Chapter 65
I remain hunched over Gregor’s still form, sobs tearing from my throat as I beg him to return. But silence answers me. He lies motionless, the warmth already beginning to fade from his skin.
Footsteps land softly on the plush rug, soiled now with soot and blood. I know it’s Kaelis before he kneels beside me, his hand settling warm against my spine. I flinch at the contact, then slowly raise my tear-streaked face.
“I’m so sorry,” he whispers.
I launch myself into his arms, and he catches me without hesitation. His embrace tightens as a shuddering breath escapes him. It’s not grief for Gregor—he never loved the man as I did—but pain for my pain. My hurt manifesting within him. As though the mere idea of my ache could tear him apart.
“I must go,” he murmurs against my hair. Yet even as he says it, his grip doesn’t loosen.
“No, please.” The words break from me even as I know they’re futile. After everything that’s happened, he’s right.
Kaelis gives me one more minute and then pulls back, anguish carved across his features. For a heartbeat, he wavers—almost reconsidering.
“Heal yourself.” His words are steeped in desperation. He pushes back my hood and splits the seams of the mask, ripping it from my face. He then cradles my cheeks and with his thumbs sweeps away the grime and my tears. “Please.”
“I will.” They’re the only words that could make him leave me. Though it feels like a part of my soul is tearing away when he releases me. Still, I let him go. I must.
My hands fall limp to my knees. I bow my head as he stands.
“She is my proxy,” Kaelis declares to the room. “In these chambers, in my academy, consider her word law, an extension of my own.” He starts for the closet door.
“What will you do next?” Vaduin wheezes from across the room. With everyone’s decks depleted, his wounds remain unhealed.
Kaelis’s eyes sweep across Vaduin with a withering stare. But he quickly banishes the expression. The prince remembers what Gregor said Vaduin told him. But he also knows now isn’t the time.
“I am delaying All Coins Day,” he announces.
“The nobles would never permit it,” Vaduin counters. “The festival days are fixed around the apexes of the seasons, when magic is at its strongest.”
“They will permit a few hours’ delay. I can do it with the excuse of needing to investigate what’s happened in the mountains, given it’s so close to the academy.
” Kaelis has already worked through the logistics—his mind racing steps ahead in seconds.
“That gives you time to pull yourselves together and present yourselves as teachers, and student.”
I look up and meet his eyes. Guilt shines within them. But he still stands tall, despite the chaos and uncertainty. He’s doing what must be done. I harden my expression, though he likely sees through the mask.
Sophie Veillgar had nothing to do with the mountain’s collapse. She didn’t lose a friend. So she must report for work as if nothing has changed.
Without another word, Kaelis is gone.
I turn back to Gregor. I cannot bring you back. Forgive me.
Silence stretches between us, then breaks like a spell. Everyone begins to move. The surviving Worldkeepers exchange glances before turning to me expectantly following Kaelis’s declaration.
I force myself to stand and cross to Kaelis’s study.
The second I open the door, Priss lifts her head, instantly alert, arching her back in a contented purr.
Her obliviousness to everything that’s transpired makes me want to both smile and weep.
I scratch under her chin, drawing comfort from the simple gesture for a second.
At least one thing remains fixed in this broken world.
“We need to return,” one of the few remaining Worldkeepers says to Vaduin, who leans against the doorframe for support, as if the private space of Kaelis’s study creates an impassable barrier.
“Return where?” I ask without looking up, opening Kaelis’s desk drawer. He always keeps three spare decks here, stocked with duplicates of common cards. Still, I pray it will be enough.
The Queen of Cups flows into me, knitting my worst wounds with a haze of blue magic that fades into scarred but whole flesh. I use a Four of Swords for the lesser injuries—it’s weaker than the Queen, but I need to preserve the strongest cards for our group’s gravest wounds.
“To the Stone Citadel,” the Worldkeeper replies as I return to the main chamber.
Only five Worldkeepers besides Vaduin remain now.
One more, Ferier, is down with Arina. I should learn the names of the two I don’t know, I suppose.
This is my new crew, after all. They might not have been the ones I would’ve chosen for myself, but they’re the ones who’ve stood by me.
“What Stone Citadel?” I fix him with a look that’s sharp with irritation. “You heard the collapse yourself—the citadel has fallen.”
“There were more Worldkeepers there. We need to see if they survived.”
“They were already dead.” And even if they weren’t, there’s no way…
“You don’t know that. You didn’t even check how many might have survived.”
