Chapter 7
Marigold
I TRACED THE RIM OF my coffee cup, the foam skull grinning up at me.
Just a week ago, Lord Raynoff had handed us the keys to Wickem’s defense and sent Cyrus and Elio to Europe. You’re central command, he’d said, like that was a thing that made sense. Corruption monitoring. Early warning. Hold the line. I’d nodded like I knew what that meant.
The dead moved beneath my feet in their usual low murmur, and the vibration in my bones had shifted—uneasy and waiting.
My father’s ring chilled my collarbone through my shirt, the metal refusing to warm.
Anticipation curled sharply in my gut.
Wickem was silent, but it wasn’t calm.
The hum of the wards pressed faintly beneath the café’s indie playlist and the hiss of the espresso machine. Everything here looked normal—latte foam art, warm tables, enchanted speakers, Keane seated across from me. But the dead beneath my feet were restless.
Raven proved the master didn’t need permission to strike here.
If he could reach one of us, he could reach anyone.
The academy had become something between a fortress and a waiting room—bristling with magic, locked down tight, holding its breath.
While we waited for him to try again, classes still ran, faculty still taught, and everyone was testing the edges of our command.
Wards hummed overhead like high-tension wires. Evacuation drills. Corruption sensors. My necromancy laced through Keane’s portal grid like a tripwire—altering us to disturbances before the wards couple register them.
It was working. Technically.
But technical success didn’t stop students from looking at me like I was the reason they needed protecting.
I felt it everywhere—the dining hall where conversations stopped as I passed and the corridors where eyes tracked and measured.
Raven had been my friend. Everyone knew that. And now she was corrupted, missing, and weaponized against us.
The unspoken questions hung heavily: How close were you really? Did you miss the signs? Lucas got hurt because of you. Are you compromised too?
No one asked directly. They just… watched. And obeyed. Because I was an heir, and that meant something—even when trust didn’t follow.
The eastern ward is fluctuating again, Keane said, pulling me back from my thoughts.
We sat near the floor-to-ceiling windows of the Mountain View Café. The glass was fogged at the corners from cold. Outside, snow dusted the porch. Keane’s portals shimmered faintly on the edge of the table, quietly monitoring for magical disruptions.
I took a sip of my drink.
Third time this week, he continued, tapping something into his tablet. I’ll reinforce the anchors, but we should schedule another drill.
Tomorrow morning, I said, setting down my coffee and making a note. Before breakfast. Students are more alert then.
He nodded, already calculating portal positioning for rapid evacuation routes. Wisp rested at his feet, her spectral form barely visible in the afternoon light.
This was how we worked now—me making the calls and Keane backing them without hesitation, even when no one else did. Only I felt like I was standing on borrowed ground anyway. But at least, with him, I never felt alone on it.
The rest of Wickem was a different story.
Lord Raynoff’s statement back in January had been carefully worded—corruption found, new council formed, precautions in place. It all seemed reassuring on paper, but anyone paying attention could see how scared we still were.
Students weren’t stupid. They’d heard the rumors—Elio condemning his parents in the auditorium, Alstone’s arrest, Lucas bleeding on the library floor. They’d felt the wards tighten and watched the heir structure shift without knowing who decided it or why.
The space between everything is under control and stay ready for another attack was wide enough to breed all kinds of resentment.
And every sideways glance said the same thing: We know what happened wasn’t normal. We just don’t know if we trust you to fix it.
Keane’s name had been cleared. Mine never would be—traitor’s daughter, half-witch, heir by technicality.
I lifted my coffee again, my fingers tightening around the warm ceramic.
Miss Grimley?
The voice made us both look up.
Two students stood nearby—upperclassmen I recognized from combat class.
The girl wore dark jeans and a cropped sweater, her arms crossed tightly and chin tilted in challenge like she was ready to argue just for the satisfaction of it.
The guy beside her hovered half a step back, his hoodie sleeves pushed up and fingers drumming lightly against the strap of his messenger bag—uncertain but here anyway.
Yes? I kept my voice neutral.
Some of us are wondering, the girl said, why we’re still under movement restrictions. Lord Raynoff’s statement said the corruption had been found and dealt with. Keane’s uncle was arrested. Her eyes flicked to him. The Lightfords are fugitives. So why are we locked down like prisoners?
