Chapter 36
Elira
There was a woman in the crowd who looked familiar.
I didn’t know why I kept noticing her—why her face kept surfacing again and again—but there she was. Always watching. She looked harmless, with kind eyes and a soft smile. Almost like she was too gentle for this place.
That was it, wasn’t it?
She didn’t belong.
Maybe that was it. Maybe it was the simple fact that she looked out of place.
I pushed the thought aside as I stepped up to my second match, rolling my shoulders and cracking my neck. I needed to focus. I couldn’t afford any distractions.
My sleep last night had been fleeting at most and full of nightmares. When they woke me to tell me my next fight was about to begin, I was almost glad.
Fighting was a welcome reprieve from the thoughts that threatened to devour me.
Adrenalin powered me as I got to the arena. I was allowed to pick from a selection of weapons on the ground before me, all still bloody and stained from former battle. I missed my blades, but at least the steel was sharp. It was just as well.
Apparently, I wasn’t the only one with powers that shouldn’t exist—judging by the hulking wolf shifter pacing the arena floor in front of me.
Shifters were always big—I knew that. But this one was a monster.
Towering at least two feet above me, muscle stacked on muscle, he looked like he’d been bred for carnage.
All I had were my shadows and my speed. So, I used them.
I ducked low, blades flashing in bursts. Shadows lashed and coiled around his limbs, forcing him off balance. Every strike was calculated. Swift. Precise.
But then—I saw her again.
In the crowd. Closer now. Staring at me like she knew me.
That pause was all he needed.
A crushing blow cracked into the side of my skull. The world tilted. My knees gave way. Blood ran warm and slick down my face.
The crowd howled—but I couldn’t hear them. Not over the ringing in my ears. Not over the memories trying to claw their way out.
I dropped under another swing and drove my shadows into his knee, sending him crashing down. My fist followed—a blur of darkness to the back of his head. He slumped forward, out cold.
The chanting rose again—Shadow, Shadow, Shadow—but it sounded distant. Like it belonged to someone else.
I staggered off the fighting ground, one hand pressed to my temple. The blood was sticky. My vision doubled.
Something flickered at the edges—shapes, light, voices. A woman. A song.
Another jolt of pain cracked through my skull. I gasped—
And then hands caught me.
“Princess…”
A whisper. Gentle. Impossible.
I blinked up—and saw her. Blurred by blood and pain, but unmistakable.
That same soft face. The eyes. The kindness that didn’t belong here.
My heart stuttered.
“…Liora?” I breathed.
She smiled. Sad. Knowing.
“You’re dead,” I whispered.
But the moment I said it, the world folded inward.
Not down—but back. Into memory.
**
“Now, now, Miss Elira. Stay still,” came the gentle but firm voice.
I squirmed on the velvet-cushioned stool, arms crossed tight across my chest. “I hate this. It hurts.”
Liora hummed softly, running the brush through my tangled hair with as much care as she could muster—but it still felt like she was tearing through it with a tree branch.
“It wouldn’t hurt so much if you didn’t go to bed with leaves in it,” she murmured, trying to soothe.
“My room has barely any windows. What else am I supposed to look at except the dirt?”
The room around us was dim, always dim. He didn’t like me having windows open. He said someone might see me. That I was for his eyes only.
So, I had my little room. My tiny garden. And her.
Liora.
My nanny. My protector. The only warmth in this cold place.
“You know he likes to see you looking pretty, Miss Elira,” she said softly. “We don’t want another incident like last time, do we?”
I flinched, my fingers brushing over the bruise hidden beneath my sleeve.
“I hate him, Liora,” I whispered, tears prickling. “I wish he’d leave me alone forever.”
“I know, child. I know.” She paused, then added quietly, “But you must be careful. You don’t want to upset him again.”
My hands balled into fists.
“He looks at me,” I choked. “He’s always looking. I wish I was ugly. I wish I was disgusting so he’d stop.”
“Elira…” Liora’s voice wavered.
“No!” I shoved away from the stool and bolted out of the room, heart pounding.
Outside, the air was cool. The little garden was walled in with tall hedges and iron fences—my only freedom. A few toys lay scattered in the grass. I grabbed a ball and threw it hard, too hard. It arced high into the air and disappeared over the hedge.
“No!” I cried, collapsing onto the ground. Hot tears spilled down my cheeks as I sobbed into the dirt.
Then—thud.
The ball rolled gently back through the bushes.
I sat up, startled. I blinked through the green leaves, crawling toward the hedge.
Peeking through a small gap, I gasped.
There was a boy on the other side. Ragged hair, muddy clothes, wide soft brown eyes.
He looked about my age.