“Without me, the Worldkeepers would have ended entirely. At least we made it out alive.” I hate how his tone implies that the choice I made to possibly leave anyone behind was easy. That I didn’t do all I could.
“Who are you to decide who lives and dies?” He steps closer, emboldened by grief.
Four cards lift from my fresh decks in warning, reminding him I’m fully armed. I don’t want to fight, but my patience, self-control, and ability to be a bigger person are all hanging by a thread.
“Enough.” Vaduin intervenes. “Our numbers are too few for infighting.”
I study him warily, remembering Gregor’s words from the altar of the vessel. The remarks he made about Kaelis—statements that had come straight from the mouth of Vaduin that I’ll never have the chance to learn the full story of.
“Vacelle, here.” I head to the other side of the main room and pass some cards to her. She’s the one who’s studying healing under Ferier. “Take care of Sorza, then the rest, please.”
“Gladly.” She nods and rushes over to where Sorza remains unconscious but breathing.
“First, we patch ourselves up. Then, we’re taking Gregor to the depths,” I announce. “We’ll find a forgotten room, deep, where he can rest in peace. We’ll seal it behind him.
“After that, I’ll escort you all to Arina’s chambers. That will serve as our new base. No one leaves the academy. No one moves anywhere without my explicit permission. The bridge passage is compromised.”
“I don’t think I recall us voting you as the new leader,” the man next to Vaduin mutters.
“You heard the prince,” Vaduin says. It’s the closest to a deferral of authority I think I’ll get from him. “She’s in charge here.”
The other Worldkeeper crosses his arms in a huff.
I continue, “Vaduin, Sorza, and I will play our roles and attend All Coins Day. After that, I begin gathering supplies for a new vessel.”
“If the altar of the vessel still exists,” Xora mumbles, defeated.
“Why would you need to create another?” the other man asks.
All eyes turn to Vaduin. I remain silent, letting him confess.
“Ravin took it,” he says quietly.
“Then we’re finished.” The first Worldkeeper collapses onto Kaelis’s couch.
“Stand,” I command firmly. “The prince dislikes blood and dirt on his furniture.”
“I don’t care what—”
My glare silences him. He rises immediately.
I give him one more wary look and then retrieve a blanket from Kaelis’s bed, draping it over Gregor’s form. I pause before covering his face, memorizing my friend’s features one final time.
I’m so sorry. The blanket drops from my fingertips, and it’s the last time I’ll ever see him.
Vaduin still hovers by the study door as the others gather near the hearth. Our eyes meet, and he reads the weight of unasked questions in my expression.
“When Ravin was taking the vessel, he spoke of his existence depending on it. You realized something then. What was it?” I keep my voice low, dropping to a whisper as I come to a stop before him.
His gaze drops to the deck in my hands. “Are you withholding healing unless I tell you?”
“I am not that cruel. But I am exhausted, and I might need some help.” I pass him a card, and, together, we begin mending his wounds.
He answers my question: “Ravin is not real.”
“I’ve watched him kill those I love. He seems real enough.” I lean against the doorframe opposite him, utterly spent.
“In this world, yes.” His words are deliberate, and he waits to see if I understand.
I narrow my eyes, parsing what I might have missed. Then it strikes me, and I draw a sharp breath. “He was made by the World.”
Vaduin nods. “In every record of Revisan I could find, in what Laylis revealed—Naethor and Queen Elari had one son: Kaelis. Ravin is nothing more than a construct, created by the World from Naethor’s wish to further deny Kaelis his rightful throne.”
Does Kaelis know this? The implications of it have my mind spinning.
Ravin exists only because of a card and a wish. He’s a product of a remade world. While Kaelis let his father believe he served him, harboring his own ambitions, Ravin played the same game. Each son fighting for the World—to make a reality they desperately needed.
“Is Kaelis and Ravin’s younger brother real?” I ask.
“So far as I can tell.” Vaduin nods. “Given that he was born a few years after the world was remade.”
That’s why Naethor was speaking to him like an heir when I overheard them in Fate Hearth.
Probably also why he’s protected Prince Belen.
The crown prince isn’t real. The “second” prince—the rightful heir—is the last person Naethor wants inheriting the throne.
The only son he has whom he’d want to inherit the crown… is Belen.
Does the younger prince know the truth about his brothers?
“So, Ravin wants to use the World to make himself real,” I murmur as my thoughts race.
“Now that he has the vessel, we must move carefully and quickly,” Vaduin continues. “We need to steal it back.”