CHAPTER 33
Two days pass before Thorin finally stops treating me like I might disappear. I sleep in his chambers now, tangled in his sheets and his silence, and I go where he goes—though he doesn’t go very far.
The first day after the rescue, he follows me everywhere, no pretense about it. The second day, he follows me everywhere while pretending not to. By the third, he’s developed enough dignity to trail several feet behind me instead of hovering at my shoulder.
I choose to see that as progress.
I stop beside a narrow stone bridge crossing one of the streams that winds through the palace and glance over my shoulder.
He’s there, leaning against a fence post with his arms crossed, pretending to be fascinated by absolutely anything other than me.
But the warmth in his face gives him away—I’ve never seen him look at anything like that before.
“Stop acting like you aren't stalking me, Thorin.”
He doesn’t answer. I stare until he finally cracks, and the laugh that escapes me is the easiest one I’ve had in longer than I can remember.
His gaze flicks toward mine. “Oh. Apologies, Lady Tarethyn. Is something wrong? I did not notice you.”
I laugh so hard that the guards passing by chuckle along, grateful, maybe, for the peace that’s settled over the palace these last two days.
“Thorin. You're following me. You didn’t have to do that.”
“No, I am not. I am simply… admiring… the stonework. The architect did an amazing job.”
I cross to him and pinch his arm. “You absolutely are following me. But you didn’t have to, you insane man.”
His expression stays perfectly serious. “Muya quenati, I happened to be walking in the same direction. Maybe it is you following me.”
“You’ve been walking in the same direction for two days. My direction, Thorin.”
“I enjoy this direction.”
I narrow my eyes, fighting a smile, and lose when the corner of his mouth twitches first. We haven't talked much about what happened with The Rebellion. I’ve had nightmares for two nights running, and both nights I’ve ended up pressed so close to him it’s like I’m trying to disappear inside his chest. As badly as I want him—all of him—I need my mind to settle first.
There’s too much to sort through: Mara’s betrayal, The Rebellion, the settlement. It sits in me like a weight I haven’t found the words for yet.
Except one thing I have found the words for.
“Onyx is your fucking brother, Thorin? Gods, that was the easiest answer you could’ve given me when I asked.”
His face drops instantly, laughter gone before I've even finished the sentence.
“Lyra—”
“Let me talk.” I cut him off before he can spiral into something evasive.
“You do enough of that, and I don’t feel like unraveling your riddles today. They give me headaches.”
That earns me a smile—the dazzling one, the one that makes the silver in his eyes swirl as he steps in close.
“Talk, my love.”
I breathe him in, searching his eyes with an intensity that makes my own magic stir under my skin.
“I know you aren’t a monster. I just need to say it out loud. When I was in the glass cage, someone told me the truth. I don’t know his name—only that he’s on your side. I know about the settlement. I know you’ve been protecting us. Protecting me.”
Something in him loosens. He sighs, low and long, and drops his forehead to mine.
“No. I’m not a monster. Not to you. To anyone foolish enough to stand against me? I am their nightmare.”
I saw it firsthand and couldn’t agree more.
“Why didn’t you tell me about Onyx? Does everyone know?”
“Not many. The scholars in the archives, of course. But I don’t trust the people around me anymore, Lyra. There’s a traitor in our midst, and I’m still trying to root them out.”
He exhales slowly before continuing. “Onyx is my younger brother. The curse runs through our bloodline. Each of us carries a piece of it, but the king bears the heaviest share. If I die, that burden passes to him.”
His jaw tightens. “We’ve spent years searching for a way to heal the land, and…” He lets out a weary sigh, dragging a hand through his hair. “There’s so much more I need to tell you. But it can wait.”
I smile, because for once he's giving me answers instead of half-truths dressed up to keep me calm and compliant.
“I have a confession, Thorin. I don't hate you.”
“You never really hated me, Lyra.” He smirks, dragging his fingers slowly through my curls.
“Oh, I actually did,” I say, laughing. “I just had to warm up to you.”
He tickles me behind the ear and I laugh harder, then he’s leaning down, and his mouth finds mine—soft, unhurried, like he has all the time in the world now that I’m real and warm in his arms instead of a memory he chases in his sleep.
“Stay with me tonight,” he murmurs. “Not because I fear you will vanish. Because I want you there.”
I smile against his lips. “I was already planning on it.”
I’ve survived kidnappings, rebellions, magical disasters, and enough emotional trauma to occupy several lifetimes.
Yet somehow the simple warmth of his hand against my cheek nearly undoes me.
His forehead settles lightly against mine and I close my eyes.
For a long moment, neither of us moves, lingering in it, stretching it out as if we could freeze time and stay in this one instant forever.
Then he leans down and seals his lips over mine. Not like a king claiming something. Not like a man taking. Like someone who has spent far too long denying himself the one thing he wants. I know, because I've spent just as long denying myself the very same thing.
His hand slides to my jaw, rough from years of sword calluses and old battles as his fingers disappear into my hair.
He kisses me as though he’s trying to memorize me, as though he might never have the chance to do it again.
His shadows curl around us, wrapping us in velvet darkness as his mouth lingers against mine.
Slowly, almost reverently, the kiss deepens until it becomes something that blazes between us, consuming every coherent thought I have.
Light flares behind my eyes, glowing and alive. His shadows surge closer, and I feel my own magic reach for him, answering something ancient inside him. His arm slides around my waist, pulling me flush against him, and every place we touch hums with quiet recognition.
