Chapter 10
TEN
AUREN
The words settle into the space between us. Not forgiveness—forgiveness isn’t hers to give, and we both know it. Not absolution, because there is no absolution for what was done.
Something else.
In all the years since Lyric’s death, I’ve encountered countless people from Valdoria.
Diplomats, merchants, refugees after the Shadow Clan’s attack.
Some knew what Morrigan did. Others didn’t.
But whenever it came up—whenever the truth of the Betrayer’s crimes surfaced in conversation—I received the same responses.
Deflection. Justification. The careful distancing of themselves from Morrigan’s actions, as if naming her crimes might somehow implicate them by association.
They spoke of circumstances, of pressures, of dark magic that corrupted her.
They made excuses for a murderer because acknowledging the truth was too uncomfortable.
Tamsin doesn’t make excuses. Doesn’t deflect.
She stands before me with tears on her face and takes responsibility for something that isn’t her fault—not because she did it, but because she carries the same blood as the woman who did.
She acknowledges Lyric’s death not as an unfortunate incident but as a crime, a horror, something that deserves grief and rage and promises of prevention.
It’s the first time anyone from Valdoria has looked at what Morrigan did and called it what it was.
Something shifts in my chest. Something that’s been frozen for decades, cracking at the edges, letting warmth seep into spaces that have been cold for so long, I’d forgotten they could feel anything else.
“I’ve spent decades wanting to destroy everything connected to your bloodline.
” The words come out before I can stop them.
“Your kingdom. Your family. Every witch who carries Valdorian magic in their veins. I told myself it was justice. Told myself the hatred was righteous. Told myself that if I couldn’t have Lyric, I could at least have vengeance. ”
Tamsin doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t look away. Just watches me with those steady eyes, still wet with tears, waiting for whatever comes next.
“And now I’m standing here, telling you things I’ve never told anyone.” My voice sounds strange to my own ears. Rough. Uncertain. Unfamiliar. “Because somehow, you’re the only person who might actually understand.”
“Understand what?”
“The guilt.” I turn away from her, facing the darkened horizon.
Can’t look at her while I say this. “The part of you that wonders if you could have prevented it. Should have seen the signs. Should have done something, anything, that might have changed the outcome. The voice in your head that whispers maybe it’s your fault, even when you know it isn’t.
Even when logic tells you that you had no way of knowing, no power to stop it, no responsibility for choices someone else made. ”
The silence stretches. I expect her to argue. To tell me I’m being irrational, that neither of us is responsible for Morrigan’s crimes. The logical rebuttal that I’ve given myself a thousand times and never managed to believe.
Instead, she moves to stand beside me. Not touching—there’s still space between us, a careful distance neither of us crosses.
“I understand.”
Two words. Simple. Devastating. Because they’re true—she does understand, in a way no one else possibly could. She carries the same guilt for the same woman’s actions.
“Morrigan used to braid my hair.” Her voice is quiet.
Almost dreamy. “When I was seven or eight, before her smiles started looking practiced. She was already much older than me, but she would sit me down in front of her mirror and create these elaborate styles, talking the whole time about what we’d do when we were older.
She was going to be queen, and I was going to be her advisor, and we’d rule Valdoria together. ”
“What happened?”
“My powers emerged.” She laughs, but there’s no humor in it.
“White fire at seven. Witch magic strong enough to shatter wards when I sneezed. Everything changed after that. The tutors stopped praising her potential and started marveling at mine. Our parents stopped looking at their heir and started looking at their miracle.” She pauses.
“I didn’t ask for it. Didn’t want to take anything from her. I just wanted my sister back.”
“But you never got her.”
“No.” The word is heavy with grief. “By the time I was old enough to understand what was happening, she was already gone. The Morrigan who defended me against tutors who pushed too hard, who promised we’d rule together—that person disappeared.
Left behind a shell that wore her face and smiled with her mouth but felt nothing real behind it. ”
We stand in silence as night fully claims the sky.
Stars emerge in constellations I’ve watched for six centuries, unchanged while everything else shifts and breaks and reforms. The fortress is quiet around us.
Somewhere below, Aisling is treating wounded warriors.
Somewhere else, Drayke is coordinating repairs.
