Chapter 26 #2
I hesitated. Not because of the Shadow rune. He had already seen it. Because I was sitting in front of him half-dressed and now he wanted the tunic lifted. Apparently this was divine punishment for sins committed in another life. “Vareena wrapped it.”
“Vareena can’t stitch.”
“How do you know?”
“Because if she could, she would have.”
Fair. I exhaled. “Fine.”
Kieran reached for the hem of my tunic, then stopped.
His eyes lifted to mine. Permission. For some reason, that was worse than if he had simply done it.
I nodded. His fingers caught the linen and raised it slowly over my stomach.
The Starlight rune beneath my left ribs appeared first, silver-blue lines resting quietly against my skin.
Lower, the Shadow rune curved over my hip, black at its center with silver shimmering faintly along the edges before disappearing beneath my underwear.
Kieran’s hands went still. His gaze followed the markings. Not hungrily. Not clinically either.
The shadows beneath his boots shifted. Only slightly. Mine answered. A cold pressure moved beneath my skin. His eyes snapped up. Neither of us breathed. Then he looked at the wound itself, and whatever had just passed between us was abruptly forgotten. “This needs stitching.”
“That’s unfortunate.”
“It’s deep.”
“I gathered that from the hole in me.”
He reached for the small leather pouch at his belt.
I frowned. “Why do you have that?”
“I figured you would need it.”
“You came prepared to stitch me?”
“I came prepared for the possibility that you had ignored medical advice.”
“That seems judgmental.”
“It was accurate.”
I ignored him and pointed toward Vareena’s bed. “There’s a wooden box underneath. You can clean the wound with what’s in it.”
Kieran rose. The loss of his presence between my knees should not have been disappointing. It was. He crossed to Vareena’s bed and crouched. “Wooden box.”
“Underneath.”
“I gathered.”
“Then why are you repeating me?”
His hand paused beneath the bed. “Because if I accidentally open anything private, I want it established that you directed me here.”
That almost made me smile. Almost. “Vareena would kill you.”
“I know.”
There was no humor in the answer. Kieran found the box and returned. I shifted to make room. Pain caught beneath my ribs. I laughed once at how ridiculous the movement had become.
Bad decision.
The laugh turned into a gasp, and I folded instinctively. Kieran was beside me before I managed to straighten. One hand caught my shoulder. The other landed at my waist. Directly over bare skin where the tunic was still raised. Directly over the Shadow rune.
We both froze.
Darkness slipped from beneath the bed. A thin ribbon.
Mine. It wound once around Kieran’s wrist. His Shadow answered.
Black curled around black, except mine carried that faint silver shimmer through its center while his stayed deep and endless.
The two strands twisted together. My breathing stopped.
Silver flashed faintly through the rune beneath his palm.
Kieran looked down.
Then up at me.
There was nothing clinical in his face now. Nothing remotely safe. His thumb moved once across my hip. The Shadows tightened. Heat went through me so fast that for one absurd second I wondered whether I had somehow manifested Fire too.
“Kieran.” His name came out softer than I intended.
His gaze dropped to my mouth. Only for a second.
Long enough. The room shrank around us. This was stupid.
I was bleeding. Halos was probably somewhere deciding how many times he could break the Crucible before anyone objected.
Vareena could walk through the door at any moment. And Kieran’s hand was on my bare waist.
I wanted him to kiss me.
The realization hit hard enough to make me angry.
Mostly at myself. The moment stretched one heartbeat too long.
Then he pulled away. Cold rushed over the place his hand had been.
The Shadows separated immediately. Mine disappeared beneath the bed.
His settled at his boots. Kieran reached for the wooden box with movements that were suddenly too controlled. “You’re bleeding.”
“Excellent observation.”
He opened the box and began laying out what he needed without looking at me.
Coward.
So are you.
I nearly jumped.
Oh, now you speak.
Nothing.
I hated everyone.
Kieran sat beside me this time. Probably wise.
Definitely disappointing. He soaked a cloth in medicinal alcohol and pressed it against the wound beneath my ribs.
