24. Chapter Twenty Four
Chapter Twenty Four
Evandra
“There are moments when magic binds without a word. Not through spells or oaths, but through shared breath, through closeness—through touch. The Rift listens most closely when hearts are open and defenses are down.” — The Magic of Edralis, Vol. III
I awoke sprawled across the bed, sunlight pouring through the velvet curtains and warming the plush fabric beneath me.
My hand instinctively reached for the other side of the bed, but Drake was nowhere to be found.
I sat up, rubbing the remnants of sleep from my eyes, and winced slightly at the dull soreness in my thighs and hips—a testament to last night’s…
activities. A wide smile stretched across my face as memories of his hands, his mouth…
The scent of fresh flowers drifted toward me.
I turned to see a bouquet resting on the vanity across the room, lit by the morning sun spilling in from the window.
The same Sunfire Lilies from our date—fiery orange and golden blooms so vivid they looked lit from within.
Beside them sat a folded piece of parchment.
I swung my legs over the side of the bed, my bare feet sinking into the thick rug as I padded to the vanity.
Lifting the bouquet, I inhaled the spicy-sweet scent.
They felt wild yet elegant—just like him.
I set them gently down and opened the note.
His handwriting was unmistakable: legible but absolutely not tidy.
Eva-
I have a strategy meeting this morning. You were sleeping too peacefully to wake. I
will see you this afternoon for training.
P.S. I’ll be thinking about how you taste the whole time.
Yours,
Drake
My cheeks flamed as the heat rushed to my face. Gods, that man. I traced the edge of the note with my fingertips, grinning like a fool. How was he both utterly indecent and genuinely thoughtful in the same breath?
A knock startled me, and moments later, Rae and Ren entered with their usual quiet efficiency.
I’d finally learned to tell them apart: Ren wore her hair cropped stylishly short, while Rae’s long stick straight hair framed her face like a painting.
Rae carried a breakfast tray heavy with tea, fruit, and pastries.
Ren swept past me and into the adjoining bath without a word—already running the water.
“Good morning!” I greeted them a bit too cheerfully.
“Good morning, Lady,” Ren replied, bowing slightly, though the grin she flashed me was anything but formal. She glanced at Rae, and the glance they exchanged said everything: they knew.
“So…” Ren began with mock innocence, “how was your date?” Rae stifled a giggle behind her hand.
I groaned, though I couldn’t stop the ridiculous smile spreading across my face. “It was… incredible,” I admitted, hoping that would be enough. It wasn’t.
Rae leaned in, eyes bright with anticipation. “Lady Evandra, you must give us more than that!”
“Well…” I hesitated, then laughed and threw my hands over my face. “You were right. About the dress. And the… size.” They squealed. Actually squealed. Again.
“Was he gentle?” Ren asked, softer now, her eyes sincere.
Rae grinned wickedly. “How big?”
“Oh, Gods!” I said through laughter, my face in my hands.
Rae nudged me with her shoulder. Her playful tone melted into something softer.
“Drake is a good man, Lady. I’m glad he’s treating you well.”
“He is,” I said softly, glancing at the flowers on the vanity. “He really is.”
The twins resumed their routine: Rae fetched a vase and placed the lilies with great care while Ren disappeared into the bathroom to finish preparing the bath.
They left with knowing smiles and strict instructions to enjoy my breakfast before it went cold.
I sank into the warm, rose-scented water, letting the steam loosen the knots in my body and the last of sleep from my mind.
My fingers trailed lazy patterns over the surface, but my thoughts moved fast.
I thought about who I’d been just mere weeks ago—a barmaid with no legacy, no plan, no real future. Now I was here. In this extraordinary city, and surrounded by people who believed I could be something more.
The idea of training no longer scared me.
I was excited. The Rift, the visions… they weren’t just strange or dangerous anymore.
They were mine. And I wanted to understand them.
I wanted to earn my place—not just as the Uprising’s “greatest asset,” but as someone who mattered for more than what she could do.
Someone who belonged.
The archives did not look like any library I’d ever seen.
I had imagined shelves, perhaps a few old tomes, maybe a stack of parchment scrolls tied with twine. But this… this was something else entirely.
The cavern stretched wider than Riftreach’s great hall, its ceiling arched high overhead like the ribcage of some buried beast. Riftlight glowed faintly at the seams of the stone, veins of silver-blue running through the walls so that the air itself seemed alive, pulsing like a heartbeat.
And the shelves—Gods, the shelves. They rose floor to ceiling, carved directly into the cavern walls.
Ladders leaned against them at impossible heights, and perched walkways bridged shelves across the open space like spiderwebs of stone and wood.
Books jostled for space, their spines cracked and faded; scrolls stuck out of pigeonholes like reeds.
And scattered between them were artifacts: a mask carved of bone, a dagger whose blade shimmered like water, a set of beads that pulsed faintly red as if remembering a heartbeat.
