Chapter 35 Make Reckless Decisions Alone
(Because Communication Is for Heroes)
Arabella
The vial was lighter than it should have been.
I turned it over in my fingers, watching the opalescent liquid shift like trapped moonlight. Mnemosyne’s warning echoed in my head: Wait until you have someone you trust with you. Sound advice, really. The kind any sensible person would follow.
Too bad I’d never been accused of being sensible.
“What do you think?” I asked Nyx, who had somehow managed to wedge herself into the narrow alley between two shops.
Her silver eyes tracked the vial with unnerving intensity.
“You count as someone I trust, right? You’re here for moral support.
And to stop me from doing anything too catastrophically stupid. ”
She huffed, a puff of smoke curling from her nostrils. She knew me too well.
The morning had started badly and gotten worse. I’d given up on sleep around dawn. The attack itself hadn’t kept me awake—that had been over so fast I’d barely registered the danger before Kaz shoved me aside. No, it was what came after.
The look in his eyes as he’d torn through those assassins hadn’t been entirely human.
I’d seen Kaz angry before. Seen him possessive, violent, utterly ruthless. But last night had been different. For a moment, just a heartbeat, I could have sworn I’d seen someone else looking out through his eyes. Someone older. Angrier.
Someone who’d worn a crown of shadows and made the world kneel.
The same presence I’d glimpsed in that vision weeks ago, when the Heirloom had shown me the truth about what—who—my husband really was.
And then, his struggle last night during our hunt through the Spire. He tried to hide it, but couldn’t completely. Not from Thorne, and definitely not from me. The crack in his usual control was alarming.
My fingers tightened around the vial. I knew I should have told him about the Shadow King.
Should have told him weeks ago. But how exactly did one bring up that particular conversation?
“Darling, remember that time you had a vision and forgot about it? Well, funny story—you’re actually history’s greatest monster. Pass the wine?”
No. He had enough to deal with. Adding an existential crisis about being the Shadow King would only make things worse.
Besides, if the ritual with the Alchemist had weakened him enough for the Shadow King to start bleeding through… well, knowledge might not be power in this case. It might be the final push that let the ancient bastard take control completely.
Nyx bumped her head against my shoulder, nearly knocking me into the wall.
She’d been like this all morning—my scaly, overprotective shadow.
Even during last night’s hunt, she’d positioned herself between Kaz and me whenever his control seemed to slip, her silver eyes tracking his every movement with wary suspicion.
She’d seen it too. Whatever was happening to him.
“I’m fine,” I told her for the hundredth time. “And you’re here to make sure I stay that way, right? That’s what Mnemosyne meant by having someone trustworthy. Someone to ground me.”
She preened slightly at being called trustworthy, her scales shimmering with pride. Never mind that she was still a juvenile, still learning to control her own abilities. She was my dragon, and that made her infinitely more reliable than, say, telling Kaz what I was about to do.
Because that conversation would go over wonderfully.
No, Nyx was the perfect solution. Present, protective, and unlikely to ask uncomfortable questions about ancient evils or marital honesty.
The confrontation with Kaz this morning had been a masterclass in barely controlled tension. When dawn came, I’d found Kaz still in the library, shadows pooling around him like he’d forgotten how to dismiss them.
“Did you sleep at all?” I’d asked.
“No.” The word had been clipped, exhausted. “But I will find him. I will find whoever’s behind this.”
“You need rest.”
“I need answers.”
“You need—” I’d bitten off the rest. You need to stop letting the thing inside you drive you to exhaustion. “Fine. Do what you want.”
His laugh had been bitter. “Since when do I need your permission?”
And there it was. The heart of our problem, laid bare in seven words. We’d gone from forced proximity to genuine partnership to this careful dance around each other’s feelings. Too proud to apologize. Too connected to truly separate.
Nyx had chosen that moment to squeeze through the doorway, plant herself between us, and growl at Kaz. Just like last night, I’d expected him to be furious. And, just like last night, he’d surprised me.
“Keep her with you,” he’d said. “At all times.”
“I don’t need a babysitter.”
“You need protec—” He’d cut himself off, jaw clenching. I’d felt the effort it took not to lock me somewhere safe until he’d eliminated every possible threat. “Just… keep the dragon close.”
And then he’d left to go back to his hunt.
