Chapter 24 #2
Her face breaks. "My family—"
"Don't," I whisper. She stops. "Don't make this about love if you used mine to hand me over." Her lips part, but no sound comes out.
Professor Thorne, still bound, looks at Seren with something colder than anger now. "Who approached you?"
She looks down. Voss answers for her. "I did."
Thorne's eyes move to Voss. "When?"
Voss's smile is thin. "Before the Eternal Flame Gathering."
My heart stops. Before the Flame chose us. Before Valerius became my partner. Before Starfire woke. Before the glasshouse. Before the kiss. Before everything.
I look at Seren. "No."
She is crying harder now. "Val—"
"No." I shake my head, backing away. "No, you were my friend before this."
Her mouth trembles. "I was."
"Were you?" Anger fills my veins.
The question destroys her face. Good. I want her to break too because I am breaking. I am breaking so badly I can't tell where grief ends and Starfire begins. The archive trembles under my feet. White-gold light leaks from the cracks in the stone.
Valerius turns toward me instantly. "Valentina."
I can't look at him. If I look at him, I will collapse. If I collapse, they win. So I keep looking at Seren. "Was any of it real?"
Her tears fall silently. "Yes."
"Don't." I scream.
"It was real." She sobs.
"Don't say that." I shake my head, tears falling down my cheeks.
"It was real, Val. I swear it was." The nickname cuts deeper than any blade.
Val. How many times has she said it like it belonged to love?
How many times did I believe her? Every memory begins to twist.
Seren laughing beside me at breakfast. Seren grabbing my hand after the Flame chose me.
Seren standing outside my room. Seren holding me while I sobbed.
Seren bleeding when the Remnant attacked.
Was that guilt? Was that performance? Was that love?
My voice breaks. "I trusted you."
Seren presses a hand to her mouth. Behind her, Voss's smile fades slightly, as if even she didn't expect that sentence to hurt this much.
"I loved you," I let out a broken whisper.
Seren sobs. The archive answers. The Starfire under the floor flares upward.
Shelves crack. Books pull against chains.
The mirrors in the vault flash with silver-gold light, each reflection showing me and Seren at different moments.
Laughing in the dining hall. Whispering in class.
Her hugging me outside my mother's office.
Her sleeping in the chair. Her shield cracking before the Remnant.
Her standing beside the Ancient Masters now.
Memory after memory. Love after betrayal.
The mirrors are cruel, or maybe they're honest.
I scream. Starfire erupts.
The wave blasts outward, white-gold and blinding. Valerius moves in front of me, not to block me, but to anchor me. His Shadowflame rises around us, wrapping my fire before it can hit Thorne, before it can hit my father, before it can destroy the archive completely but he doesn't shield Seren.
I do. Even now. Even after everything. My Starfire splits around her. It burns the shelves behind her. It melts the old law sigil beneath the Masters' feet. It throws Voss backward into a mirror hard enough to crack the glass further but Seren remains untouched.
She falls to her knees sobbing.
The realization hits me harder than the betrayal. I couldn't hurt her. Valerius feels it. His fury burns colder.
The first Master lifts both hands. The black-star sigil above the pedestal flares. "Enough." The word slams into the archive.
My Starfire buckles. Valerius's Shadowflame snaps back. The Masters move as one. Dark rings spread from their feet, swallowing the gold fire crawling across the floor. The archive groans under the pressure.
Professor Thorne fights his bind, face strained. "Valentina, do nott engage them directly!"
I can barely hear him over the roaring in my blood. Seren wipes her face and lifts one trembling hand. Her Veil bind tightens around Thorne. He gasps.
I turn on her. "Stop hurting him!"
She flinches. "I'm trying to keep him alive."
"By binding him?" I say in disbelief.
"If he fights them, they'll kill him." She says, blood leaks slowly from her nostril.
Thorne's voice is hoarse. "Do not pretend strategy is mercy."
Seren looks like he slapped her. Good. No... not good. I don't know what I want anymore. I want her to be lying. I want her to be under a spell. I want Valerius to burn everything except her and then somehow make her the girl she was yesterday but she isn't possessed.
She's crying. She's choosing.
Voss gets to her feet slowly, one side of her face bleeding from the mirror impact. "Secure the Starborne."
Valerius steps forward. The air darkens. "Touch her and I will turn every law you worship into ash."
The first Master looks at him. "Your line said that once before." Valerius's Shadowflame stills. The Master lifts one finger. A mirror in the vault flashes. A scene appears. His.
A man with Draven eyes kneeling before a woman crowned in Starfire.
Black flames around them. Bodies on a battlefield.
The man's hand locked in hers as masked figures circle them.
Then the image shifts. The Draven man screaming as chains rip him away.
The Starborne woman burning white. The battlefield splitting.
Valerius stares. His face drains of color.
The Master's voice is soft. "Devotion failed then too." The mirror cracks.
I grab Valerius's hand. "Don't listen." His fingers are ice.
The bond is full of old pain that is not his and still feels like a memory his blood remembers. The Master continues, "Shadowbound hearts are always useful. Break one, and the Starborne follows."
My blood turns cold. The queen warned us. They would try to sacrifice him. They will try to break him because they know I will follow.
Voss gestures to Seren. "Now." Seren goes pale.
"What?" I whisper. She can't look at me.
The second Master turns his mask toward her. "You were given a role, Ashwick child."
Ashwick child. Seren's shoulders shake. I hear my own breathing. "What role?"
Voss smiles again. "She was never meant to spy forever. Only until the Starborne woke."
Seren's green magic rises around her hands. Different now. Darker. Threaded with black.
Thorne's eyes widen. "Seren, don't." For the first time, fear breaks through his shock. Real fear.
"What is she doing?" I ask. No one answers.
Seren is crying so hard she can barely breathe. "Val," she whispers. "I'm sorry."
I shake my head. "No."
"Please forgive me." She sobs.
"No." I beg.
Her hands lift toward me and Valerius.
Professor Thorne snarls, fighting the bind so hard blood appears at his throat where Veil magic cuts into skin. "Seren!"
Valerius pulls me behind him. Seren's spell erupts.
Green-black light wraps around the bond between us.
Not my wrist. Not his. The space between, the invisible thread.
The spell touches it. Pain explodes through me.
Valerius roars in agony. I fall forward, clutching my chest.
He catches me with one arm while the other reaches for the spell, Shadowflame burning uselessly against it.
"What is this?" he grits out.
Seren sobs. "A severance primer."
The words destroy the room. Severance primer. A spell to prepare a bond for cutting. My vision blurs.
"You were going to cut us apart?" I whisper.
Seren shakes her head violently. "No. Not me. I only—"
"You only what?" Valerius snarls. "Held the knife steady?"
Seren cries out like he struck her. The green-black spell tightens. Valerius doubles over, still holding me. Through the bond, I feel what it is doing. Mapping us. Learning the shape of us. Finding where Starfire and Shadowflame braid together so something stronger can cut later.
The Ancient Masters watch patiently and satisfied. My anger changes. It becomes quiet. Seren's eyes meet mine. She sees it. She goes still. "Val?"
I stand. Valerius tries to stop me, but I place my hand over his. "I'm not leaving you." The words are for him.
The fire is for her. I turn toward Seren.