Chapter 27 #2
Professor Thorne sees it. "Shadowbound hunter." Valerius's expression changes.
"No," I say.
He looks at me. I don't know exactly what he intends to do but I know that I oppose it.
His mouth almost curves. "You felt that."
"I identified intent." I nod.
"Close enough." The Remnant lashes one chain toward him. Valerius burns it aside. Black fire and old law collide, shaking the corridor. Stone explodes from the wall. The creature advances, chains dragging sparks over the floor.
Professor Thorne raises a ward. "Fall back."
Valerius doesn't. I lift my hand. He catches my wrist. "Not yet."
I look at him. The Remnant is less than twenty paces away. "Release me."
"No." He says firmly.
"Valerius." I warn.
"Let me do this." He begs.
"I don't know what this is." I say.
"That's the point." He pushes his mental wall higher.
The bond between us dims. My mark cools. I feel less of him. He steps away. Professor Thorne recognizes something in his face. "Draven."
Valerius ignores him. The Remnant swings another chain. This time, he doesn't burn it. It wraps around his chest. Professor Thorne shouts his name. My mother screams. I stand still.
The chain tightens. Valerius is pulled forward, boots scraping across stone.
He could summon Shadowflame, I know he can.
His magic burns beneath his skin, ready.
He chooses not to. The Remnant lifts him, black chains coil around his arms, waist, and throat, holding him several feet above the floor.
Blood appears where the links cut into him.
The bond floods open. His wall drops. Pain crashes into me, ribs compressed, breath restricted, old law burning into his mark and hope. Beneath all of it... Hope. He truly believes I will come back to myself and save him.
"Valerius!" Thorne tries to move, but his wound tears. He drops to one knee, one hand pressed to his side.
My mother lifts a ward. The Remnant shatters it. Valerius looks only at me, his face is pale, blood runs from the corner of his mouth. He says my name through the bond.
Valentina.
I ignore it and assess the corridor. Forty-six Remnants emerging from the lower cracks. Twenty-three first-years remain within immediate range. Seven professors are wounded. The Shadowbound hunter is occupied. Strategically, the current distribution is favourable.
Valerius sends again.
Look at me.
I do. Relief flickers across his face. The chain tightens around his chest, something breaks, I feel it through the bond. A rib, possibly two. His pain is severe.
He still looks at me with faith. "You said they would never have me," he whispers. His voice is barely audible above the alarms.
I remember saying it in the council corridor at the hidden chamber. After the queen warned us. The words are true historically. "You allowed it to capture you," I answer. "That was strategically unwise."
The entire corridor stills. Valerius's hope falters. Professor Thorne looks at me as if he doesn't recognize the person standing here.
My mother whispers, "Valentina."
Three Remnants crawl from the crack behind her.
I erase them. Four more rush the students near the stairwell.
Gone. Valerius's pain continues through the bond but I turn away from him.
The silence that follows is worse than screaming.
Another memory enters the bond. Not mine... His. He sends it deliberately.
The dining hall. Mira's voice cutting through the room. His silent question.
Mine?
My answer. Yes.
His mouth on mine. The memory shifts. My bedroom. His arm around my waist. My hand over his.
Then the gallery. Darkness. His forehead against mine. My whispered choice.
I want you.
The memories strike the sovereign heart one after another.
The locked door inside me doesn't open. The cold Starfire absorbs the emotion attached to each image, my power strengthens. Valerius feels it happen, his face breaks. The Remnant drags him toward the crack in the floor.
Professor Thorne tries to rise again. He can't. "Valentina," he says, voice hoarse. "This has gone far enough."
"There are seventy-three active Remnants within the south wing." I remind him.
"Valerius is being taken." Thorne screams.
"He chose to become compromised." I say.
My mother sobs my name. I erase six more creatures.
Valerius stops sending memories. The bond becomes very quiet.
For the first time since he became tied to me, I feel him release expectations.
He no longer believes I am coming. The Remnant pulls him closer to the opening.
A black-star projection forms in the air above the crack.
One of the Ancient Masters appears within it, silver mask floating over smoke.
"Shadowbound," the Master says.
Valerius lifts his head. Even bleeding, even chained, his smile is cruel. "You needed a larger creature."
