Chapter Thirty-Four
I haven’t touched this journal in over a year. I thought if I ignored it long enough, the ache might dull.
It hasn’t.
He’s gone, dead, and the space he left behind just keeps getting louder.
But I’m writing because I don’t want to lose the day I met him. Not yet. Not after everything.
It was at the market, of all places.
I was on duty. He was leaning against a cart of smuggled scales like he wanted to be caught. Arrogant. Outerlander. Cocky in that infuriating, casual way that only someone outside the system can be.
I told him I could Reassign him on the spot. He laughed and said, “Then do it.” I don’t know why I didn’t. I should have. I meant to. But something in his eyes, there was no fear. Just curiosity, like I was the one being studied.
So I left.
But I went back.
Twice. Then four times. Then I stopped counting.
He made me angry, almost every time we spoke. He asked me questions no one else ever had, challenged everything and called the Citadel a system. Said we were taught obedience, not truth. He accused me of following rules I didn’t believe in, and worse—he was right.
I told myself I was meeting him to gather intel. Then I told myself I was just trying to understand.
But the truth is, I kept going back because when I was with him… I didn’t feel like a soldier. I felt like myself.
He was wild. Sharp in all the ways I wasn't. Smarter than he let on. And stars, he was kind in a way that felt dangerous. He showed me places I wasn’t supposed to see.
Told me stories that never made it into the Citadel’s records.
He said history was written by survivors, not saints.
And that some truths only survive in blood, not books.
If I had Reassigned him that day, I would’ve done everything right. Yet I would have missed the most honest thing I’ve ever had.
Loving him cost me everything I thought I needed, but he gave me something the Citadel never could.
He gave me you.
And damn me… I’d choose him. Every time.
Even if it meant losing him again. Over and over.
Moonlight spills through the window, pale and thin, but just enough to read the journal resting open in my lap. I haven’t turned the page in minutes. My hands won’t let go—knuckles locked white, grip so tight it aches. Like if I hold on hard enough, maybe the truth won’t sink in.
But it already has. She lied.
She said he was a coward. A criminal. Outerlander trash who chose smugglers over family. Said he abandoned us, abandoned me, and then got himself killed before I was born.
But that’s not what these pages say. He loved her. She loved him. They ran. Together. And then he died.
All my life, I thought Innerlanders and Outerlanders couldn’t mix—couldn’t trust each other, couldn’t even understand each other.
Turns out, they did. Turns out, I exist because they did.
So why did she tell me he left? Why paint him as the villain? What else has she twisted to fit the version of the world she wanted me to believe?
I was raised to think the system was clean lines, good and bad. Control and chaos. Inner and Outer, but now I’m not so sure. Now, it’s all bleeding together.
If I can’t trust her version of him, what else do I have to question?
Ezzy. Finn. Rowan. They’re all Innerlanders. And they’re nothing like what I was taught to expect. They’re my friends. And if they aren’t what I was told… If my dad wasn’t…
Then maybe Talen isn’t either.
Maybe I’ve been wrong about him, too.
I keep saying he’s just another weapon of the Citadel. Another loyal dog in polished black. I’ve told myself he’s the enemy because it was easier than admitting I don’t know where he stands. Or where I do.
If I believe this… then what does that make me? What does that make him?
Maybe I’ve been wrong about him. About what he stands for... what if he isn’t like the rest of them? What if he’s more like me than I want to admit?
I don’t know what to do with any of this—what it means, what I’m supposed to feel.
So I shut the journal and place it down, lie back. And wait for sleep that’s not coming.
I wake up tired, restless, my eyes feel full of sleep, and my head’s a mess. The journal sits where I left it a week ago, half-open on the bedside table like it’s daring me to pick it up again. I don’t.
Not because I don’t want to know, I do. But the weight of what I’ve already read is enough to make my stomach turn. Another page would be like stepping off a cliff blindfolded. And I can’t, not with everything else hanging over me right now.
So I leave it there. Pretend it’s just a book. Pretend I’m not afraid of what’s in it.
My mum’s version of my dad is already cracked and bleeding. One more truth, and it might shatter completely. And if it does, then what does that make me? I’m not ready to find out, not yet.
