Rebel Witch

Gideon stands at a window of the Wentholt’s cottage, watching Rune leave on Lady. Harrow asks why Gideon didn’t leave with her. He claims that Rune would come to resent him if he chose the cowardly way out and left innocents to be slaughtered. Gideon believes that Rune is the same brave girl he fell in love with, but she’s too scared to remember herself right now. Harrow suggests that he follow her to ensure her safety because Westport Station is crawling with Cressida’s soldiers and spies as well as witch-hunting hounds searching for Rune.

Gideon changes into a suit of Bart’s to help him blend in as an aristocrat and travels to Westport Station. When a witch-hunting hound barks in Rune’s direction and begins dragging his soldier toward her, Gideon purposely runs into the soldier and gets tangled up in the dog’s leash. Rune safely departs on the train, but a witch in the station recognizes Gideon and takes him into custody, citing orders to capture him dead or alive.

Rune settles into an empty seat on the train car, which is crowded beyond capacity as people try to escape. Seeing her reflection in the train car window, she wonders who she is. She sees no similarities between herself and her adoptive grandmother or between herself and Cressida or her sisters. However, the longer Rune stares, the more she realizes that she has seen the shade of her hair, the color of her eyes, and the shape of her jaw in three other people recently. She doesn’t allow her thoughts to start down that path, though. Instead, she focuses on how she’ll soon be out of Cressida’s and the Blood Guard’s grasps for good.

The witch leads Gideon outside the station and forces him to kneel. Instead of shooting him, she draws her casting knife and presses it to his throat. However, before she can slash his throat, several gunshots ring out, and she falls dead at his side. Gideon looks up to find Rune standing behind him with a gun drawn.

Glancing out the window of the train one last time as it departs, Rune sees Gideon at gunpoint. She forces the staff to open the train door and jumps from the moving train back onto the platform before sprinting for Gideon. After she saves him from the witch, they run from other pursuers, narrowly escaping by boarding another moving train.

While in the train car, Rune mentions suddenly that she wants three children, surprising and confusing Gideon. She realized that the vision she had while they saved Meadow—of Gideon and the three children laughing—was of her children: They were the three people who shared Rune’s features, revealing that the vision she saw was of a future she and Gideon share, where they’re both happy and safe. She realized that to secure that future, she must stay. She tells him that she wants to marry him and that she’ll stay and fight to ensure their future.

On the journey back to Wentholt cottage, Rune and Gideon visit Wintersea and find it abandoned. When they hear a distant clanging, they follow it to the basement where Laila has been shackled by her own brother, to be found by the witches as punishment for letting Rune and Gideon go. Rune uses a spell to release Laila.

Rune, Gideon, and Laila travel to Wentholt to reunite with their allies. They’re surprised to discover several Blood Guards at the residence who defected from the Commander to join Gideon. While they all strategize next steps, Gideon receives a letter from Harrow with Juniper’s findings. Harrow reveals that Analise and Elowen’s bodies are hidden at the Crossroads and that Cressida plans to travel there before the new moon to strengthen the preservation spell. Gideon, Rune, and their allies rush to make the three-day journey to the Crossroads before the new moon in four days.

Before leaving, Rune searches spell books for anything that will aid her in the coming conflict. Antonio accompanies her, revealing that he was consecrated to the Ancient named “Wisdom” while he was an acolyte. He shares a story with Rune that she never heard before: Near the end of Queen Althea’s reign, loyalties began shifting to her cousin, Winoa Roseblood, who claimed that non-witches were inferior and should be subservient. Althea called on the Ancients for advice, and only Wisdom answered. Wisdom advised her to call a council to oust Winoa and her supporters and put a rest to the heresy. Althea followed the advice but was overthrown by Winoa at the council, who established the tyrannic Roseblood Dynasty. Guilty, Wisdom bound herself in human form and dedicated herself to correcting her error; only then can she join the Ancients again.

Afterward, Rune finds a resurrection spell in her grandmother’s spell books detailing that the sacrifice must be living when the spell begins and can be killed only after the spell-marks are drawn on the bodies of those the caster wishes to resurrect. However, casting a resurrection spell will corrupt a witch beyond redemption. Rune asks Antonio to wed her and Gideon after they survive the coming conflict, and he agrees.

On their last night of peace, all their allies gather at Bart and Antonio’s, where they play music and celebrate, dancing and laughing. Gideon and Rune dance together, marveling at the allies who have joined their cause.

Halfway to the Crossroads, Laila and the soldiers split off to head to the Rookery, where they plan to take control from Noah’s soldiers and remain a safe hold for Gideon and Rune to return to after. Bart and his aristocratic friends whom he’s convinced to join their cause remain at Wentholt cottage in case Harrow and Juniper return with witches for the cause. Meanwhile, Rune, Gideon, Seraphine, and Antonio carry on to the Crossroads.

Upon arriving, they find Cressida’s sisters in the water, but the protective spells around them prevent anyone from getting near. They’re unable to free them from the water before Cressida appears with an army of witches, who hold Seraphine and Antonio at gunpoint. Among them are Harrow and Juniper; Harrow admits that she betrayed them in her letter because Cressida threatened Juniper’s life. Before Cressida can reach them, Rune forces Gideon to shoot and kill her. If she’s dead before Cressida can begin the spell, she can’t resurrect her sisters.

Gideon shoots Rune, ruining Cressida’s chances of resurrecting her sisters. In her dying moments, Rune uses her blood to sketch symbols onto Gideon’s cheeks—eternalizing the spell she wrote for him while breaking his curse and enduring Cressida’s whipping in Umbria. The spell ensures that Cressida can’t touch him ever again. Gideon confesses his love for Rune just before she dies.

Cressida attempts to enact spell after spell on Gideon, to no avail. Any attempt to harm him bounces off an invisible barrier and back at Cressida, harming her instead. Even when she and her soldiers attempt to shoot him, every bullet deflects. Gideon, though devastated, is in awe of what Rune did for him. He overpowers Cressida, but before he can kill her, Seraphine stops him. Seraphine reveals that she’s Wisdom, an Ancient whom the resurrection spell can’t corrupt. She writes the resurrection symbols on Rune’s body and sacrifices Cressida’s life to restore Rune’s life.

Seraphine and Antonio burn Cressida, Elowyn, and Analise’s bodies to ensure that no one can ever bring them back. Afterward, the Ancients appear on the banks of the river and invite Seraphine to return to their realm with them. Seraphine’s parting words to Rune are that her grandmother would be proud of her.

Laila enters the Rookery, where she gives all the soldiers new orders: They’re to follow the command of Commander Gideon Sharpe. She gives them three choices: Enlist in the army and report to Gideon, quit and go home, or be hauled to prison. Rather than defy these changes, the soldiers accept them.

Rune watches as carriages line up outside Wintersea House, arriving to celebrate her becoming the new parliamentarian of their government. She represents her district in the House of Commons, for which 13 officials have been elected—six witches and seven non-witches. Since defeating Cressida, she and Gideon have married; instead of wedding rings, they wear casting scars banded around their ring fingers to symbolize their devotion to each other.