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Yaroslava halts, taking in the scene. Her eyes sweep over my bloody temple, my ruined clothes, my arm clutched clumsily to my side, and sympathy crumples her face.

For a beat, I almost let myself smile. Yara is here. When we're together, nothing bad ever happens to me, right? Then my smile shifts into a new sort of panic, when Tatya's prying eyes run over Yara's black outfit, confident posture, and hands balled into fists. When we're together, nothing bad ever happens to me, but what about her? What if Tatya recognizes her?

"My, my, a special girl indeed," Tatya says, arching a brow. "You have a type, Vlad. She dresses like my sister, wears makeup the way my sister did, and follows you blindly, just like Dimples. What's your name, girl?"

If Dimples is surprised to see her big sister alive, she is good at concealing it. "I'm Polina," she says flatly. I've never seen her so emotionally this guarded before. The enigmatic mask has always been my forte. "And I'm here for Vlad. Let him go."

Vlad, not Mir? She remembers. And you still came to rescue me, Fire Girl?

Tatya dismissively scoffs. "No can do, Polly. Do you know how many crimes this monster is due to pay for? You better leave, or you risk dying with him." She still holds the Soulwrecker in her palm, and beyond the tower columns, a hint of crimson begins spreading over the horizon. The dawn is near. The single hour of the month when the Soulwrecker can be shattered has arrived. Of course she scoffs. She has counted the timing perfectly.

Meeting Yara's gaze, I slowly nod at the stairs. Please, leave. The three of us form some sort of a circle, where I'm the one still on my knees. And I don't even bother to rise up. I know I look pathetic, beaten, vanquished. Good. Yara should see all the worst, she should be terrified, she should leave! If her memory is back, doesn't she remember who started the fire she burned in? Doesn't she see that a nuthouse longs for Tatya to check in? If Tatya can't recognize her, she will never stop hunting her little Dimples.

Yara doesn't understand it, or doesn't want to. Because instead of leaving, she pulls Nilam's gun from behind her back. "I wasn't asking," she says. "And I don't like it when others take what is mine, Tatya. Vlad is mine, so let him go. Please."

Alarm flashes in Tatya's eyes but then dies out as she scoffs again. She doesn't believe Yara--Polina--has the courage to pull the trigger.

I want to scream. A gun, Yara, really? Tatya is a ticking bomb: injure her, frighten her, enrage her--she crashes the Soulwrecker, and we're undone, not a breath of our existence. I realize I've never asked Nilam how it works. Will the flames eat us alive, along with our souls? Or we'll just drop dead and won't feel a thing? Or we'll feel everything, every cell of our bodies turning to ashes, with our souls shredded into hundreds of pieces, like a story ripped into a meaningless number of words?

I don't want Yaroslava's story over. Even if I have to die for it. Suddenly, this realization rouses another one. I have to die, not Yara. She has their mother's pendant and Tatya has the ring, both protecting each of the daughters. My soul is the only one at stake.

Still, there is more than one way to hurt a soul and torment a body. Fire Girl isn't afraid yet? I can change it. "Tatya, so I get to have a dying wish?"

Excitement sparks in her eyes. I've just accepted my fate, haven't I? Instantly forgetful about everything else, she turns to me. "Why not."

"Will you tell me who was next after Dimples was saved?"

Tatya thinks for a moment, her shoe tapping against the floor. "Vilta. She used a love potion to get back with the boy she'd been cheating on, so I made her rip her own heart out. Romantic, isn't it? She wanted to give her heart to that boy so desperately, and I helped her. Then, there was a boy, what was his name?.. Whatevs. He was a football player, failed his exams, and enchanted the teachers to let him stay in school so he could keep playing. He was dumb as a log, but creative. Honestly, I'm surprised he managed to chop his both legs off before bleeding to death."

"What about Nilam?" Are you scared now, Fire Girl? Are you ready to leave?

"The one who's been helping you spreading this poisonous sorcery? Oh! I told him to cut himself as many times as he used magic. Too many to live, I guess? But no worries. The pain earned him a place in Heaven. Forever."

Forever. And never to live again. At the memory of Nilam's dead body, fury swells up on my chest. I hate it. I hate magic, the city, the people who let this all happen. Nobody cared for Tatya's crimes, because nobody thought they'd be next. My best friend is dead, and I can't even avenge his death. Or maybe... I can? I won't get out of here alive anyway, will I? There is a weird comfort in knowing the exact moment of the inevitable. A hero should accept the inevitable proudly, as heroes have done from the beginning of times--yet I'm not a hero, and Vlad told so Yaroslava years ago. I've never been happy abiding by the rules, but I can have some wicked fun now and still be a villain.

