I struggled with myself not to strike my sister’s hands away from me, not to break the bond she’d forged between us. Shrieks unleashed within me—not my own—like wails carried on a ferocious, icy wind. They scratched at my insides, panicking as they tried to find their way out. But I bit my tongue, tasting blood. My blood. From my body.

I struggled to hang on. I refused to give up.

The entire room lit up. I could see Angelina clearly; she burned as brightly as I now did. At least on the outside. From within, my vision blurred and I clenched my jaw as blackness swelled, growing like a tidal wave, threatening to drown me.

And then Angelina’s hands left me and I gasped, falling in a boneless heap on the feathery pillows of her bed. I was sweating from head to toe, and my chest ached. This time when Angelina’s fingertips grazed my face, skimming my jaw, there was no magic in her touch. Just the tender concern of a sister.

“How do you feel?” she asked softly, her voice brimming with anticipation. Hope.

I didn’t have to glance at my skin to see the flickering glow I’d been so desperate for. Still, I sighed. “Tired, Angelina. I’m so tired.”

She just lay down beside me, settling her head against my chest as if she were listening to the unsteady thrum of my heart, assuring herself I was still alive. That I was still me.

I wished I knew the answer to that question myself.

Her arm fell across my stomach, such a familiar gesture, and I knew she was sleepy, that I’d probably worn her out. Guilt suffocated me at having awakened her.

I listened to the sounds of Angelina’s breathing, while at the same time I searched within myself, hoping and praying I was all alone now, that Sabara was gone. Once and for all.

I don’t know how long we stayed like that, wrapped around each other in the dancing light emanating from my skin, but I was certain that Angelina, first princess of Ludania, had at last drifted off to sleep.

It surprised me, then, when I heard her voice, so young, so quiet, fill the air around us. “It didn’t work, did it?”

I squeezed my eyes shut, not wanting to hear her words. She was wrong, she had to be. But I gave her the only answer I could, the truth. “I don’t know,” I whispered back to her.

Angelina nodded. “I wish she’d leave us alone.”

Surely, from where she lay, she could hear my heart’s ache.