Chapter Twenty
The sky skiffs descended in a slow spiral, glyph woven sails catching the morning sun like fractured glass.
The Wildes spread beneath them—dense and unruly, a vast sprawl of shadowed trees, tangled undergrowth, and mist-choked glens that pulsed with ancient magic.
Cassara stood near the rail, hands braced, watching as the land rose to meet them.
She didn’t flinch when the skiff jolted upon landing, didn’t spare a glance at the other first-years clustered behind her, some wide-eyed, others trying too hard to look unimpressed. Her focus was on the forest, on the place where legacy and instinct would either converge or implode.
At the far end of the hold, Auren stood watch, gaze sweeping over the first-years with quiet scrutiny. He wasn’t in training gear today but his more formal, instructor attire. His coat was unbuttoned at the collar, gloves tucked at his belt, and his posture held the same coiled composure as always.
Cassara felt her heart skip at the sight of the wind dragging through his hair, already recalling how it had felt tangled between her fingers.
They’d barely spoken since the ruins, both agreeing to maintain a careful, professional distance until after the expedition. It was easier than before. There was none of the fear or uncertainty, none of the wondering, just confidence that soon, somehow, they’d find a way to be together.
“First Year Cohort. You will have three days to track and procure a beast bond.” Auren’s voice seemed to find her even across the crowded deck, as if he were speaking directly to her despite addressing the group.
“Should you find yourself in trouble and require extraction, you will use the emergency flare included in the survival packs you were given when you boarded. You will find enough rations to sustain you, and I would advise against eating anything you might find, no matter how appealing.”
“He’s talking about you, Evie,” Sonia whispered, eliciting a chuckle from some nearby students. Evie’s face turned bright red.
"Keep talking, Sonia," Cassara said coldly. "See how funny it is when you're bonded to a moss slug."
Sonia's smirk faltered. For a moment, genuine anger flashed across her face before she masked it with indifference. "Whatever," she muttered, but her voice lacked its usual bite.
Auren's voice drew their attention back.
"....a bond is not a trophy. It's a partnership forged in mutual respect.
Force will get you killed. Arrogance will get you abandoned.
If you approach a beast with anything less than absolute certainty that you're willing to give as much as you take, don't approach at all. "
The same warning and expectations that had been repeated a hundred times since they’d first arrived.
For Cassara, everything felt different now.
Not just because of Kareth’s Edge, though the memory of the ruined island hung heavy in all their minds. It was the air here—charged, feral, thick with the possibility of fate snapping its teeth shut.
A few students shifted. Others straightened.
“If you’re lucky,” he continued, “you’ll return with more than scars.”
But when his eyes swept the group, found hers, the air in her lungs stalled. Just for a moment. Gone was the careful neutrality he'd worn for days. What remained was concern, stark and unguarded, edged with hunger he couldn't quite mask.
Be careful, his eyes seemed to say. Come back to me.
They held each other’s gaze.
No smile. No expression. Just a single nod, barely perceptible, but she felt it like a touch, like the ghost of his hands at her waist in moonlit ruins.
She nodded back, her pulse thundering beneath her skin.
The moment shattered when someone coughed nearby, and Auren's attention moved on, becoming the instructor once more. But Cassara's cheeks burned with the memory of what had passed between them.
Julian stood off to the side, glancing her way and shifting his weight like he was waiting for something—approval, attention, or maybe just the right moment to insert himself.
Cassara's stomach turned but she managed to keep her expression neutral while angling her body slightly away from him.
The memory of his hands on her, his mouth, his anger, the way he'd backed her against that wall—she wanted to hit him, to expose him to the world.
But if she reacted, if she flinched or accused or even acknowledged what had happened, he might mention the invisible force that had dragged him away and start asking questions that led back to Auren.
It was a risk Cassara was unwilling to take.
So she said nothing.
"You're really going alone?"
Cassara looked up to see Gideon standing nearby, arms crossed, watching her. She turned away, tightening the strap on her survival pack, grateful for something to distract her. "Why? Would you like to come hold my hand?"
