Chapter 11
Iwoke to silk. Not the rough-spun linen I’d grown used to. Not the threadbare blankets we’d huddled under in caves. Silk. The kind that whispered against skin like water, like wealth, like safety I hadn’t earned.
Wrong. All wrong.
Panic slammed through my chest like a fist.
Where are my children?
I lunged upright, muscles screaming in protest. The room tilted. My hand shot out, reaching for a weapon that wasn’t there, fingers closing around empty air—
“Whoa, easy—” A male voice. Close. Too close.
I twisted, body moving on pure instinct. My elbow connected with something solid. A grunt. Movement behind me.
More than one.
The mattress dipped as I scrambled backward, my spine hitting an ornate headboard carved from what looked like bone and moonlight. Three figures.
My breath came in short, sharp bursts. The room, gods, where was I? High ceilings. Tall windows.
Three men. All too close. All watching me like I was a wild creature they weren’t sure how to contain.
“Where are they?” The question tore out of me. “Where are my children?”
“Safe.” The voice was familiar now, cutting through the panic with infuriating calm. Varyth. Of course it was Varyth. He stood nearest to the windows, silver hair catching the light like he’d been carved from the moon itself. “They’re with Lira. Playing. They don’t know anything happened.”
“Happened.” I repeated the word like it might make sense if I said it. “What—”
And then it hit me.
The garden. The attack. The fire.
Oh gods, the fire.
I looked down at my hands, half-expecting to see them wreathed in those impossible black flames. But there was only skin, pale and unmarked. No burns. No blood. Nothing to suggest I’d just set four people on fire and enjoyed it.
“You collapsed.” Darian stepped forward from where he’d been leaning against the wall, sandy hair falling across his brow. “Used too much power too fast. Your body shut down to protect itself.”
“How long?” My throat felt like I’d swallowed glass.
“A few hours,” a third voice rumbled. I turned to find the male from the garden, the one with the split-dye hair and battle leathers that looked like they’d survived apocalypses.
His skin was the colour of cedar, warm and rich against the stark contrast of his midnight-blue hair.
A brutal scar carved diagonally across his face, from temple to jaw, catching the corner of his mouth and twisting it into a permanent scowl that made even his neutral expression look vaguely threatening.
Like the universe had decided to make smiling a combat manoeuvre.
His battle leathers were well-worn but masterfully crafted, deep charcoal-black, fastened with burgundy leather straps and reinforced with metal plates over his shoulders that caught the firelight.
He watched me with dark teal eyes that saw too much. “Your children have been asking for you. We told them you were resting.”
“They believed that?” I choked out a laugh. “Mireth knows better. She always knows.”
“Perhaps,” Varyth said quietly. “But for now, she’s choosing to believe it. Let her have that.”
The words should have comforted me. Instead, they made everything worse, because he was right. Mireth was six years old and already learning to pretend, to protect herself with comfortable lies.
I’d done that to her. A year of running had taught my daughter how to lie to herself.
“I need to see them.” I swung my legs over the edge of the bed, ignoring how the room swayed. “I need to—”
“You need to sit down before you fall down,” the male said, his voice a deep thunder that carried the weight of someone used to being obeyed.
“Fuck off.” I didn’t even look at him. “Who the hell are you anyway?”
“Lincatheron.” He didn’t seem offended by my hostility. If anything, something that might have been approval flickered across his brutal features. “Master of Arms. And you’re about two seconds from passing out again, so how about you stop being stubborn and—”
The door crashed open.
I flinched, my body coiling to fight or flee or whatever the fuck would keep me alive for the next five seconds.
But it wasn’t attackers.
It was two women, and they looked pissed.
“Out.” Shaelith stood in the doorway, white hair falling in waves over one shoulder, cocoa skin almost glowing with fury. “All of you. Out. Now.”
“We need to debrief—” Lincatheron tried.
“And you can do that after she’s had five minutes without a wall of masculinity suffocating her.” Shaelith made a shooing motion. “Go. Find something productive to do. Break things. Brood. Whatever it is you people do.”
Behind her, another woman appeared in the doorway. The one from the training field, Darian’s mate. Eilrys. Though she’d seemed softer then, less like she was considering multiple forms of violence. “She means it. Out.”
“We were just—” Darian started.
“Looming,” Eilrys finished. “You were looming. All of you. Like a murder of very stupid, very well-intentioned crows.”
Varyth opened his mouth.
“Don’t,” Shaelith warned.
For a heartbeat, I thought Varyth might argue. His jaw tightened, silver eyes flashing.