Life continuing despite the horrors of the day.
“I don’t hate you.”
The words surprise me as much as they seem to surprise her. She turns to face me, eyes wide, the starlight catching on traces of dried tears.
“I should.” I force myself to meet her gaze. To say this directly, honestly, without the protective mask of coldness. “By every measure of logic and self-preservation, I should hate you. You’re Morrigan’s blood. Valdorian royalty. Everything I’ve spent decades learning to despise.”
“But?”
“But you threw yourself off a wall today to save my life.” I take a breath. Let it out. “And just now, you cried for a sister you never met, killed by a sister you’re going to destroy. And somehow, standing here in the dark with you, I can’t find any hate left.”
Her fire flickers back to life around her fingers. Soft. Warm. Not the unstable guttering of distress but something steadier. Something that reaches toward me the way it did in training—curious, welcoming, impossibly gentle for a flame that can annihilate shadow magic.
“I don’t hate you either.” Her voice is quiet. “In case you were wondering.”
“I wasn’t.” A lie. “You have every reason to.”
“Maybe.” She tilts her head, considering.
“You’ve been cold. Hostile. Made it clear you despised everything I represent.
But you also caught me when I fell. Twice.
You held me while I slept through magical exhaustion.
You found a training approach that worked with my instincts instead of against them.
” A ghost of a smile crosses her face. “Cold, yes. Hostile, sometimes. But not cruel. Never cruel.”
I don’t know what to say. Don’t know how to process the realization that she’s been cataloguing my actions the same way I’ve been cataloguing hers—noticing patterns, analyzing behaviors, building a picture of who I actually am beneath the ice.
“We should get you to Aisling.” The deflection is automatic. Safer than continuing this conversation, which has already stripped away more defenses than I’ve let fall in decades. “Your reserves need assessment.”
“Probably.” She doesn’t move. “But, Auren?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you.” She reaches out and touches my arm. Brief. Light. The contact sends a shock through me that has nothing to do with temperature—her fire and my frost meeting at the point where her fingers rest against my sleeve. “For telling me about Lyric. For trusting me with that.”
“I don’t know why I did.”
“Yes, you do.” Her smile is sad and knowing and entirely too perceptive. “But you don’t have to admit it yet. Just... thank you. For letting me see past the ice.”
She withdraws her hand. The absence of contact feels like loss. I watch her walk toward the stairwell that will take her down to the infirmary, her fire trailing soft light behind her, illuminating stone walls in gentle warmth.
At the doorway, she pauses. Looks back.
“Lyric sounds like she was wonderful. And I’m going to make sure Morrigan pays for taking her from you. Not for you—you don’t need me to fight your battles. But for Lyric. Because she deserved better than what she got.”
Then she’s gone, her footsteps fading down the stairs, leaving me alone on the rampart with stars and silence and the echo of warmth where her hand touched my arm.
I don’t move for a long time.
I told her about Lyric. Told her things I’ve kept locked away, things I’ve never spoken aloud to anyone. And instead of using the information as a weapon—instead of deflecting or defending or making excuses—she cried for my sister and promised to avenge her.
Something has shifted between us. Something fragile and uncertain, barely formed, easily shattered if either of us pushes too hard. It isn’t trust, exactly. Isn’t friendship or forgiveness or any of the simple labels I could apply to contain it.
It’s possibility.
The idea that maybe—just maybe—I don’t have to carry this grief alone anymore. That someone else can understand it without excusing it. That the ice I’ve built around myself for protection might not be the only way to survive.
I look up at the stars. Try to imagine what Lyric would say if she could see me now—standing on a rampart, still warm from a witch princess’s touch, feeling things I haven’t felt in too long.
About time, she would probably say. I was starting to think you’d turned into an ice cube.
The thought makes me smile. Small. Private. The kind of smile I used to reserve for her alone.
Maybe some part of her is still with me. Maybe she’s been waiting for exactly this—for someone to crack the ice enough to let warmth back in.
I turn away from the stars and follow Tamsin’s path toward the infirmary.
There are still wounds to tend. Still strategies to plan. Still a war to fight against the woman who destroyed both our families.
But tonight, for the first time, I don’t feel entirely frozen.
It’s a start.