Because the corruption wasn’t dealt with. Because Raven proved the master could strike inside Wickem. Because we didn’t know who else might be compromised.
But I couldn’t say any of that without causing panic.
Scout shifted on my shoulder, his skeletal form pressing closer to my neck. I resisted the urge to touch him for comfort.
The restrictions stay, I said simply.
But—
The master targeted Raven specifically because she was vulnerable and accessible. I met her eyes. Movement restrictions make targeting harder. They stay until we have better intelligence on his next move.
You don’t even know if there is a next move, she said, pushing the boundary of respectful challenge and testing how far she could question an heir. You’re just guessing.
True. But I wasn’t going to admit that.
The restrictions stay, I repeated, firmer this time.
The girl’s jaw tightened. She wanted to argue. I could see it in the set of her shoulders, the way her magic flickered at her fingertips. But I was an heir. She was an upperclassman who’d trained her whole life, yes, but that didn’t override bloodline authority.
She looked past me to Keane, clearly hoping the second heir—publicly cleared of treason charges just last month—would soften my decision or at least explain it better.
Keane didn’t move, didn’t speak, just sat there with that quiet, controlled presence that made it clear he was backing my call.
The silence stretched, uncomfortable and tense.
Finally, the girl turned and left, the guy following with an apologetic glance back.
I waited until they left the café before exhaling.
That’s not going to make me more popular, I muttered.
Probably not, Keane agreed. His hand found mine, and he gave it a quick squeeze of support. But it’s the right call.
I knew that. Logically, I knew the restrictions made sense.
Keane’s name had been cleared in Lord Raynoff’s statement. His uncle had been arrested, Keane’s innocence established. But a month wasn’t long enough to erase the damage of being labeled a traitor and hunted.
Students deferred to him because he was an heir, not because they trusted him.
Same problem I had. Different origins.
I didn’t defer. Didn’t hide behind Keane’s inherited authority. Didn’t explain my right to be here.
I just… held the line.
Even when it felt like standing on cracked ice.
The student would follow orders, just like everyone else.
But following orders because you had to wasn’t the same as following them because you trusted the person giving them.
THE NEXT DAY, I STOOD just beyond the royal dorm, my boots sinking slightly into frost-laced grass.
The tower’s curved stone cast a long shadow across the path, splitting the view—student dorms and dining hall to the left, the open hush of gardens and the spired silhouette of the royal dorm to the right.
Cold bit at my cheeks, pine sharp in the air as distant woodsmoke curled up from chimneys near the library wing.
The wellspring stirred faintly beneath the earth.
My necromancy reached toward it without effort now.
A pulse of recognition came back—warm, steady, and aware.
I could feel the signature of the master’s magic in the distance, like rot veined through stone, waiting.
If the corruption spread here again, I’d feel it first.
At least this part of me worked—the magic, the knowing, the one piece that made me feel useful instead of symbolic.
You’re doing it again, Keane said.
I turned. He approached across the frost-crisp lawn, his hands curled around two steaming mugs.
Doing what?
Listing all the reasons you don’t belong here, he said simply, passing me one mug. His fingers brushed mine, warm and steady. For a second I just held on to that contact like it meant something.
It did.
I looked at him. Hair slightly mussed from wind, blue eyes unreadable in the fading light, scar at his jaw catching just enough of the sunset to burn gold. He was beautiful in that quiet, unshakable way—always had been.
I’m not sure I’m cut out for this, I said, twisting my ring on its cord.
Maybe, maybe not, he said. But you’re still doing it. Every day. Even when it costs you.
I didn’t answer, just leaned into him, my shoulder against his chest. He let me as one arm came around my waist.
The students trust me more with you here, I said quietly. You make me credible.
No, he said into my hair. You make me human.
My throat tightened. I missed Cyrus’s fire and Elio’s sharpness. I missed the way the four of us had felt like a team—tenuous, yes, but real. Now it felt like I was playing their parts on top of my own.
Keane turned his head and pressed a kiss to my temple, light and sure.
You’re not disposable, he said softly. Not to me. Not to them either. They just don’t know how to show it yet.
I looked up at him. Promise?
He brushed his knuckles down my cheek. Always.