Chapter 15
“I’m so glad I’m not you right now,” Lakota huffed.
“Shut up.”
“I couldn’t cut the tension in that room with my talons.”
I threw up my mental gates, blocking him out momentarily. But he wasn’t wrong.
Rhodes and I had been in the Hollow’s war room for ten minutes, and discomfort crawled beneath my skin like hives. A mix of fighters occupied the long table at the center—some were wardens of the border, others were blades who traveled beyond for combat. Fallon leaned against the back wall.
Across from us, a younger man lounged in a chair by the window, casually carving a piece of wood into a spike and blowing the shavings onto the floor.
He had brown, wavy hair with shaved sides. He looked familiar—too familiar—but with the low light and my angle, I couldn’t place where I knew him from. His leathers were styled differently from what was common in the Hollow.
The chatter died the moment I stepped into the room, making it painfully clear I was the reason for the silence.
Nausea rolled in my gut.
The door swung open, and the room moved as one. Every soldier rose, heads bowing as Arrow Fitzroy strode in and claimed the largest seat at the end of the table.
“Report,” he muttered.
Chairs scraped against the floor as everyone sat, except for Fallon and a female warden clutching a scroll. She unrolled it across the table, revealing a detailed map of Kalymdor.
“Everything is in place for the Mageia mission, General. Now that Scarlet Thorne is awake and ready to begin, we can proceed with our infiltration and search the college grounds.”
Arrow gave a subtle nod, signaling for her to sit. His gaze swept the room. “Where are we in locating the Key?”
Silence. A heavy, knowing kind.
Finally, a male blade spoke. “From what we’ve gathered, the object was last in the possession of a professor at Mageia.
Based on Kalluri’s intel, Cora Reyes was caught snooping through faculty offices.
She claimed she was searching for something unimportant—but now that we know Reyes is a Tyrian spy, and three professors are dead, we can assume she was after the artifact. ”
My heart jolted. “Three are dead?”
The blade nodded solemnly. “Allionadda Maksimov was lost in an explosion of natural fire.”
The air was ripped from my lungs. Professor Maksimov—Allie—had offered us private flying lessons outside our regular class schedule.
Unlike the others, she didn’t bend to Kalluri’s every whip.
She had stormed into his office after the Burn Trials, defending me during my interrogation—even though she barely knew me.
But she knew of Lakota, and of his previous rider.
Another professor unafraid to seek the truth. Another professor dead.
Arrow tapped a finger against the table, the sound sharp in the quiet room. Then he fixed me with a stare that sent a shiver down my spine.
“Scarlet,” he said, his voice measured. “Do you know what Reyes was after?”
A lump formed in my throat. I swallowed it down, feeling the burn at my fingertips as my element flared in response. I forced it back before stray sparks could escape. Stepping forward, I placed my hands on the table.
“Shayde Wylder confirmed the Grim is searching for access to the Eternal Tomb. This Key you speak of must be related to that.”
Soft gasps rippled through the room. I ignored them, forcing my tone to remain indifferent. “When we were on the mountain, she had a broken shard of the Mareki Gem—one that can steal elemental magic from another, draining their life in the process.”
Arrow’s nostrils flared.
Fallon pushed off the wall, stepping closer until she leaned on her knuckles against the table, staring me down.
“She declared her intent to become an archmage,” I said, keeping my voice steady, “which I assume would serve Tyria’s conquest of the continent. But I don’t understand the importance of the Eternal Tomb. Isn’t it heavily guarded by Mageia at all times? That’s what the public has always been told.”
“No, it is not.” Fallon slowly shook her head, her eyes void of emotion. “That is a lie Mageia spread across Arya to keep them from looking.”
I let out an exasperated breath. “How is that possible? Mageia is our war college. How are Aryans supposed to feel safe when their leaders are outright lying to them?”
Fallon smirked. “Because Mageia’s leadership is a bunch of—”
“Fallon,” Arrow warned, his tone edged with authority.
She inhaled deeply, reined herself in, then refocused. “You said Wylder believes Cora is after the Eternal Tomb. Does he believe, or does he know?”
I flinched, weighing her words. She was pushing, testing me. I fought the urge to let her sharp tone push me into defiant silence.
“He knows,” I snapped. My fingers curled into fists at my sides. “I was also constrained and interrogated by Captain Thorne’s men for the same information.”
“That’s not possible,” said the familiar fighter by the window, not looking up from his carving.