Then he inclined his head. “Of course.”
The three males filed out like chastised children. Darian shot Eilrys an apologetic look as he passed. She blew him a kiss that somehow managed to be both affectionate and threatening.
The silence that followed felt like oxygen after drowning.
“Sit.” Shaelith gestured to one of the plush chairs. Not a suggestion. “Before you actually do pass out and make this my problem.”
I barely made it to the chair before collapsing into it, the cushions catching me like they’d been waiting. My hands were shaking. When had they started shaking?
Eilrys moved with quiet efficiency, pouring amber-coloured liquid from a crystal decanter on the side table. She pressed the glass into my hands. “Drink. It’ll help.”
The first sip burned. The second one less so. By the third, warmth was spreading through my chest, unknotting something tight and vicious that had been coiled there since I’d woken.
“Better?” Eilrys asked, settling into the chair across from me with the kind of grace that suggested she’d been raised in courts and ballrooms.
“Define better.”
Shaelith snorted, claiming the third chair with considerably less grace. She sprawled in it like a cat claiming territory, one leg thrown over the armrest. “Fair point. You did just discover you can spontaneously combust people. That’s got to be a bit of an adjustment.”
The laugh that escaped me sounded unhinged. “I manifested fire and murdered four people. I’m not sure adjustment is the right word.”
I stared at the amber liquid swirling in my glass, watching how the light caught in it. Nothing like the flames that had poured from my hands like they’d been waiting there all along.
“They weren’t just flames, were they?” I didn’t look up. Couldn’t. “The way everyone reacted—”
“No,” Eilrys said quietly. She leaned forward, elbows on her knees, and her posture shifted. Less elegant courtier, more... someone else. Someone harder. “They weren’t.”
Shaelith made a sound that might’ve been agreement or warning. Hard to tell.
“Those flames,” Eilrys continued, her voice careful now, measured, “were shadow fire. And shadow fire doesn’t just happen, Isara. It’s not random magic.”
My fingers tightened around the glass. “Then what is it?”
“Nyxarian.” The word fell between us. “Specifically, it’s tied to their court magic. To their bloodlines. To their power.”
I looked up then. “That’s impossible. I’m not—I was human. I crossed the Veil. I’m changing, but that doesn’t mean—”
“No, it doesn’t.” Shaelith cut in, her tone sharper than broken glass.
“Which is why everyone’s losing their collective shit over it.
You shouldn’t have Nyxarian magic. You definitely shouldn’t have that much of it.
And you absolutely shouldn’t be able to wield it with zero training while barely conscious. ”
“I wasn’t—” The protest died in my throat. Because she was right. I’d been half-mad with rage and terror, and the fire had answered like it had been mine all along. “Fuck.”
“Nothing about the Veil is random.” Shaelith leaned forward, elbows on her knees. “Shadow fire is rare. Exceptionally rare. Most Nyxarians never manifest it. Those who do...” She trailed off, sharing a look with Eilrys.
“What?” I demanded. “Those who do what?”
“Become very powerful,” Eilrys finished quietly. “Or very dangerous. Usually both.”
“Fantastic.” I pressed my palms against my eyes. “So I’ve been gifted cursed fire from the realm that’s hunting me. That’s just perfect.”
“It’s not cursed.” Shaelith shook her head. “It’s yours. And Varyth wants Brynelle and me to train you to control it before you accidentally burn down his castle.”
My head snapped up. “Brynelle. Is she—”
“She’s fine.” Shaelith’s expression gentled fractionally. “Resting. Those binding ropes are nasty, they suppress magic, burn like acid. But she’s tough. She’ll be back to her usual self by tomorrow.”
Eilrys laughed. “Your wife’s definition of ‘usual’ involves colour-coding battle strategies and alphabetising weapons.”
“She’s very organised chaos,” Shaelith said with a grin that transformed her entire face. “It’s part of her charm.”
The pieces clicked together in my exhausted brain. “Wait. You and Brynelle?”
“We’re married,” Shaelith said simply.
“To each other?”
“No, to the furniture.”
I blinked. “Sorry. Brain’s not working.”
“Clearly.” But Shaelith’s smile softened her face, made her look younger. Less like she was mentally evaluating nine ways to disembowel someone. “Yes. Brynelle is my wife.”
The way she said my wife—like Brynelle was a weapon and a wonder and the best damn thing that had ever happened to her—made something crack in my chest.
Because that’s how Navaire used to talk about me. That same bone-deep certainty. That same impossible pride.
Eilrys smiled. “They’re disgustingly perfect together.”