Chapter 34 Kael
THIRTY-FOUR
KAEL
The observatory tower is still warm with the ghosts of their voices when I slip out the side door and shadow-step straight to the roof.
Not the high dome where we just bared our souls to each other.
The lower one—the flat, warded ledge nobody uses because the wind up here cuts like glass and the academy’s outer protections thin to almost nothing.
Perfect for someone who needs to feel the cold bite of reality after spilling too much truth in one night.
I don’t bother with my jacket. Let the wind tear at my shirt. Let the chill sink into my skin until it matches the ache under my ribs.
Dorian’s words are still looping in my head like a curse I can’t dispel.
“I miss my best friend.”
Five words. Five fucking words, and he cracked open a wound I thought I’d cauterized years ago.
I pace the ledge, boots scraping stone. Shadows spill from me in restless ribbons—lashing at the air, then curling back around my ankles as though they’re trying to hold me together.
They remember him, too. The way we used to sit up here when we were sixteen, backs against the dome, passing a flask of stolen fae wine and talking shit about everything and nothing.
He’d laugh—bright and careless—and I’d let myself pretend the world didn’t end at the academy walls.
That there was a future for me where I was free.
Then he told my father where I was hiding when I found the courage to try to break free. My father tightened the link in my blood another notch. And I learned what it really meant to be a demon prince’s son who he thought was mentioned in a prophecy meant to undo his entire world.
I stop at the edge, toes hanging over the drop. The quad is a dark smear far below. Wind screams past my ears. My wings itch under my skin—wanting out, wanting to fly until the ache is just distance.
Footsteps sound behind me. Heavy and steady. Raiden.
I don’t turn. “If you’re here to lecture me about mercy, save it.”
He stops a few feet away. I can smell him, pine, fur, the faint metallic edge of fox magic.
“Not lecturing,” he says. Voice low, rough from the growl he’s been holding back all night. “Just…checking. You looked like you were about to tear the tower down after Dorian opened his mouth.”
I laugh—short and bitter. “Tempting.”
He steps closer. Close enough I feel his warmth cut through the wind. “You almost did it when Lindsay first came back. You lost control in your room. Shadows everywhere. I walked in, and you nearly took my head off before you recognized me.”
The memory hits like a fist. I’d been drowning in my father’s voice—kill the threat—while Lindsay’s magic flooded the bond like wildfire.
It was after I felt Raiden claim her and strengthen the bond between them.
It made me feel feral for over twenty-four hours.
I’d been seconds from shadow-stepping to her dorm and ending it—ending her—before Raiden barged in, grabbed me by the throat, and held me down until the storm passed.
He’d growled low in my ear, “Breathe, shadow prince. She’s not the enemy.
Not yet.” Until I could hear him over the link.
“You talked me down,” I mutter. “Growled at me until I remembered who I was. Why were you even there?”
“To tell you exactly that.” His voice softens—just a fraction. “And now you’re up here looking like you’re about to throw yourself off the edge instead of throwing shadows at someone’s throat. So I’m asking. What’s the play?”
I open my eyes. Stare at the drop. “The play is I’m still linked to him.
The blood oath never broke. It weakened when I chose her—when I chose mercy—but it’s still there.
Whispering. Every time the Veil thins, it gets louder.
Telling me she’s dangerous. Telling me she’s the key to widening the tear.
If she tries to lower the barrier between worlds… ”
I trail off. The wind swallows the rest.
Raiden steps up beside me. His shoulder brushes mine.
“You think you’ll be forced to kill her,” he says. Not a question.
The words taste like ash. “I think if he tightens the leash again—if he uses the link to pull me back—I won’t have a choice. The oath is blood-deep. It overrides everything. Even the bond with her.”
“Then we break it.”
I laugh again—hollow. “You think I haven’t tried? Last time I got close, Dorian sold me out. My father dragged me back and made the link stronger. If I try again and fail…”
Raiden turns to face me fully. His eyes are gold in the starlight—steady, unyielding.
“Then we don’t fail.”
I meet his gaze. “You don’t understand. The oath isn’t just magic.
It’s him. His will in my veins. Every time I push, he pushes back harder.
And if he senses I’m trying again—if he feels me reaching for the knife—he’ll use the link to make me hurt her.
Not metaphorically. Literally. He’ll turn my shadows against her. Make me watch while I do it.”
Raiden’s growl is low, dangerous. “Then we don’t let him sense it.
We plan. Together. We get Nolan to find a blind spot in the oath.
We make sure Dorian is on board with the plan.
We get Auron to break his own cage so we have one more heart bound to her.
And we do it before your father figures out we’re coming for him. ”
I stare at him. “You’re talking about open war with a demon lord.”
“I’m talking about protecting what’s mine.” His voice drops to a rumble. “She’s mine. She’s ours. And I’ll burn every realm between here and the Veil before I let anyone—your father, the prophecy, the curse—take her from us.”
The wind howls between us.
My shadows curl toward him—cautious and curious—then wrap loosely around his wrist like a question. Raiden doesn’t flinch. Just looks down at them, then back at me.
“You’re not alone in this anymore,” he says. “But Lindsay deserves to know all of it.”
I swallow and nod. The ache in my chest isn’t just the oath tonight. It’s a fragile blooming hope.
We can do this. It might feel like the six of us against the world, but we were written in the stars. We are meant to save the realms, and if taking down the Veil will do that, I plan on helping. But first, we need to free Auron and myself from our other chains.