I stopped in the doorway, overwhelmed. “This is…”
“Sacred,” Ness interrupted, bustling past me with an armful of parchment that looked one step from collapsing. They dumped it onto a side table and straightened their round spectacles. “Yes, yes, I know. Do close your mouth, Lady Evandra. The moisture can deteriorate the parchment.”
I shut it quickly, cheeks warming.
Ness gestured impatiently for me to follow. “Now that you are sufficiently settled, we begin. Instruction, study, comprehension. You will attend me here every morning before your physical training in the afternoon.”
Their voice carried the sharp precision of a commander and the overlong cadence of a scholar who lived half inside their own mind. I trailed after them, weaving between long stone tables piled with maps, open books, and artifacts half-wrapped in cloth.
Ness stopped at one of the central tables, swept a space clear with alarming efficiency, and pulled a leather-bound tome from a nearby stack. Its cracked cover looked older than I was, and the air around it almost hummed.
“ An Introduction to the Rift and Magical Beasts, ” Ness announced with a flourish, sliding it toward me. “Anonymous author, First Cycle. The foundation text for all Riftborn studies. You will begin here.”
I froze. Recognition jolted through me. My fingers brushed the cover reverently. “I’ve read this one already.”
Ness blinked, thrown off their script. “You… what?”
“My father gave me a copy,” I explained quickly. “For my birthday this year, actually. It was my mothers.”
For a moment, Ness simply stared at me, spectacles glinting in the Riftlight. Then they exhaled through their nose, muttering something that sounded suspiciously like, “A whole lesson plan out the window.”
“You should have told me,” they said at last, voice clipped.
“I didn’t know it mattered.”
“It matters,” Ness replied, their tone softening almost imperceptibly. “He prepared you, then. More than most.” Their eyes flicked to the book in my hands, then to my face. “And you understood it?”
“As much as I could,” I admitted.
Ness gave a sharp nod, already scribbling notes in the margin of a parchment with furious precision.
“Very well. We shall accelerate. No sense in plodding through material you already know. But you will re-read it regardless, cover to cover. Context changes comprehension. What you skimmed before understanding the Rift existed may strike you differently now.”
I nodded, trying to hide the swell in my chest. My father had given me this book. He knew. Maybe not everything—but he had wanted me to have this, to carry it even when I didn’t understand why. Maybe my mother instructed him to.
“Then where do we start?” I asked.
Ness tapped the edge of their quill against their ledger, eyes narrowing at me as though recalibrating a complex equation.
Finally, they turned and strode toward one of the taller shelves, muttering under their breath about “rearrangements to the syllabus.” Their stubby fingers trailed over spines, pausing, then darting higher up the ladder in an agile scramble that seemed almost inhumanly precise.
When they descended, they carried a different volume—this one slimmer, its cover plain save for a faded insignia stamped in gold. They set it on the table before me with far more care than the last.
“Then we start here,” Ness said. “Records of the early ambassadors. The Riftborn who chose not only to survive the purges, but to speak for us. To plead, negotiate, and—on rare occasions—persuade.”
They flipped open the book, the pages brittle, edges darkened with age. In neat script, names and accounts marched down the columns. But my breath caught when I saw it.
Her name.
My mother’s name.
Ness’s voice gentled, though their diction remained exact. “Here—Lady Morwenna. Notorious for reckless bravery. Acclaimed for her success in saving dozens of Riftborn lives during the Great Change. Do you see?”
Their finger hovered above the passage, underlining the words without touching.
I leaned in. The letters swam. I had never seen her name in ink like this, set down as though she were legend.
“She—she’s in here?” My throat ached around the words.
“Repeatedly,” Ness said, already flipping further.
“Here she is again, negotiating with the miners of Trevain. Here, smuggling a half dozen horned children across the border disguised as monks. Here—” Ness’s eyes flicked up at me, sharp behind their spectacles.
“Lady Morwenna was no mere sympathizer. She was the spine of our cause when others bent or broke. It seems… fitting that you carry her gift.”
The swell in my chest was almost too much. “She never told me.”
“Of course not,” Ness said briskly. “To protect you. To protect all of us. It is possible your father may not even have known.”
I touched the page, careful not to smudge the fragile ink. My mother’s name. My mother’s courage. Not in lullabies or half-told stories—but here, in the rebellion’s bones.
“She was an ambassador,” I whispered, half to myself. “She saved people.”
“She chose, ” Ness corrected firmly. “When faced with fear, she chose defiance. That is the pattern you should study, Lady Evandra. Not just beasts or visions. The will behind them. The choice.”
The cavern seemed to hum around me, Riftlight glimmering like stars caught in stone.
I closed my eyes for a moment, seeing her more clearly than I ever had: not just a mother bent over garden baskets, but a woman standing before soldiers with her head high, carrying secrets that would have burned anyone else alive.
“Then I’ll learn,” I said, opening my eyes.
Ness’s lips twitched in what might have been approval. “Good. That will save me the trouble of scolding you further.”