The Master tilts his mask. "We needed her choice." His blank face turns toward me. I erase another line of Remnants. The Master watches. "Efficient."
Valerius's jaw tightens. The Remnant raises one clawed hand toward the mark over his heart.
The sovereign mark beneath his shirt begins glowing gold and black.
The creature doesn't intend to kill him.
It intends to remove the mark. Take the Shadowbound.
The queen's warning returns. 'They will try to make you sacrifice the boy.'
Valerius looks at me one last time, with no hope this time, only sadness. His thought touches the bond gently.
I love you Valentina! I'm sorry!
Not for his plan but for failing to bring me back.
The Remnant's claw presses against his chest.
Valerius screams. The sound tears through the corridor.
The mark over my heart pulses. The claw pushes deeper.
Gold-black light stretches between his chest and the Remnant's hand.
The bond convulses. Something is taking him, removing him away.
The golden-dark thread between us begins to thin.
Valerius is going to survive but after this he won't be mine.
Mine.
The word moves inside the silence. The locked door inside me fractures, one crack, then another. The Remnant pulls harder. Valerius's mark rises beneath his skin like burning metal.
Mine.
The word returns, fiercer this time.
Mine.
Something behind the door screams, not Starfire...
Me. The corridor vanishes, I move, without running or walking, space folds.
One moment I'm surrounded by ash and wounded students.
The next, I'm in front of the Remnant, my hand is around its wrist.
Its claw is still pressed against Valerius's chest. It turns its faceless head toward me.
The Ancient Master's projection leans closer. "There." The word is satisfied. That should warn me but I don't care.
My grip tightens. Warmth explodes through my hand. White-gold, furious and alive. The Remnant's arm unravels, it shrieks. The chains around Valerius snap apart. I catch him before he hits the floor. His weight falls against me, heavy and bleeding, one arm instinctively wrapping around my shoulders.
The Remnant lunges. I turn.
The roar that leaves me is smaller than the one born from my father's death, but hotter and more personal.
Starfire erupts from my chest and consumes the creature.
It doesn't cease quietly this time. It burns, every chain, every mark, every fragment of old law.
The Shadowbound hunter screams until nothing remains. The black-star projection shatters.
The Ancient Master's final words echo as the image disappears. "There you are Starbourn."
Silence follows. Valerius is in my arms, alive but barely steady. His chest is torn where the Remnant touched his mark, gold-black blood and light mixing beneath his ripped shirt. His breathing is shallow.
His eyes open, hazel and raw. Hope returns so quickly it's painful to witness.
"You're back," he whispers.
The words enter the crack inside me. For one heartbeat...
I feel everything. His weight against me.
His blood on my hands. His breath against my cheek.
The memory of his mouth. His arms around me in the dark.
The dining hall. The garden. The gallery.
My bed. The council separating us. His promise to come.
My promise that they would never have him.
Love rises through me so violently I almost choke.
"Valerius." His name breaks from me.
His eyes widen. He feels it. The bond floods with me. He lifts one blood-covered hand and touches my cheek. "There," he whispers. "Stay."
I want to. Gods, I want to, then the sovereign heart closes. The emotion cuts off. The warmth disappears. The door seals. I'm holding an injured asset in the middle of an active battlefield. I lower him carefully to the floor.
Valerius watches my face.
The hope remains for one second too long.
I stand. "You remain strategically valuable," I tell him.
The words destroy what the Remnant couldn't.
He looks at me, blood at his mouth, chest torn open, eyes hollowing around the truth, not because I didn't save him, because I did and for one heartbeat, he had me.
Then lost me again. Professor Thorne reaches us, limping badly.
My mother follows, tears streaming down her face. Valerius doesn't look at them. Only me.
"You felt it," he says.
"Yes." I nod.
"You came back." He says broken.
"Temporarily." I say.
Pain moves through his face. I turn toward the remaining Remnants.
Thirty-one. The number has decreased while we were occupied.
Tempest and Veil forces are containing the lower stairwell.
Eli has returned and is fighting near the first-year evacuation path, lightning ripping through ash. The battle is still active.
I lift my hand. Valerius catches the edge of my cloak weakly. I stop. He looks up at me. "You didn't save me because I'm strategically valuable."