A heavy pause settled over the room.
Rhodes stepped up to the table then, his presence sharp, cutting. I could feel his gaze burning through me, but I kept my focus locked on Fallon. Her eyes widened slightly before she schooled her expression back to neutrality.
In the chaos of those last weeks at Mageia, I had unintentionally kept that a secret—until now.
“They wanted information about the Eternal Tomb.” My voice was steady, but the memory clawed at the edges of my mind. “After burning my skin with a fire-hot poker, they resorted to using a truth powder on me.”
I hesitated, the pause stretching as the memory resurfaced—how strange it felt to shut my mental gates that day. How it felt like someone else was there, pushing the gate closed beside me.
My breath caught. My eyes snapped back to Fallon’s.
Her usual wicked expression had softened just slightly—enough to reveal something I had never seen from her before.
Resolution.
“Was that you?” I asked breathlessly.
Before she could answer, Arrow stood. “That could not have been Captain Thorne’s men. Is he still sworn under the Glade’s loyalty?”
Arrow’s question sliced through the moment, redirecting every gaze in the room. I tore my eyes from Fallon, the unspoken question between us left hanging.
The man with the wavy brown hair had risen from his chair, stepping forward with quiet confidence. He nodded in agreement, his carved wooden spike forgotten in his grip.
“Yes, General,” Rhodes replied, his gray-blue eyes fixed intently on Arrow’s. “Captain Thorne serves my father, and his loyalty to the Shadow Glade’s legion is spoken of with reverence.”
My brows scrunched. “The men claimed Thorne sent them. And it’s no coincidence they were also asking about the Tomb—just like the Grim.”
“You’re wrong.” Arrow’s voice was sharp, absolute. “Captain Thorne has been searching for the same answers as the Hollow since he enlisted. If that’s what they said, they must have been lying—trying to put a target on Thorne’s back.”
If that’s what they said.
He was dismissing me. Belittling me.
My pulse quickened. A slow burn spread through my chest, anger twisting in my gut.
“That is what they said,” I growled, slamming my palms onto the table. Sparks ignited at my fingertips, searing tiny scorch marks into the wood.
A sudden rush of water from a nearby elemental doused my hands, snuffing out the embers. I yanked them back, flicking off the droplets as I stared at the charred marks on the table. Conversation about the Eternal Tomb ricocheted around the room, but my gaze didn’t move.
“Out of all our missions into Mageia, we have never been able to find the entrance.”
“It’s a suicide mission to go back right now. Everything is on lockdown.”
“Kalluri wants his cadets back. If we send them in, they’ll never be released.”
“We have to make haste. If the Mareki isn’t mended in time, the Forgotten Realm will crumble. All magic will be lost.”
My head snapped up. “The Forgotten Realm?”
Silence slammed into the space like a blade. Every head turned toward me.
Arrow leaned forward. “The Mareki’s prophecy,” he said. “On the day you two were born, a Seer visited the Hollow. She laid her hand upon your foreheads and recited the prophecy as a warning.”
Pieces snapped together. “I know where the Eternal Tomb is.”
“Tell them,” Lakota encouraged me.
The room stilled.
I swallowed hard. “There was a time when I heard Captain Thorne approaching in the hall, and I wanted to… hide. I wasn’t doing anything wrong, but I didn’t want to face him.
” My eyes dropped to the floor, fingers curling against my palms. “The only thing big enough to conceal me was a bookshelf, so I pressed myself against it, hoping he’d pass without noticing me.
But the moment my weight shifted against the wood, the shelf…
disappeared. And I fell backward into a dark corridor. ”
The silence sharpened.
“Once Thorne and his soldier passed… they couldn’t see me.
I was kneeling right there, staring straight at him, but it was like I didn’t exist. The bookshelf isn’t just furniture—it’s a magical barrier, one that only I can pass through.
My friends couldn’t follow. No one else could get through the ward. ”
The wavy-haired man narrowed his eyes. “Your friends?” His voice carried an edge. “You told your friends about this? Did you reveal this to Shayde Wylder?”
I snapped my head up. “No. I—I didn’t. Only my roommates knew.”
Fallon tapped her knuckles against the table, her expression unreadable. “But Shayde suspects it. I caught him scrutinizing a bookshelf in Mageia last year. It wasn’t just some random shelf to him.”
My brows furrowed in question.
Her eyes cut to our father.
“What did you find within this corridor?” Arrow asked.