Chapter 8 Lindsay
EIGHT
LINDSAY
After we dress—me in dark leggings and a fitted black top that clings like a second skin, that I used magic to acquire, and Raiden in loose pants and an open shirt that shows the fresh claw marks I left across his chest—he insists on walking me to the Council chambers.
I let him.
Not because I need protection, but because the bond between us is still humming with new intimacy, and having his warmth at my back, his tail occasionally brushing my calf, feels like armor I actually want to wear.
I’m not sure why he hasn’t shifted fully back yet, but I assume it’s because he still believes I’m in danger. It’s sweet.
We move through the corridors in silence at first. Students scatter when they see us—eyes wide, whispers trailing like smoke. I don’t care. Let them stare and fear me; at least, now, they have an actual reason for it. I’m done hiding what I am.
Raiden’s hand settles on the small of my back as we approach the massive obsidian doors of the Council chamber. The touch is light and grounding, a silent promise: I’m here. I’ve got you. But I’ll let you lead.
I pause just outside the threshold, the runes etched into the stone pulsing faintly, as if they can sense what’s coming.
The memory hits me then—cold and unbidden, pulling me under the way the Veil used to.
I’m back there.
Kneeling on black glass that reflects no light, only depth. The air is thick, tasting of iron and old flowers. My hands are pressed flat, fingers digging in as though I could claw my way out. I can’t, I should know since I tried.
A shape unfolds in front of me—not walking or floating, just appearing. Long limbs with too many-joints, eyes like broken mirrors scattered across a face that never quite settles. It doesn’t speak with sound. It speaks with pressure, with memory, with truth forced into my blood.
Child.
The word is a hook in my sternum. Even as fear explodes behind my rib cage, I look up. The creature tilts what might be a head.
You were warm once, it says. Inside her. I felt your heart start. Small. Fast. Afraid. Then curious. Like her.
My mother’s face flickers across its fractured eyes—young, laughing, then screaming, then quiet and resigned.
She gave me you, it continues. A bridge. A door. A piece of me that could walk in sunlight. The prophecy was made real. I let her go after. She forgot the years she was here. Forgot me. But you…you carried the dark into the light. And now you bring it to me.
The glass beneath me clears.
I see her again—my mother—stepping through a fracture in our world, unafraid. The creature waiting patiently on the other side. It opens like a flower made of night, and she walks in.
Years pass in seconds.
She learns his language. She argues with him. She laughs at his questions about love, about pain, about why humans cry at beautiful things. She teaches him lullabies and fairy tales that she can recall. He teaches her how to pull shadows like thread.
When she realizes she’s pregnant, she doesn’t panic. She places her hand on her belly and whispers to me—We’re going home soon.
When I was born, the Veil shook. Not with anger, but with recognition. It held me in limbs that weren’t limbs and said:
She is the key. She is the prophecy. She is mine and not-mine. Let her walk on both sides.
It slipped her back through the fracture. She woke on my Gran’s grass with no memory, with a baby she didn’t remember carrying and raised me anyway.
And I grew up with shadows that followed me that no one else saw. Things that happened that I couldn’t explain. The way people always seemed to like me, even when I was clearly rude. It’s why being a waitress worked out so well.
The memory releases me like a hand letting go of my throat. Raiden’s palm is still warm against my back. I exhale slowly, shadows curling around my ankles like loyal hounds.
“I’m ready,” I tell him.
He leans in, lips brushing my temple.
“You were born ready,” he murmurs. “Go show them what the Veil’s daughter looks like when she’s done playing nice.”
I nod once. Then I push the doors open. They groan wide.
The Council waits inside—twelve figures seated in a semicircle of high-backed thrones, faces hidden in shadow and arrogance. Even though I know that Headmaster Veyne and Councilor Draven, Auron’s father, sit among them.
I step forward alone.
Raiden stays behind me, just outside the threshold, tails flaring once in silent warning.
The doors begin to close. I don’t look back. The shadows rise with me. And the oldest thing in the Veil walks into the room wearing my skin, my rage, and my crown.
Let them try to bind me now.
They’ll learn what happens when the key decides to turn itself.
The chamber is silent as I cross the polished marble floor, my boots echoing across the space. The Council members shift in their seats—subtle, but I see it. Feel it. The air thickens with their magic, wards flaring to life around the room like invisible chains ready to snap shut.
I stop in the center, shadows pooling at my feet like spilled midnight.
“Lindsay,” Headmaster Veyne says, his voice like dry leaves scraping stone. “You’ve returned. We were…concerned.”
I smile—coldly, without a trace of warmth.
“Concerned,” I repeat, letting the word drip like venom. “Is that what you call pushing someone through a portal to die? Concern?”
Murmurs ripple through the thrones. Veyne’s eyebrows dip as he glances at the other members.
“We did no such thing. The Veil fractures are unstable. Accidents happen.”
“Lies.” The shadows surge forward, tendrils lashing out to coil around the base of each seat—testing, teasing, ready to tighten.
“I know what you did. I know what you are. Pathetic old fools clinging to power you stole from the dark. But I’m not here to beg for mercy.
I’m at the academy to learn what the Veil did not teach me. ”
Councilor Draven leans forward. “Learn what?”
It takes every bit of restraint inside of me not to lash out at him. But revenge is a dish best served cold, so I hold myself back. I want him to look over his shoulder until I decide to act.
“The history you buried. The real reasons you sealed the fractures—not to protect anyone, but to hide your shame. The spells you hoard like misers. I’ll take classes. I’ll play your little academy game. For now.”
One of the councilors—a woman with silver hair and eyes similar to chips of ice—scoffs. “And if we refuse? If we decide you’re too dangerous to roam free?”
The shadows tighten—cracking wood in a silent warning.
“Then I’ll open fractures right here,” I say, calm as death.
“I’ll tear holes in your precious wards and release the monsters you locked away.
The ones you created with your arrogance and then abandoned to the dark.
They’re hungry, Council. Starving for the light you denied them. And they’ll start with you.”
The air goes still.
Fear—palpable, sour—fills the room. Headmaster Veyne’s face pales, but he tries to hide it behind a mask of authority.
“You wouldn’t dare. The academy would fall. Innocents would die.”
I tilt my head, letting the shadows climb higher, wrapping around their ankles now, cold and insistent.
“Do you think I care?” I whisper, and the truth of it rings in every syllable. “I’m the villain in your story now. The monster you made. And villains don’t lose sleep over collateral. They win.”
The councilor to Councilor Draven’s left shifts uneasily. “What do you want?”
I smile again—darker this time, full of teeth. “Everything.”
The shadows retreat, coiling back to my feet like satisfied predators.
“For starters,” I say, turning toward the doors, “a schedule. And a warning for each of you: Stay out of my way.”
I walk out without looking back. The doors slam shut behind me. Raiden is waiting, eyes wide with pride and a touch of awe. I take his hand.
“Let’s go learn some secrets,” I say.
And the Veil inside me purrs.