“Don’t cry,” he said quickly. “Did you get your ball?”
I nodded, still stunned. “Yes… thank you! But—who are you?”
He grinned, crooked and wild. “I’m Finn. Want to be friends?”
**
I woke to the feel of fingers gently brushing hair from my face. Familiar.
I blinked up, disoriented, into Finn’s older—more worn—face. There were shadows beneath his eyes, and a tightness in his jaw. But when he saw me awake, something in him softened.
“You’re awake,” he breathed, voice rough with relief. “Jasper said you collapsed in the tunnel. He brought you to me. Are you okay?”
I sat up too fast. Pain flared behind my eyes, sharp and immediate. I winced and clutched at my temple.
“I… collapsed?”
“Yeah,” he said, watching me carefully. “Took a hit pretty hard. But you still won the fight.” His voice dipped into something bitter. “Mother’s very pleased. We might even get real food tonight.”
He tried to joke, but I wasn’t listening. Not really.
Something must’ve shifted in my expression, because his smile faltered. His brow furrowed as he studied me, uncertainty creeping into his features.
“What?” he asked cautiously.
I stared at him.
And for a moment, I didn’t see the man he’d become—I saw the boy behind the hedge. The liar behind the bars.
Betrayal coiled in my gut like a slow-burning poison, eating its way through the part of me that still wanted to believe him.
“I’ve been dreaming a lot lately,” I said quietly.
Finn shifted beside me. “Have you?”
“These dreams… they don’t feel like dreams.” I looked at him. “They feel like memories. Ones I wasn’t supposed to have.”
He blinked—once, twice. His face had gone still.
“Elle…”
“Did you lie to me, Finn?”
I didn’t raise my voice. I didn’t accuse. I just asked—flat, raw, and cold.
He dropped back like he’d been struck, landing hard on the stone floor. The colour bled from his face.
I didn’t stop.
“Please,” I said. “Just tell me the truth.”
“You don’t understand—”
“Who is Liora?” The name hit the air like a knife.
Finn’s lip trembled. His hands pressed to the ground like he needed it to stop himself from falling apart.
“Please, Elle… it’s not worth it—”
“You told me you found me in the woods,” I said, my voice starting to shake. “You said we met when I was sixteen.”
I leaned in, my breath shallow. My hands were trembling.
“But that’s not true, is it?”
Finn looked stricken, haunted.
“Elle,” he breathed, “I love you. I just wanted to protect you.”
“So, you lied to me?” I said, bitter and breathless. “Was I not meant to remember?”
“Liora said you wouldn’t. That it would be kinder if you forgot. I thought it would be kinder. Elle, I swear.”
“Tell me what you know, Finn. Everything.” My voice cracked. “How do I know Vael? How do you know him? Who is Liora? What happened to me?”
I was shaking now. My heart thundered. I could barely breathe.
Finn’s face crumpled under the weight of what he’d kept buried.
“You were supposed to forget forever,” he whispered. “That’s what she said.”
“Who? Liora?”
He nodded. “You don’t understand, Elle. When I met you… yes, I didn’t tell you everything. Because knowing would only hurt you more.”
“Vael called you a broken shifter,” I said, voice low and cutting. “Why?”
His shoulders sank, his gaze falling to the floor.
“Because I was born into a pack of wolves. My parents, my brother—they all shifted young. Strong. Proud. But me…” He swallowed hard. “I never got an animal.”
My breath caught. “You… have no wolf?”
He looked away. “In my pack, that’s worse than death. A shifter with no form is a disgrace. A defect. My family disowned me the day I turned seven. Left me in the woods to die.”
“Oh gods,” I whispered. “You were seven?”
“I should’ve died out there,” he said, voice hollow. “But I had the instincts. I knew how to move, how to survive. So, I stayed close to the castle grounds—stealing scraps, sleeping in hollows.”
He looked up at me then. The boy I once knew flickered behind his older eyes.
“And one day, my path took me near the woods, to that old cottage no one was allowed near. Everyone knew about it. Tall hedges. Iron gates. A place whispered about—but never approached.”
“Vael’s cottage,” I said, my throat tightening around the words. “And mine.”
Finn nodded slowly. “No one knew you were there. Not until that day I threw the ball back over the hedge.”
I was trembling now, my whole body aching with the weight of what I already knew—and didn’t want to know.
“I was… a prisoner?”
His silence said more than words. Then, quietly: “He kept you in a tiny room. Almost no windows. You hated it. If you disobeyed… if you fought back… he’d lock you in the cupboard. Chain you to the walls.” Finn’s voice cracked. “That was your punishment space.”
I recoiled instinctively, pulling back as if the memories themselves could reach through the air and claw at me.