Chapter 41
Chapter Forty-One
As night edges towards daylight, the Assembly reaches several decisions. Meredith Jackson and Samuel Trent are sentenced to death for repeated breaches of the paper mage treaty and for practising unwilling soul transfer magic. Their executions will take place at a neutral facility in three days.
I will not attend.
Timothy Reep and ten of the remaining eleven coven members receive lengthy custodial sentences in specialised prisons, stripped of office and rank. The fire mage is deemed too unstable and will spend the rest of her life in a warded, fireproof cell beneath the Magic Sector.
The treaty is amended and reaffirmed. The Vampire Court, the Ministry of Magic, and the Human Sector pay reparations—the government accepts responsibility for its people.
The human guards are reprimanded: Detective Wallace loses his post on the police force, and the rest of his department will be investigated.
Paper mages retain full diplomatic immunity, and the wording that protects us is strengthened.
By the time I am released, Unity Hall feels wrung dry.
The last representatives drift away in tight, tense knots, voices low, faces drawn. Meredith’s name lingers over everything like smoke—executions, sentences, ‘necessary measures.’
Lark appears at my side. “Are you all right?” she asks.
“Yes, thank you. I am okay.”
She squeezes my arm.
Fred joins us, smiling. “I have to go,” she says. “But before that”—her gaze sharpens—“I already know what you are going to say about the notes, Harper. We are family, so of course you will give us the magic to send them.”
I blink, then smile. “Of course. What a good idea.”
The magic already rests in them, but I nudge it anyway.
“You will be able to send magic notes to anyone you want to,” I say. “Just focus on the message and picture the recipient in your mind. This is pure magic at its finest—impossible to intercept. Thank you again for coming,” I add. “I am still a little shocked that you did.”
My thoughts drift: brick and tile, perfect grass and flowers, the long, silent years shattered by these women.
Monsters, treaties, councils, wars—such threats will return. There will be more spells, more crises, more people who think ‘abomination’ is a reasonable word for someone different, someone who survived.
But next time, I do not need to stand alone.
Friends who stride into the Sector Assembly and lay their loyalty down like a gauntlet—that is no small gesture. It is immense.
They hug me, and I hug them back.
Beryl promises to see me soon. I must speak with her about what the ley line did to my magic—perhaps, with experimentation, we can return her to human form or grant Beryl peace. But those are conversations for another day.
I slip away. I need some fresh air.
The corridors are quiet, and my footsteps are muffled by yet more enchanted carpet. Two guards glance up as I pass, then look away, expressions carefully blank. No one stops me; diplomatic immunity, it seems, is good for something.
A glass door leads to a terrace garden. I push through and step into cool air.
It is almost dawn. The sky over Unity Gate is a pale grey-blue, the eastern rim bruised pink. Low shrubs edge the terrace, clipped into obedient shapes. Planters brim with white flowers that glow beneath the ward-lights, and a narrow bench curves along the wall.
I sink onto it and let my shoulders finally sag.
The silence feels strange. Inside, everyone is still arguing; out here, the only sounds are the hush of vents and the distant rumble of aircraft from the Unity Gate airport.
I stare at my hands. They look steady.
They are not.
You told them—everything that mattered. You did not let Lander take the fall.
It should feel like relief. I should be proud. Instead, I feel hollowed out, scraped clean.
A dark blur flashes past the corner of my eye. A moment later, claws grip my shoulder through the silk and a familiar weight settles there.
“Snack Thief,” I whisper.
“Bad,” Arthur croaks softly and leans in, pressing his head to my cheek. Feathers tickle my skin; he smells faintly of wind and whatever he has stolen recently. I scratch the base of his neck, and his eyes slide shut in bliss.
“Bad, Harper,” I whisper. “I am sorry I left you.”
He answers with a hoarse little caw that sounds very much like a reprimand.
Measured, unhurried footsteps halt just inside the doorway. I do not turn. My magic recognises him before my mind does, a faint pressure even through the dampeners.
“I wondered where he’d got to,” Lander says quietly.
I glance over my shoulder.
He has shed his formal jacket; his shirt sleeves are rolled, his collar loosened. The Assembly has left a grey smear of exhaustion beneath his eyes.
He looks as though he has been fighting the world—and winning by stubbornness alone.
“Traitor,” he tells Snack Thief mildly. “You always choose the best shoulder.”
Arthur fluffs up, utterly unrepentant.