“Lyra.”
The way he says my name makes my heart ache.
I swallow. “Don't.”
A faint crease appears between his brows. “Don’t what?”
I laugh softly. “Don’t look at me like that.”
His gaze never leaves mine. “Like what?”
Gods. Men are exhausting.
“Like I hung the moon in the sky and placed every star, or whatever it was you said to me weeks ago.”
He laughs, low and warm, then shakes his head. “You have no idea how impossible you are.”
“I do, actually.”
He leans down to kiss me again, whispering against my mouth. “You are mine, Lyra.”
Before his lips reach mine again, I glance up. My breath catches—his eyes have gone black… as black as the night he tore the world apart to find me. Black veins creep slowly up his neck.
Claim me, my magic whispers.
“Mine,” he growls, and crushes his mouth to mine in a kiss that melts me.
Then I feel it.
The air around us shifts. Not dramatically. Subtly. The way the world changes in the heartbeat before a storm arrives. The mark on my wrist grows warm. At first, I hardly notice. The sensation has become familiar over the last few weeks, our bond humming quietly beneath my skin.
Only…
This isn’t our bond.
This is something else.
Something ancient.
The warmth spreads up my arm, across my chest, and settles beneath my ribs.
Gold light flickers beneath my skin. Our magic has always danced together, but this feels different.
I glance down and watch the glow race along my wrist. His shadows answer it.
Black veins climb higher, twining with the gold as though the two have always belonged together.
Thorin goes perfectly still as horror flashes across his face.
I feel it immediately—the shift, the tension, the sudden stillness. My gaze snaps back to his.
Something has changed.
I see hope. Raw and blinding. For a moment, neither of us speaks. He’s looking at me, and yet he isn’t. Not really. His eyes are fixed on mine, but something behind them has shifted, as though he’s seeing something beyond me.
This isn’t my Thorin.
Acting on instinct, I reach for the mental training he taught me and slip inside his mind. I’m barely there before I catch a single thought, fuzzy but forming. I see torn parchment, missing from the archives.
For the Cursebreaker to heal the land, the Darkbringer must take the ember and heal the kingdom. Only then will the curse be broken.
The light brightens as the air grows warmer. Magic hums through me like sunlight trapped beneath my skin. Thorin stares—not at me, but at the light. At the thing he’s spent centuries searching for.
And suddenly I understand.
Not everything.
Not even close.
But enough.
Enough to know the prophecy is standing between us. Enough to know that something is looking at me through his eyes.
No—not something.
The corruption. The darkness rotting this continent.
Something forces me out of his mind, and my vision blurs as I’m shoved back into myself.
When it clears, his expression hasn’t changed.
He’s still looking at me as though nothing happened.
My stomach drops. This isn’t him. Whatever is happening to him right now, he doesn’t know.
I start to pull away before he does something he’ll regret, but his hand catches mine. Not forcefully. Instinctively.
“Wait!” The word leaves him before he can stop it.
The light surges. Gold spills through my veins as the shadows at his feet answer, curling toward us—toward me, toward the light. For one suspended heartbeat, it feels almost beautiful, light and darkness reaching for one another, ancient halves of the same story finally finding their way home.
Then I feel it.
A pull, deep inside my chest. Not pain. Recognition.
Something ancient stirring awake. Thorin goes perfectly still as black veins climb his arms, spreading beneath his skin while shadows slide across him, no longer under his command but driven by instinct alone.
His gaze locks onto mine, wide with something between hope and horror, as his hand rises almost of its own accord and comes to rest against my chest, directly over my heart.
The mark on his wrist flares, and the light inside me answers.
And suddenly I understand what he thinks is happening. What he believes is happening.
The return.
The restoration.
The cure.
“Thorin—” His name dies in my throat.
The shadows move, not around me, but into me.
Cold detonates through my chest and my entire body locks as the world tilts violently sideways.
Agony tears through me, and I scream. I scream from the pain, from the betrayal of it being him—my Thorin.
I scream until my throat is raw. But this pain isn’t physical…
it’s so much deeper. As though invisible hands have reached inside my soul and wrapped themselves around something ancient.
His expression changes so quickly it steals the breath from my lungs. Hope drains from his face, replaced by pure, unfiltered horror.
“Lyra—NO!” The words break apart on his lips.
He doesn’t know what he’s doing to me. Gods, he doesn’t know.
The realization crashes into me even as agony rips through every nerve in my body. He thought this was supposed to happen. He probably believes combining our magic is the cure. Whatever darkness is taking hold of him knows it’s not. Thorin’s magic was always supposed to consume mine.
“THORIN!”
The shout reaches me from a few paces away.
Onyx.
The terror in his voice freezes my blood. I’ve never heard him sound like that. He races down the path, the color draining from his face. His eyes lock on the shadows pouring into my chest. On the gold light darkening beneath my skin. On Thorin.
Whatever he sees makes him look sick. “NO!” The word tears from him. “STOP!”
He throws out his palm, sending a wall of solid air barreling toward us, but Thorin's shadows are no longer his to command. They surge forward on instinct, colliding with the blast. The impact tears Thorin backward with brutal force and the connection snaps.
The shadows recoil… but it's already too late.
I collapse forward as a scream tears from my throat. The light beneath my skin flickers—gold, black, gold, black—as agony rips through every part of me. My vision swims. I reach for him, but I never make it.
The last thing I see before darkness takes me is the light fading from his eyes.