Chapter 55 - Lucian
The storm breaks before dawn. Wind howls across the valley, snow driving sideways, erasing tracks as quickly as they’re made.
I stand on the battlements of the safehouse, cloak whipping behind me, eyes fixed on the white horizon.
It feels like Cadmus itself breathes out there, hidden, watching, waiting.
Below, the rebels stir to life. Fires are stoked, weapons checked, supplies rationed. No one speaks of the hospital. No one says Cassian’s name. But the silence carries it. Every glance toward me asks the same question: Will he face his brother, or will he break?
I give them no answer.
***
Elira joins me on the wall, her breath steaming in the cold. She leans her breaching axe against the stone. “You can’t fight ghosts forever,” she says.
“I’m not fighting a ghost.” My eyes don’t leave the horizon. “He’s flesh. Blood. They carved him, but he’s still mine.”
She studies me for a long moment, then nods. “Then don’t hesitate. When the time comes, strike fast. For him, or for yourself. But don’t linger.”
Her bluntness cuts, but it steadies me. I grip the stone, grounding myself. “I won’t.”
***
By midday, the storm eases. Scouts return with reports of Crown patrols thickening along the border. Supply routes tighten, soldiers move in disciplined columns. They’re preparing for something.
“They know we’re close,” Rourke mutters over the maps. His flask lies untouched for once. “They’re funneling us straight into their teeth.”
“They want Lucian to see him,” Vera says softly. “They’re setting the stage.”
I trace the routes on the map with my finger. Every line converges on a blank stretch of forest, no towns, no markers. Too empty. Too deliberate. “Cadmus is there,” I say. My voice carries no doubt.
Elira bares her teeth. “Then we take it.”
“Not yet,” I counter. “We bleed them first. Pick their patrols, choke their supply lines. We make them nervous. We make them rush. Then we strike when they least expect.”
The council nods, but Vera watches me longest. Her eyes hold questions I don’t dare answer aloud.
***
Night. The rebels move in small packs, slipping through snow and shadow.
We strike fast, an ambush on a supply convoy, a silent raid on an outpost. Each time, we leave their dead in the snow and vanish before the echoes fade.
Each time, I search the faces, waiting to see him.
Each time, relief and dread war inside me when I don’t.
As we burn another outpost to ash, a courier’s bag yields a single drive. We load it into the console back at the safehouse. The screen flickers, static hissing, and then,
Cassian.
But not as I remember. His face is sharper, scarred, jaw rebuilt.
Eyes colder. The scene progresses into a montage showing Cassian’s face gradually changing through modifications until Declan appears on screen.
His voice is steady, too steady. “Lucian,” he says.
“Brother. Traitor. You will kneel before Cadmus or you will die beneath him.”
My chest caves. My breath won’t come. The rebels watch in silence, horror plain on their faces. Vera steps closer, her hand brushing mine, grounding me. But the screen burns the image into me: Cassian, remade via plastic surgery and experimentation to become Declan, now their weapon.
The video ends. Silence crashes down.
Elira spits on the floor. “They’ve finished him. He’s gone.”
“No,” I snarl. My voice shakes, but the fire in me blazes higher. “He’s not gone. He’s there. And I will bring him back, or end Cadmus with him.”
***
Later, alone in the hall, I let the fury bleed out. My hands shake, fists bruised from striking the stone wall. The loop plays again, each frame carving deeper. Vera finds me there, blood on my knuckles, sweat freezing in my hair.
“They want you broken,” she whispers. “Don’t give it to them.”
I press my forehead against hers, breath ragged. “Then stay with me. Keep me whole.”
Her arms wrap around me, strong and steady. For a moment, I believe I can.
***
The safehouse feels smaller after the video. Every shadow stretches too long, every silence presses too heavy. Rebels move in hushed tones, their eyes flicking to me when they think I won’t notice. They don’t need to say it; they all saw. They all know. My brother is their enemy now.
I pace the hall, the video looping in my head. His jaw, scarred and rebuilt. His eyes, flat as glass. His voice, trained into steel. Brother. Traitor. The words sting worse than any blade.
Vera finds me there. She doesn’t ask if I’m all right. She knows the answer. Instead, she holds out Marta’s journal, opened to a page I’ve read a hundred times. Chains can bind the flesh, but not the soul.
I take it, fingers tracing the words. But I can’t believe them tonight.
***
We plan. We plan because planning is all that keeps us from unraveling. Elira slams her breaching axe into the map, marking the patrol routes. “We can bleed them for weeks, but it won’t matter. Cadmus waits. He waits. You think he doesn’t know you’re coming, Lucian? He’s waiting to cut you down.”
I meet her stare, steady. “Then let him wait. Every day we steal, every soldier we break, every convoy we burn, that’s a chain snapped. That’s a message sent.”
Rourke drinks, but his flask shakes. “You’re driving us into the pit. You think you’re leading us out, but all I see is the edge.”
Vera’s voice cuts through the tension. “Then we hold the line until the edge becomes a door. We’re not walking into their trap blind. We’re building our own path.”
Her steadiness steadies me. I nod once. “We bleed them until they bleed no more.”
***
The days that follow are a blur of strikes. Ambushes in forests, fires on supply lines, shadows moving in the night. Each time, the rebels grow sharper, harder. Each time, the Crown pulls tighter, angrier. And each time, I search for him among their ranks.
Once, I almost believe I see him, a silhouette on a ridge, tall, broad-shouldered, standing too still.
My heart lurches. I sprint toward it. The snow swallows my boots, the wind slashes my face.
But when I reach the ridge, it is empty.
Only silence, only snow. And in the silence, the loop plays again. Brother. Traitor.
***
One night, we take a patrol alive. Young, terrified, bleeding from a wound Elira gave him. I drag him into the snow, slam him against a tree. “Cadmus,” I snarl. “Where?”
He shakes his head, teeth chattering. “I…I don’t know. They don’t tell us. Only officers.”
“Then tell me what you do know.”
His eyes widen. He spits blood. “That he isn’t yours anymore.”
I strike him before I can stop myself, fist splitting his lip. He crumples, sobbing. Vera pulls me back, her hand iron on my arm. “Enough,” she says. Her eyes burn, not with anger, but with sorrow. I realize then what I looked like: not a leader, not a brother. A man unraveling.
The soldier dies in the snow. His words remain.
***
Back at the safehouse, I sit in the dark, hands still trembling. Vera sits beside me, silent, until at last, she speaks. “You can’t save him by destroying yourself.”
I look at her, hollow. “What if that’s the only way?”
She doesn’t flinch. “Then we save him together. Or we burn Cadmus together. But you don’t face this alone.”
Her hand finds mine, steady, grounding. For the first time in days, the loop falters. Not gone, not silenced, but dulled. I breathe. And the breath doesn’t break me.
***
At dawn, scouts return with new maps, new movements. Crown patrols tightening, resources shifting. Everything narrows toward one place: a forest military compound with no name, no mark, too heavily guarded to be anything but Cadmus.
The room stills as the map spreads across the table. Every rebel leans in, eyes sharp, breaths held. My chest pounds. This is it. The path I’ve dreaded and hungered for.
I rest my hand on the map, fingers digging into the ink. “Cadmus,” I say. My voice is steel. “It ends there.”
And in the silence that follows, no one doubts. Not even me.