CHAPTER TWELVE
The descent to the Lake of Veilith was steep and tricky, but Talon had been correct—the vines were asleep.
Their milky, bulbous eyes were shuttered, their fleshy lengths as still as the stone they clung to.
Aside from a few stinging scratches from stray branches that I could not see in the dark, I made it to the bottom unscathed.
Tonight was the only opportunity I had to confirm if this bond was real.
A part of me was terrified; if the lake confirmed Talon’s words, I would have to face Keeper Sora knowing she had fed me nothing but lies.
And if the water reflected only my own desperate face, looking back at me from the lightless depths?
I took a shaky breath, trying to process the thought.
If his face did not appear, I was not entirely sure my attraction to him would diminish.
If I saw only myself, and the connection remained, I would have to admit that I was not just responding to ancient magic, I was responding to the man himself.
That was the possibility that truly terrified me.
If the bond was not real, then I was simply a creature who wanted the dark, and that was far harder to manage than destiny.
The Lake of Veilith was a flawless sheet of liquid obsidian, reflecting the starless sky without distortion. The trees along the shore bent inward, their branches dipping toward the water as if confiding their darkest secrets in its depths.
The soil softened beneath my knees as I lowered myself to the bank. Cool dampness seeped through my nightdress, and the ancient, earthy scent of moss and mineral water filled my senses.
I hesitated only a moment before sliding my fingers into the lake. The surface broke around my hand, ripples spreading outward in widening circles.
Then, something beneath answered.
At first, I thought it was moonlight catching strangely along the lakebed. But the glow pulsed. Once. Then again. A slow, steady rhythm, deep below, like a heartbeat reverberating through the water. The silver light widened, drawing my gaze with it, until the darkness gave way to shape.
A face emerged beneath the surface.
My lungs emptied instantly.
Cold eyes lifted to mine from impossible depths, unblinking. His dark hair drifted as though suspended in another current entirely, and the markings along his jaw flickered faintly—silver answering silver.
“Talon,” I whispered.
The distance between us felt irrelevant. The bank beneath me, the city above, the High Court—they all turned to ash. My skin erupted in a feverish heat, my pulse hammering against my ribs as if his hands were already moving over me.
A sob caught in my throat.
It was true.
I was not crazy, and Talon was not a liar.
A wave of dizziness had my hands clawing at the damp moss, gripping the earth to keep from falling falling sideways.
No one could find out. The High Court, the Priestess, Keeper Sora—if they knew what I had seen, they would execute us both. The stakes were no longer just my reputation; they were my survival.
And yet, alongside the terror, a spark excitement set my blood ablaze. Now that I knew there was an ancient, undeniably valid reason for the resonance in my body, I did not have to suppress my desire. I did not have to question why I burned.
The lake brightened for a fraction of a second, silver light flaring around his silhouette like a dying star. But as I blinked, the vision dissolved, the lake going still and returning my own shaken expression to me.
I sat back on my heels, eyes wide and breath uneven.
I had wanted certainty.
Now that I had it, the world felt like it was tilting on its axis.
* * *
I slipped through the side entrance of the Archives, my movements frantic and silent. I moved through the shadows of the library, my damp hem heavy against my ankles, dripping incriminating patterns onto the stone.
I was nearly to the heavy iron door of my sleeping chamber when a voice cut through the stillness.
“Kaelia.”
I froze, the cold of the stone floor seeping into my bones. I turned slowly to face Keeper Sora. She stood at the end of the corridor, a single candle in her hand casting long, judgmental shadows across her face.
Her gaze dropped immediately to my knees, which were caked in dark mud and damp from the bank. She did not ask where I had been. She simply inclined her head, her expression unreadable.
“Come with me.”
I followed her into her private study, the air thick with the scent of old parchment and lavender. She did not sit. Instead, she went to the highest shelf, withdrew a weathered tome I had never seen, and faced me.
I did not care for her lying words.