He didn't take the bait, just looked at her for a beat too long, then said, "Don't forget your signal flare. Just in case."
She didn't answer. Her mind was still half-caught on the weight of Auren's gaze, the unspoken promise hidden there, and on Julian, hovering too close, acting like nothing had happened.
As if summoned by the tension, or perhaps unable to help himself, Julian moved to join them. "You don't have to prove anything, you know. No one would think less of you for going with a team."
Every instinct screamed at her to step back, to put distance between them. Instead, she held her ground, kept her voice even. "I would."
Julian offered a slow smile that didn't reach his eyes. "Then I'll save your place beside me on the ride back."
The casual presumption of it made her skin crawl, but she couldn't let it show. Couldn't give him any reason to think she was upset with him and risk him mentioning last night to anyone who might listen too closely.
"Don't bother," she said simply, and turned away before he could respond.
Ahead of her, the ramp hissed as it lowered and the Wildes spread out before them.
At that moment, everything else fell away. Julian. Auren. The tension coiled in her chest. None of it mattered.
This was it.
This was what she had been waiting for.
Cassara stepped off the ramp with her head high and her grip steady on Spireglass, the metallic haft of her glaive cool and certain against her palm.
Before her the forest rose like a living thing.
Moss carpeted the ground in thick, uneven swaths, broken by jagged roots that twisted like serpents frozen mid-strike.
Pale light filtered through the canopy in shifting columns, catching on mist that crept across the ground.
The trees were massive, ancient, their bark scored with patterns made by creatures larger than her imagination could fathom.
Cassara didn't wait for instructions, the second her boots met earth beyond the landing point, she moved.
Every step forward steadied something inside her that had been fracturing for weeks. This wasn't about proving herself to her father, or Julian, or the academy. This wasn't about rankings or reputations or living up to a name she'd been born into.
This was about becoming the tamer she'd always known she could be.
The forest swallowed her within minutes.
Behind her, voices faded to nothing. The landing zone disappeared behind walls of green.
She moved slowly, scanning the undergrowth, reading the signs the instructors had drilled into them—broken branches, disturbed earth, claw marks on bark.
Her ACS adjusted constantly to the shifting arcane pressure, crystals pulsing warm against her skin. Spireglass hummed in her grip.
The terrain shifted as she walked. The ground grew softer, more treacherous. Moss gave way to damp earth that squelched beneath her boots.
She stepped through a narrow thicket, pausing to adjust her grip on Spireglass. Ferns the size of blankets draped over stone outcroppings. Strange vines dangled like necklaces from the branches overhead, slick with dew and speckled with bloom-like pods.
Too late, she noticed one of them shifting.
It dropped fast, a thick, sinuous coil of green and gold wrapping around her wrist with a snap of instinct.
Cassara twisted, yanking her arm back on reflex, but it held tight. Another vine uncoiled from above, angling toward her face like a striking serpent.
Spireglass surged to life in her other hand.
She sliced upward, the blade catching the vine mid-lunge with a crackle of arcane backlash. The vine coiled around her wrist spasmed, then went limp, slithering back up into the canopy. The pulsing flowers along the vineline closed in slow, eerie unison, no longer curious, but sated.
Cassara stood still, chest rising hard with each breath.
A scratch marked her forearm. Not deep, but already tinged with a strange purple-red where the vine’s sap lingered. Her ACS flickered a warning: foreign compound detected. She activated the filtration glyph stitched into her glove, hissing as it glowed hot against her skin, burning the toxin clear.
She swallowed hard, and did her best to dismiss the fear that had curled cold in her gut for just a moment.
Then she started walking again.
Slower, this time, more aware of how the forest breathed around her.
The Wildes were beautiful, yes, but beauty here was just another way to lie.
By mid-afternoon, the trees began to whisper—a low murmur that sounded almost like her name.
Cassara's steps slowed. She told herself it was nothing, just wind through leaves, but the air hung too still for that. The sound came again, closer this time.
Her grip tightened on Spireglass.
She squared her shoulders and kept moving. The Wildes wanted to unsettle her, that was all. It was part of the challenge and she wouldn't let it get under her skin.