I’d left right after. Obviously, he hadn’t wanted me with him during the day any more than he’d wanted me there last night—not really. But that didn’t mean I had to sit around and twiddle my thumbs all day in the apartment.
Now, standing in this alley with my possibly catastrophic decision in a bottle, I wondered if I was making things worse.
I’d been wandering the market levels for the better part of an hour, the vial burning a hole in my pocket, until I’d ducked into this narrow space between shops and thought: Screw it.
I needed to know. Needed to understand what had been taken from me, what memories Auremar’s mages had locked away. Maybe they’d help me understand why I was drawn to dangerous men with ancient souls. Maybe they’d show me how to help Kaz without destroying what was left of him.
Or maybe they’d drive me mad. Only one way to find out.
“If this goes badly,” I told Nyx, “don’t let me jump out a window. Or set anything important on fire. Or marry any more Dark Lords.”
She rumbled agreement, though I caught a hint of amusement at that last part. Her attention sharpened, silver eyes fixed on me with an intensity that suggested she understood the gravity of what I was about to do.
I uncorked the vial. The scent hit me immediately—roses and copper and something that made my heroic bloodline sing with recognition. My mother’s magic, maybe. Or just the echo of what had been stolen.
“Bottoms up,” I muttered, and downed it in one go.
For a moment, nothing happened. The potion tasted of summer rain and old books, sliding down my throat smoothly. I had enough time to think maybe Mnemosyne had given me a dud, some overpriced placebo for desperate nobles.
Then the world exploded into fragments of the past, and I understood why she’d wanted someone trustworthy nearby.
The alley tilted sideways. Nyx’s concerned rumble seemed to come from very far away as the first memory crashed into me.
Mother’s hands, gentle on my hair. “Remember, little rose, power isn’t in the magic itself. It’s in choosing when to bloom and when to show your thorns.”
Another memory, sharper now. A dark-haired man with stern eyes kneeling beside my bed. “Your mother is sick, Arabella, and the tower helps her feel better.”
The memories came faster now, each one a shard of glass cutting through the fog of forgetfulness.
My mother teaching me to channel light into my palms. My father—and it was strange to see him young, almost caring—warning me to hide my gifts.
“The king has uses for girls like you,” he’d said. “Best he never knows what you can do.”
But I’d been young. Proud. Stupid.
The memory that came next made me gasp. I was eleven, standing in the great hall of Solandris’s Sunspire Palace, facing a man in royal robes. King Auremar, though younger, his golden crown catching the light. He’d wanted to see my magic, and I’d been so eager to impress.
The light I’d conjured had been beautiful. Pure. Everything the heroic bloodline was meant to be.
His smile had been worse than any sneer. “Magnificent,” he’d said. “She’ll do nicely.”
Do for what? I had remembered that event very differently—that the king had sent me home with barely a word.
Then I realized the original memory had been altered.
The image fragmented before I could find out anything more, but the next one provided context.
My mother, pale and shaking, arguing with my father in hushed tones.
“You can’t let him take her. You know what he does to girls with the bloodline—”
“The king has made his decision.”
“Then I’ll make mine.”
Light burst from my hands, and I was jerked back to the alley.
I stared at my palms, horrified, as golden radiance spilled between my fingers. Not the controlled magic I’d learned to wield, but something raw and primal, responding to the emotions flooding through me with each recovered memory.
Nyx’s head snapped toward me, her silver eyes widening. She moved quickly, wrapping herself around me, her wings folding over us both like a protective blanket.
My magic surged, wild and uncontrolled. This was bad. This was very, very bad. If anyone saw—if the Syndicate realized what power I wielded—
Then something extraordinary happened.
Nyx began to glow.
Not with reflected light, but with her own luminescence. The rosy tint that had been spreading across her scales brightened to a brilliant pink, and I felt our bond flare with sudden intensity. She was absorbing the magic, pulling it into herself.
“Nyx—” I tried to warn her, but another memory crashed over me and more power erupted in response.
The potion was working too well now, memories cascading over one another in a nauseating rush.
But Nyx held firm, her body a barrier between my uncontrolled magic and the rest of the Spire.
I felt her strain, felt her juvenile abilities stretched to their limit as she absorbed wave after wave of wild energy.
But I couldn’t stop watching the show in my head, couldn’t look away from the truth I’d been denied for so long.