The Queen held out her other hand. Smiling, she murmured, “Are you ready for Truth with a capital T?”

Again, Eliana’s mouth would not work. Her lips would not form words.

“Don’t be afraid. There’s just something you need to see, if you’ll let me in.” Her gentle smile grew blinding. “Butterfly.”

And so Eliana took her outstretched hand and finally, finally understood.

Truth, like honor and courage and love, does not come in shades of gray. You either have it or you don’t—there is no in between.

Sometimes it takes a lifetime to uncover it, and sometimes it is clear and simple as a sunrise. Also like honor and courage and love, sometimes the truth can be lost, and you have to find your way back to it, crawling over fields of broken glass and dead bodies, your knees and hands bloody and raw, until you get to it and it’s even sweeter than before because of what you suffered on the way.

Eliana was filled with that grateful sweetness now, filled so full her heart could burst. She had seen and felt everything D had seen and felt in the past three years—in forever—and now she understood. She understood everything.

And she loved him all the more for it.

“You couldn’t tell me—you couldn’t tell me it was Constantine,” she whispered, voice breaking over every other word. The Queen still held both their hands, providing a connection that allowed her to see inside D’s mind, and him to see inside hers. “He was protecting you from my father…and you were protecting me from him, too. All those years, you watched over me, making sure nothing happened to me. Making sure I was always all right. And then, at the end…”

A scene like a painted picture in her mind: a circular, stone room, two men fighting, a naked woman chained to the wall. Her father plunging a knife into the other man’s back, the man falling to his knees, the woman screaming. D in one doorway and Lix and Constantine in another, watching in horror. Her father throwing another knife at D; its blade sunk deep into his chest.

Constantine, loyal and protective of his brother, broken down from years of abuse from her father, pointing a gun at him and pulling the trigger.

Her father falling slowly to the ground.

Then the Bellatorum helping a wounded D to his feet, Constantine handing him the gun so he could carry him, Eliana skidding to a stop just outside the door.

“He found out—about us—about you and I,” D said hoarsely, trembling as badly as she was, his face fraught with the weight of so many memories, so much pain and loss. “He would have killed me, he would have killed us all if Constantine—”

“I know,” she sobbed, on her knees beside him. “I know.”

She tore her hand from Jenna’s and threw her arms around D’s neck.

“But you didn’t when you said you’d die for me,” he whispered, his voice harsh. “You didn’t know and still you…you…”

“Because I love you, idiot.” She choked it out. Tears ran down her face and dripped off her chin, her entire body shaking. “It took thinking I’d lose you all over again to realize you’re all the best parts of me. I’m never as good as when I’m with you, and if I can’t be with you then I’m as good as dead anyway.”

Then his arms came around her, and they knelt there like that together in silence, rocking gently, until his lips found hers and he kissed her with all the hunger and possession and tenderness and love he’d always felt for her, all of it between them, bright and burning and so sweet it hurt.

I love you, God how I love you, how I’ll always love you, until the day I die.

Someone cleared his throat.

“Pardon me,” Leander said, freezingly polite, “but perhaps you’d like to…ahem…freshen up after your long journey. And then we can all talk more later.”

D broke away, breathing hard, and nodded. But Eliana could only stare back at her beloved warrior, unwilling to let her eyes stray from his face, even for a second. He rose to his feet and gently pulled her along with him, wrapped his arm tight around her shoulders and tucked her under his arm, and still she stared up at him, rapt.

“My colony,” D began, but the Queen interrupted him.

“They’re safe from us, Demetrius. But unfortunately, I can’t guarantee they’ll stay that way. The Expurgari know about the existence of all the confederate colonies except the one in Brazil. Which is why most of Sommerley has been moved there. They haven’t made a move against us yet, but after today and what happened at St. Peter’s…”

Her voice trailed off.

“Rome will be the first place they’ll look,” D said, his voice dark.

The Queen nodded. “And they’ll want vengeance for having been deceived for so long. You’re welcome to go to Brazil—it’s large and well hidden, and better fortified than we are here. Otherwise, I’d recommend establishing a new colony quickly, somewhere secure. And as I told Celian, you’re welcome to join the Council and the confederacy, on your own terms. The choice is yours. Either way”—she held a hand out to Leander, who grasped it, pulling her against him with a hard look to D that indicated he wasn’t fully on board with this plan—“we consider you family now. We’ll do everything in our power to help you, whatever you decide.”

Something in D’s face softened. He looked from her to the Alpha, who was protecting Jenna with his body in exactly the same way D was protecting Eliana with his. He inclined his head—a move that was both thanks and grudging admiration—and then looked down at Eliana, at her bare legs and the coat she wore over absolutely nothing.

“Nice jacket,” he murmured.

“Nice pants,” she murmured back.

He smiled. “Between the two of us we make a suit.”

She laughed weakly and hid her face in his chest.

“There’s a suite of rooms in the north wing you’re welcome to use, as long as you like,” said Leander, his voice a little less tense than before. “The viscount can show you the way.”

There was a squeak of indignation from the viscount, which she might have imagined because of the roaring in her ears, but then he had moved to the door, shirttails dangling against his bare thighs, which, as he stiffly moved, parted to reveal a pair of baby blue silk boxers. His face was livid, and Eliana knew by the look in his eyes they’d made an enemy.

And so, perhaps, had the Queen.

But D moved to follow, and she let herself be led away, wrapped in the circle of his arms.

The wedding was a simple and solemn affair, vows and rings exchanged under a canopy of pine boughs and wildflowers deep in the ancient, wild woods at Sommerley.

Eliana had insisted it be outdoors, and at night. Number two and three of her top three favorite things, she said, and D knew without asking what number one was, because she showed him every day in a million different ways.

Lix and Constantine were there, of course, along with Celian, who officiated. Jenna and Leander were the witnesses, as were a host of tiny, unseen woodland creatures, drawn in curiosity to the small clearing ringed in candles, the play of light through the trees and the sound of voices, hushed and reverent.

D repeated the words he’d said to his love before, and now she said them back, the vows of honor and loyalty, the ritual words that would bind them for life.

In truth, they were already bound beyond what any words could prove. They were bound by chains that could never be broken, the chains of love that bind stronger than the most flame-tempered steel. And as he looked into his beloved’s tear-filled eyes as she solemnly swore her oaths to him in a soft, shaking voice, D couldn’t help but feel something he’d never felt before in his life.

Blessed.

The past few months had been an extraordinary blend of happiness and hope, chaos and confusion, and life-altering changes for them all. After an initial meeting between the Bellatorum and the Council of Alphas, the Roman colony had joined the confederacy and accepted Jenna as their Queen. And what a meeting it had been! Expecting to find D and Eliana jailed or tortured—or worse—the three other members of the Bellatorum had arrived at Sommerley mere hours after D. They’d burst into the manor in much the same way he had, and they’d been brought to their knees as he had, but for a far different reason.