I wanted to burn all of her fraudulent texts. I wanted to tell her that no words she could provide would undo what I had seen in the water, but I remained still, my teeth digging into my bottom lip until I tasted copper.
“The Veythar is planting ideas in your head that will get you killed,” Sora said, her voice sharp as a blade.
“I am not sure what you mean,” I said, attempting a coy tone.
Sora squinted, the corners of her eyes tightening in anger. “You need to be smarter than that, child, or you will end up like Thora.”
She slammed the tome down onto her wooden desk and pointed to the stool tucked beneath it.
I lowered myself onto the seat, my legs unsteady.
“You need to see what he is doing to you,” she said pointedly. “Because it has been done before.”
The ink on the pages began to shift, shimmering until they drew a silver thread of dust into the air.
“Thora was a normal girl, she came from a healthy home and even had an Elarthai.”
A pale-haired woman appeared, her silhouette glittering, her eyes turned toward a horizon that was not there. The faint whisper of wind stirred through the room, carrying with it the scent of pine and rain. Beneath her feet, a forest shimmered into existence, its trees bending to an unseen force.
The scent of pine and damp earth thickened until it filled my lungs, real enough that I almost expected to feel soil beneath my feet.
“But, she fell for a lie.”
The light shifted and deepened as another figure stepped from the glow—a man formed of shifting shadow, his edges blurred and restless. His presence seemed to leech the warmth from the room. I felt his coldness against my skin.
“Xylos convinced her he could provide for her what an Elarthai could not. That they could be more.”
When Thora turned to face him, something inside me clenched. The figures drew closer, their hands nearly touching. When their palms finally met, light burst across the study, blinding and perfect for one suspended heartbeat.
“And it killed her.”
The silver bled to a sickly green, then darkened to a void of black. The light fractured. Darkness bled inward from the edges of the page, twisting into faces that were not quite faces, forms that slithered and grew teeth. The forest crumbled into ruin.
The light in the book flickered with the echo of Thora’s silent scream before the page went still, the last of the dust falling in a thin, glittering trail.
“You see, Kaelia,” she said simply. “If you submit to this pull, you will follow her path.”
I shook my head, a tense laugh escaping me. “Keeper, I understand your worries, but there is no trickery happening here.”
She slammed the book closed and strode around the desk.
I instinctively tried to pull my legs back, but the stool was pinned against the desk, trapping me. Sora did not seem to notice—or perhaps she did not care. She crouched between my knees, and for the first time in days, her presence felt suffocating.
When she rested her wrinkled hands on my muddied dress, I stilled.
“Kaelia,” she started. “If it is not true, then why do you not become bound?”
My heart faltered, my lips parting around words I did not have.
“I have not found the one,” I settled for.
She tapped my knee once before standing. “Well, you no longer have the time to find them.”
I stood abruptly, my chair flying back and clattering against the wood. “What are you saying?”
Sora’s lips thinned into a hard line. “You need to find an Elarthai, suitable or not. Because no matter what image you have conjured up in your head about him, the Veythar master will not allow you to pass solstice unbound.”
“What if he did?” I challenged.
“You foolish girl.” She shook her head, returning the book to the shelf. “If what you are proposing is what I am thinking, then the matter of urgency only increases.”
I wiped my clammy hands on my dress and swallowed hard. “How does it?”
She whipped around to face me, her eyes blazing. “You will lose your soul either way. You remains boundless? They will come for you. You bind with him? The High Court comes for you both. There is no version of this story where the shadow leaves you standing.”
My vision tunneled as the reality of her words settled over me like a shroud.
I was being hunted by the very people who were supposed to protect me, and my only crime was a reflection in a lake.
I felt small, trapped between a city that demanded my light and a man who offered me the dark.
Both paths felt like a slow walk toward a cliffside.
“So you propose a safe bond then?” I croaked, my voice sounding like it belonged to someone else.
“Yes,” she said simply. “Tonight. Before the sun rises. Choose the light, Kaelia. Choose an Elarthai. Choose to live.”
Choose anything but him.