My teeth clamped down hard enough that I tasted iron.
He waited until my breathing settled before moving the cloth again.
No jokes. No useless reassurance. Just careful hands and silence.
When the wound was clean, he threaded a needle.
I stared at it. “That is enormous.”
“It isn’t.”
“It absolutely is.”
“You fought six versions of yourself today.”
“Five. Apparently the Queen doesn’t count.”
His eyes lifted briefly. “She counted.”
The certainty in his answer made me stop. I held the tunic beneath my chest while he positioned the needle. The first stitch went through and pain flashed white. I hissed. Kieran’s free hand settled against my side. “Breathe.”
The second hurt worse. By the third, I had stopped pretending I wasn’t gripping his shoulder. By the fourth, my nails were digging into the leather there. He didn’t complain. The fifth made my injured thigh tighten and pain shot through the wound.
Kieran stopped immediately. “Too much?”
“Just finish.”
His eyes searched mine. “Lyra.”
“Finish it.”
He did. His face remained close enough that I could see the faint scar near his ear, close enough to count the slow rise and fall of his breathing.
Every accidental brush of his fingers against my skin sent heat curling low in my stomach, and none of it had anything to do with pain.
Apparently my body could distinguish between mortal danger and Kieran Nyxara.
It seemed to consider him more complicated.
Finally, he tied off the last stitch. “Done.”
I exhaled and released his shoulder. Four crescent marks remained where my nails had pressed into the leather. “Sorry.”
Kieran glanced at them, then at me. “It’s fine.”
He reached for fresh linen and began wrapping my ribs. I watched his hands. “You tried to stop Halos.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
His brows drew together slightly. It was a stupid question. “You know why.”
I wasn’t entirely sure I did. Kieran continued wrapping the bandage. “You saw the wards breaking.”
“I saw you losing control of power you didn’t understand while Halos deliberately increased the pressure.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“It’s enough of one.”
There he was again. A wall disguised as a person. I almost pushed. Then another question came back to me. “Which one scared you most?”
His hands paused. “What?”
“The projections. Which one?”
He finished securing the bandage before answering. “The Broken one.”
I blinked. Not Shadow. Not the Queen. Not the Mourner with blood covering her hands. “The Broken one?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Kieran looked at me. “Because the others were still fighting.”
The answer hurt in a way I hadn’t expected. There was more behind it. I knew that much. But for once, I didn’t ask. Kieran lowered the tunic carefully over the fresh bandage. “What about you?”
“What?”
“Which one scared you?”
I knew immediately. “The Shadow.”
“Because of what she was?”
“No.” I looked down at my hands. “Because she wasn’t afraid of it.”
He waited.
“She looked comfortable.”
“With Shadow?”
“With herself.” The admission felt worse once it was aloud. “She wasn’t fighting half of what she was. She wasn’t trying to hide it. She wasn’t wondering whether someone would execute her if they saw too much. She just existed.”
“And that frightened you?”
I nodded.
“Why?”
“Because I wanted to know what that felt like.”
Kieran was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “There is nothing inherently evil about Shadow, Lyra.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
I looked at him.
“Magic doesn’t make choices. People do.”
The words settled somewhere uncomfortably deep.
I thought of everything I had been taught since arriving.
Light protected. Shadow consumed. One sacred.
One dangerous. Nirael ruined because one element had somehow poisoned the other.
I thought of the woman inside the projection.
Shadow had moved around her as naturally as breathing.
“Did you see the way it moved around her?”
“Yes.”
“It doesn’t do that for me.”
“It will.”
The certainty in his voice caught me. “How do you know?”
“Because you’re still afraid of it.”
“That sounds backward.”
“It isn’t.” His gaze dropped toward my hip. “You keep treating Shadow like an affliction instead of an affinity. It isn’t. It belongs to you. Until you stop fighting that fact, every command you give it will have fear beneath it.”
I swallowed. “And if I stop being afraid?”
“You might actually become dangerous.”
I stared at him. His mouth barely moved. Not a smile. Almost. “Comforting.”
“It wasn’t meant to be.”