Gritting my teeth, I slowly climb to my feet, stopping Yara with a glare as she makes a small motion as though wants to help me. My chin up, I take a deep breath to shield my thought from my aching body, and turn my head to meet Tatya's eyes. "The problem with a dying wish is," I begin, inimically quiet, "that it's supposed to mean something. To grant the dying person some kind of closure, peace, happily-ever-after wherever their soul goes next. And since my soul won't go anywhere, I don't need a wish, do I?"

Confused, Yara glances between Tatya and me. None of them catch the idea of what I'm trying to accomplish, and that's good. I need them both distracted. If Tatya fails to remember to command me to stay away from her, I can charge at her before she drops the orb. The tower is pretty small, so all of us, one way or another, are close enough to the parapet around the edges. I can knock Tatya off her feet--it's not even a fight--we'll both fall off the tower, and if I'm concentrated enough, I can manage to yank her wooden ring off before we reach the ground. Then, once we crash, once the Soulwrecker explodes, Tatya's soul will be annihilated along with mine. And if Yara is disoriented enough at the moment, she won't have time to stop me, she'll stay up here, safe.

Tatya won't hunt the magicians anymore, and I'll get my revenge as my dying wish. That is how villains win.

I muster a crooked smile. "But I do have a confession to make. You're right, Tatya, I poisoned your sister with my dark sorcery. I played with her emotions, manipulated her, used her. Because that's what we monsters enjoy the most."

Triumph lights up Tatya's face. This is exactly what she wished to hear: me admitting that her actions are righteous, and I deserve every ounce of her wrath.

"I designed Yaroslava into a freak so she wouldn't have anyone but me to turn to. And you know what? The silly girl believed we were meant for each other, she believed that was love." My chest tightens with anguish as Yara's face pales.

I'm doing this to her again, don't I? I'm breaking her heart. This is the only thing I'm good at, after all. I'm sorry, Fire Girl. But this is the only way I can save you.

"And I bet if she had been here right now, she would have blindly followed me into Hell once again." I force a laugh up my throat, low and cynical and cruel. "She was nothing but a toy to me. I made her say what I wanted, feel what I wanted, touch me the way I wanted." Excitement thickening in Tatya's pupils, she raises her hand up, getting ready to throw the Soulwrecker to the floor at my feet. All my muscles tense, anticipating my attack. "And when I grew bored, I tossed Yaroslava away, like a spent coin, for you to pick up and rid me of."

With the morning approaching, the wind has hushed, and nature seems to be lulled to sleep. Not a whisper around. Not a flicker of a star. In the silence fallen after my words, I hear Yara swallow hard. I don't bear to look her in the eye, yet as I glance sideways, something brushes at the back of my mind, something out of place, a wayward thought I struggle to formulate. Until I do formulate it. She doesn't look surprised. Appalled, angry, repulsed--yes, but not surprised. Does she believe me? This is what I wanted yet the expected result makes me sick of myself.

I'm sorry, Fire Girl. I think I still don't know how love works. Does anyone? But with you, even a storm is a welcoming sign. Even death. You made me feel good enough. So I don't regret a minute with you since I brought you back. I would have done it all over again, a thousand times more, even if I knew this would lead me to my final breath.

"I'm not sorry." As I say it, Tatya's smile vanishes. She thought I'd die in regret, heartbroken and defeated. And just as easily, I deprived her of the pleasure of victory. That's how we villains win. "You can obliterate my soul, I don't care." Because I love you, Fire Girl. "Because I'm a monster, and I don't feel anything."

I think of the night her eyes locked with mine at the graveyard. I expected to see a broken girl, impulsive and savage and mad. A girl who wished to take advantage of me, making me believe I deserved her love, going for money, privileges, protection... I needed to believe it. Desperately. I needed the proof that she died because she deserved it. Yet, as this time I offered her everything--and she accepted nothing. Nothing but my love.

You don't need to be a demon to do monstrous things. You don't need magic to ruin lives. Humans break each other's hearts just as easily.

And I failed to deserve her love once again if she doesn't look shocked by my words now.

Yet my dark smile doesn't waver and my back stays erect.

Tatya frowns, and then...when I think this is the perfect moment to knock her off balance while everyone is at loss, she suddenly closes her palm, hiding the Soulwrecker from my sight. "Shoot him, Polina."