So my mind keeps sliding away from the journal because it’s easier, safer, to think about something else. Someone else.
Talen.
The thought is dangerous. It sparks and catches on to the next one before I can stop it—the kiss.
God, the kiss.
He’s been gone all week, but not seeing him has done exactly nothing to ease the pressure building under my skin.
And I’m not talking about my magic.
The ache’s getting worse. Low, hot, and constant, like something crawled under my skin, now begging to be let out.
I’d happily deal with it myself if I had even a scrap of privacy.
But Ezzy’s always snoring four feet away, and the bathing chambers?
Packed. Always. I haven’t had time alone since I got here over five months ago, and my body fucking knows it.
Back home, I could get myself off in the dark and sleep easy after.
Here, I’m left buzzing, restless, wound so tight I could snap.
The only thing that calms me a little bit is the blossoms, white and pink choking the streets like the Innerlands are desperate to look softer than they are.
The air’s warmer, the days are longer. Almost enough to trick you into thinking things are easy.
But then I remember Call Week, and every bloom just feels like a clock ticking louder, petals dropping like they’re counting down to my turn.
And I didn’t come back to the Citadel to watch flowers open or fantasise about Talen. I came for answers, about Ashvale, about what really happened. I owe them to Rhiann, to Charlie, to Nessi. If I don’t find them, then walking away—leaving everything, leaving Bren—was for nothing.
I miss him. Not the heat, but the steadiness, the friend.
But none of that matters if I don’t survive Call Week. One blade, one slip of my own magic, and I’m done before I ever learn the truth. Two weeks. That’s all I’ve got to lock my Threads down tight, to live long enough to get what I came for.
Talen’s had me out on the ledge for twelve days straight, watching every step, pushing me harder than I wanted. The fear’s still there—chest cinched, knees locking the second I look down—but I’ll give him this: It's helped. The knotting comes easier now.
It was brutal at first. Him just standing there, watching. He didn’t laugh—but the smirk was there, subtle and annoying, like he was trying very hard not to say something clever.
But he never pushed, never rushed.
When I panicked or froze, he’d let me ask questions, which helped more than I want to admit. Nothing deep, nothing useful that helps me find answers—just scraps, simple things about him.
Turns out his brother, Ezekiel, was a bit of a troublemaker—ran with the wrong crowds, drank too much, always in the middle of something loud or reckless.
Talen tried to warn him. Said the Citadel doesn’t look the other way forever, and being a Veirmont wouldn’t protect him.
If anything, it painted a bigger target on his back. Made him perfect for a public lesson.
They were close, but clashed constantly. The same goes for his parents. From the way he talks, he doesn’t seem particularly tight with them either. Still, none of that stops his voice from cracking when he says his brother’s name.
The day after, I didn't push or ask him anything; instead, he sat and drew in his sketchbook, occasionally looking up at me. I told him he’d better not be drawing me, especially not like the ones he did of Beth; he didn't answer, but a small crooked grin spread across his face anyway.
After twelve days straight, I finally got a break from battling my brain’s irrational urge to panic at elevation. Talen’s been gone all week. Something’s stirring in the Outerlands. Patrols are doubling, but no one’s saying why.
So I’ve been training with Beth and catching up on stuff with Rowan.
Despite figuring out that the symbol on the doors is the old crest of Aurelia, we’ve made next to no progress linking it to Ashvale or the dragons.
No surprise there. Brian did come back with more of his dad's old books for ‘Ezzy’ though, they’re all on dragons.
Some of it Rowan already knew, but all of it was new to me.
Apparently, dragons hold magic the same way we do. But they can’t release it, not without a rider. Without bonding, their Threads build. Slow. Relentless. Until it ruptures them from the inside. They die like that, burned out by their own power.
The author called it Internal Resonance Failure. Said it didn’t happen until after mating age. Like the body waited, let them breed before it finally breaks.
But before the Treaty, before the Citadel outlawed bonding over three hundred years ago, it was different.
Back then, if a dragon found a rider with compatible Threads, they could share the weight.
Magic flowed between them. The dragon got a release, and the rider—well, they got the strength of a dragon in return.
Some lived for centuries if they continued to find new riders.
It figures the Citadel cast them out, too dangerous letting anyone walk around carrying that much power.