Lander crosses to the bench and pauses at a polite distance. “May I?”
I nod.
He sits—not too close, not too far—just near enough that his warmth reaches me, and my treacherous body leans the tiniest fraction his way.
For a moment, we simply breathe.
The sky lightens by degrees, colour seeping into the world as if someone is gently painting it back in.
“That went… better than it could have,” he says at last.
“I am not in a basement cell next door to Meredith,” I agree. “So yes. Marginally better.”
He huffs a laugh, then sobers. “How are you holding up?”
“Tired. Overwhelmed. Mildly murderous.” I hesitate, then add, quieter, “Grateful.”
His brows lift. “Grateful?”
“For them.” I nod back towards Unity Hall. “For Lark. For Fred. For Hatty and Beryl. I would never have asked them to come. I still might have ended up executed, but at least I would not have inconvenienced anyone.”
His mouth does that little twist that means he is torn between amusement and exasperation. “Harper.”
“I mean it,” I insist. “They risked a lot by standing up for me in front of everyone. They did that because you told them I needed help.”
He looks away, down the steps, as if the paving slabs have become fascinating. “I might have… mentioned a few things,” he says lightly. “Strictly off the record.”
“A little bird told them,” I echo Fred’s words. “You were the little bird.”
“I just made a few calls.”
Warmth prickles behind my eyes. I reach up to stroke the raven again so I do not have to look at Lander directly.
“Thank you,” I say quietly. “For bringing my family when I was too foolish—and too proud—to ask. For protecting them. For protecting me.”
His gaze snaps back to my face. “You’re not foolish,” he says. “You were scared and trying to handle everything alone. You’ve been doing that for a very long time.” His jaw works. “I didn’t want you to do it this time.”
“I—I told them I lied to your team, threw your cover story under the carriage.” I wince as the words land between us, heavy and ugly.
“I heard.” His gaze tips to me, sharp and assessing. “You didn’t have to.”
“Yes, I did.” I look down at my hands again, because it is easier than holding his eyes. “I will not stand by while other people pay for my choices. I did what I thought was right. My mistake was, once again, not speaking to you first.”
He is silent for a beat.
“Before you were summoned,” he says softly, “half the council, a few vampires, and one of the human ministers wanted to confine you to the Magic Sector indefinitely. Someone else wanted you declared an asset of the Ministry.” His lip curls slightly at the word.
“Knox and I reminded them you have full immunity under the treaty.” His tone goes flat and dangerous.
“I also reminded them that if they tried to reinterpret that at your expense, they could find another hunter to clean up their messes. I’m not interested in serving people who break their own laws. ”
My chest tightens. “You would walk away. For me.”
He snorts, as if the idea is obvious. “Harper, I was halfway through drafting my resignation in my head when you folded off the island. I only paused because hunting you down seemed more productive in the moment.”
I wince. “I am sorry.”
“I know,” he says. “But I’m not. Harper, you were so brave, and today? You stood in the centre of that hall and told the truth, knowing it might destroy you. That counts for a hell of a lot more.”
I swallow, throat tight.
“Unofficially, anyone with half a brain knows that without you and those ‘accidental’ gaps, we’d be neck-deep in a war nobody could win. Even politicians can recognise when they owe someone.”
“That must hurt,” I say gently. “Being indebted to the magical creature you spent a year chasing.”
He huffs a quiet laugh. “It took me far too long to realise I was really just… orbiting you. Trying to keep up.” His gaze finds mine.
“For the record, there is no one I won’t stand against for you.
Not Meredith Jackson. Not Timothy Reep. Not the council.
Not my own sector. If they come for you again, they go through me first.”
The promise lands like a spell. I flinch—not from fear, but from the part of me that still insists I am not worth this kind of loyalty.
Snack Thief clicks his beak and nuzzles my jaw, as if trying to smooth the sting.
“I don’t know what I am,” I say. The truth spills out, thin and tired. “I was Hestia. Then I was House. Now I am Harper. I have been a woman, a monster, a building, an anomaly. The Assembly stared at me like I was a bomb that might go off. Perhaps they are right.”
“They’re wrong,” Lander says.
The certainty in his tone makes me look up.
He is already watching me, leaning back against the bench, one arm stretched along the backrest behind my shoulders. Not touching, but there. His gaze is steady, unflinching.
“I have spent my life hunting dangerous magic,” he says. “I know monsters. You’re not one of them.”
“You tried very hard to kill me,” I remind him.