My muscles go numb, losing my only opportunity.

Yara stares at her. "What?"

Giggling like a thief in a treasury, Tatya dives behind Yara's back, away from my grasp. "Kill him, Polly. Don't repeat my sister's mistake. Didn't you just hear? You're nothing but her replacement for him. Shoot him. I thought there was no worse end than getting your soul destroyed for eternity, but spending an eternity in Hell, knowing that the girl who was supposed to love you killed you? That's the worst. Kill him, Polly."

The sunrise threatens the clouds, spilling its glow across the skyline, but the final hour of the night isn't over yet. Panic tightens its leaden grip on me when I see the gun shake in Yara's hand. She is actually considering it. I convinced her to consider.

"Pull the trigger, yes, yes," Tatya continues, cooing over Yara's ear. "Freeing the earth of him is not a sin. He tricked my little sister into lies that destroyed her. He'll do the same to you."

Her expression unreadable, Yara slowly lifts her gun, and I can't tell whether it's just to distract Tatya. I can sense Yara's emotions brushing against mine, but my magic has been dulled for so long, I can't place her feelings. It's... brittle, fragile. Like fear. Is she scared for me? Or of Tatya's words and whatever truth might be behind them?

Maybe she came here not to save me at all. Maybe she came here to finish what Tatya started.

Her sister isn't wrong, all misfortunes in Yara's life started with me, with my book of spells I gifted her. Because of me, her sister lost her sense of rights and wrongs. Because of me, she was left alone the night of the fire, with nobody to help her. Because of me, she has spent almost four years in the abyss, haunted by the dark and her fears.

"Say something," Yara whispers, her shining eyes.

But I can't say anything. With a triumphant smile behind Yara's back, Tatya holds the Soulwrecker in one hand and my cufflink in the other, and shakes her head. I say one word wrong--my soul is dead; I say two words wrong-Tatya recognizes her sister, and Yara will be next.

"I don't love you, Fire Girl." I do. A million times, I do. "I've never had." I've loved you since the day I met you under an oak tree in a hospital yard and you said heroes and villains weren't that different. "And I'm not scared of death, because death is what I always bring."

I've already cheated death before, I manipulated people, I lied to them--lied to myself. I've broken all the rules and dared to wish for more. And tonight, watching the girl I love to point a gun at my chest, I'm not even scared. There must be something deeply wrong with me--because I'm not sorry for all my mistakes. Because they were genuine and they made me who I am now. They led me to my friends, to my dreams. To my Fire Girl.

"He'll kiss you," Tatya keeps hissing behind Yara, "and then he'll poison you. He'll make you feel special, and then he'll trample upon your love. He'll stop your heart, and then he'll lure you into the dark. He'll make you a criminal. A witch. A monster."

Yara's eyes shine brighter, yet not a tear falls down her cheeks. "She's not wrong, Mir," Yara says, "is she? You made me make many difficult choices. So, so, so many. And you're doing it again now. Maybe not everyone deserves a second chance. Maybe not everyone can be forgiven."

I don't want to look in her eyes, but somehow they are all I see now. Brown, like spring woods. Encrusted with speckles of sunlight. And I find myself smiling. I trust you. I'm tired of pretending to be perfect, I don't want the control if she has it. I give up and give in.

Taking a breath, Yaroslava moves her finger to the trigger. "It will hurt."

"I know." I nod. You trusted me once, and I hurt you, it's only fair that it's my turn now. I'm yours, Fire Girl. At your mercy. If you sentence me to death, I accept it, my Fire Girl. My witch. My reckoning. An angel fallen before my eyes to make my heart bleed with hope.

"See you on the other side, Mir."

A gunshot pierces the morning stillness.

It burns, the bullet burying its way through my flesh. It hurts, and then it doesn't. The moment the dark veils the light, I feel Yara's emotions brush against mine once again, the emotions I couldn't place all this time.

It's magic. Of course. Her memories were locked along with her powers; if she remembers my name, she remembers her strength. She's not a scared girl with a gun--she's a Vedma. With the power to take my pain away. Because she doesn't want me to hurt, after all.

Because I love her, and she knows it. She loves me, too.

To the other side, they say, the only thing you bring with you is what you carry in your soul. I carry no fear, no regret, but I will always carry my hope.

She LOVES me. And her love gave my life meaning.

SHE loves me. The girl with the most beautiful soul in the world.

She loves ME. But have I done enough to earn her love?

There is no pain anymore, no dawn light, no life. Death welcomes me as one of their own.

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