Chapter 12
JAX
The last thing I remember before the dirt was the pain. Or rather, the absolute agony.
Mazrov's distorted magic took a chainsaw to my aura and went to town.
Mom's hands were everywhere, burning hot, like she could hold me together through sheer maternal stubbornness.
Brynn and my cousins hovered above me, their faces tear-streaked and blurred.
Then... lights out. They'd wrapped me in dead relatives and buried me like some kind of darkblood seed, hoping the ground would keep Mazrov's magical acid from dissolving whatever was left of me.
Being buried alive should've been terrifying, and maybe it was, but now I barely remember what it was like underground. I don’t remember the pain of it. The thoughts. Just dirt and roots and sweet nothing. That’s probably some kind of mercy.
Then came the pull.
Not by a hand or shovel—more like some cosmic fishing line yanked through my solar plexus.
One second I was basically dirt, and the next, I was choking on ash-heavy air, clawing my way out of a shallow trench.
Aboveground, I was surrounded by fresh, dug-up soil, and I followed the sound of voices—real, living voices—until I found them. My family and… everyone else.
Now, standing in the ruins of the courtyard, the reality of what I missed is hitting me like a gut punch.
My mother makes me drink from a bottle of water, then pulls me aside.
She talks fast, a summary of a nightmare.
She tells me about the escalation at Heathborne.
A dragon taking Esme. The dragons. The clearbloods.
Our weakened spirit grid. Chad being an actual demon spy.
A dragon wedding Esme. The escalating war.
The breach. The Ide trials. The dragon taking Esme.
And then, she tells me about… Dominic Merlin and the passengers.
“We had no choice,” she murmurs. “We wouldn’t have survived without the Ides. They restored our defenses. And now you’re back.” She still stares at me in wonder, like she can’t quite believe I’ve returned in one piece.
I stare down at my hands, trying to process everything she just said. My head reels—but most of all, from the most immediate reality: an Ide. I have an Ide inside me.
That’s not something I expected to wake up to.
I’m not sure when exactly it entered me.
Maybe while I was still underground? My memory is hazy.
I close my eyes and reach inward, not sure what I should expect to feel.
A monster? A cold, oily thing sliding through my thoughts; a parasite?
I feel Brynn’s eyes on me as I try to probe deeper, toward the center of my being, my mind.
Then I feel something. A pressure behind my eyes, like the beginning of a migraine but without pain.
I probe at it mentally, expecting the cold invasion of a foreign entity, but instead encounter a strange warmth radiating from this presence.
It feels... not right, but not wrong either.
Like déjà vu without a memory, or recognizing someone I've never met.
I pull back, disoriented, needing to catch my breath.
Whatever this thing is, it isn't what I expected. I need more time and space to understand what's happening inside my own head.
My stomach lets out a low, hollow growl. I’m basically a walking biohazard, covered in a crust of cemetery loam. Before I do anything else, I need to scrub the taste of death out of my mouth and consume my weight in protein.
My eyes drift to Dominic as he steps forward in… Elliot Crane’s body, and I feel a prickle of unease. How did that work? Did Dominic even ask for permission before borrowing Elliot’s autonomy?
Brynn asks my question before I can.
“Did you even ask Elliot?” she pipes up. “Before you sunk into his body?”
Dominic tilts Elliot's head, a faint smile touching his lips. “Elliot was happy to oblige.” His dark gaze is steady. “He is a distant descendant of mine. Blood calls to blood, and he understood the stakes.”
Then he turns to the rest of the crowd. “The battle for survival is over for today,” he announces, his voice vibrating through the courtyard.
“Go. Wash the ash from your skin. Break bread. Sleep. We will rebuild these stones, but first, we must rebuild the spirit. For the next few days, we start life anew.”
His gaze lingers on me, and for a second, the pressure in my skull pushes back. I don't argue. I don't have the strength right now. I just want a hot shower and a meal. Then, I need to figure out where Jax ends and this passenger begins.
Mom guides me back toward the academy’s residential wing. The hallways are quiet, coated in a fine layer of gray dust that muffles our footsteps. She walks me to my door, her hand resting on the wood for a moment before she lets me in.
“Get some rest, Jax,” she says. “Tomorrow is... well, tomorrow. One day at a time. I’ll send food up from the kitchen now.”
“Thanks,” I say, then step into my room and shut the door.
The silence is deafening. This is my personal space, but I feel strangely distant from it.
My books are where I left them, stacked in precarious towers beside my bed instead of on the half-empty shelf.
My clothes are folded-ish. My bed is made—the only thing that’s truly neat in the room, thanks to Mom drilling that habit into me since I was seven.
It’s a snapshot of a life that halted when Mazrov attacked me.
I move to the bathroom, my movements stiff.
I strip and turn on the shower, cranking it until steam billows.
The temperature is a welcome shock to my system.
I duck under, watching dirt spiral down the drain while I scrub shampoo through my hair.
My shoulders are locked up tighter than Darkbirch security.
I press my forehead against the tile, letting the water pound my neck like a sadistic massage therapist. Moving feels like wading through concrete, but when I glance down, I'm weirdly still ripped. No muscle loss. No sunken chest. Still got the six-pack I worked my ass off for.
Guess the darkblood spirit-healing-magic does wonders for muscle retention. Who needs creatine when you've got dead relatives wrapped around you like mystical Saran Wrap? I should market this to the gym bros.
Soap sluices down my ribs. The water running into the drain eventually turns clear.
I kill the water and grab a towel, wiping steam from my face as I step onto the bathroom mat. The hot shower helped, but I still feel off. Not sick exactly, just... different.
After toweling off, I dig through my closet for something clean. My hand closes on an old pair of sweatpants and a faded Darkbirch graveball shirt, Blackroot Wardens across the chest. Been a while since I played.
Graveball—the darkblood version of rugby crossed with magical parkour—was my thing from about thirteen on.
I even made second string for the Wardens before Mazrov.
We didn’t get many chances to play, or just mess around in general, but when we did…
let’s just say I was the last guy you wanted across from you.
I pull the shirt over my head. The subtle pressure in my skull pulses again—stronger now, insistent, like someone pressing a thumb against the inside of my forehead. I wince, rubbing at my temples.
I return to the bathroom, needing my toothbrush, and glance up at the mirror.
My heart nearly stops.
The face staring back isn’t mine.
It’s my father’s.
Theodore Salem’s features have overlaid my reflection completely, sharp and unmistakable despite the lingering steam.
The same strong jaw I inherited. The same crease between his brows, deepening in concentration.
He looks exactly as I remember him—right down to the faint scar above his left eyebrow.
Except his eyes are dark, almost black, not gray.
Fuck.
I stumble backward, nearly tripping over the commode.
“It's me,” a voice says clearly in my head. Not my voice. His. “It's your dad.”
“Holy shit,” I whisper, my voice barely audible over the pounding of my heart. My fingers dig into the edge of the sink as I lean forward. “Dad? How—what—?”