Chapter Thirty-Seven #2
“You don’t have anything to say?” It comes out quieter than I expect.
She pauses, then shrugs like it’s nothing. “Not really... I mean, who am I to judge? Lucien’s hot, yeah. But mainly? He opens doors. Gets me access, helps me get close to people who otherwise wouldn’t give me the time of day.” She lifts her flask, taking a sip. “You gotta do what you gotta do.”
That’s it. No lecture, no moral compass, no judgment. Just… that. And it doesn’t absolve anything. Doesn’t make me feel better. But god, it helps. Just a little.
The lecture theatre door creaks open behind us. I glance back—Ezzy slips in, quiet, a little hesitant. Finn trails after her, hands shoved deep in his pockets.
Ezzy catches my eye and offers a small, sheepish smile. Guilt punches straight through me. I’ve been such a bitch. After the way we left things this morning—tense, clipped, cold—I don’t blame her for hesitating. She’s my friend. One of the only real ones I’ve got left.
“I should go. Thanks.” I say to Beth as I sling my pack over my shoulder. “See you tomorrow for Call Week.”
Beth nods. I turn toward the door, toward Ezzy, but she calls after me.
“Oh, and Lyra?” I pause. Look back. “Don’t stress about Talen,” she says, tone lighter now, like she’s trying not to make it a thing.
“Tomorrow, if you get Called, just focus on the match. You’re ready.
” Then she offers a half-smile. “And hey… even if the relationship’s fake, I don’t think his feelings are. I’m sure it’ll work out fine.”
My stomach drops.
Shit.
The words hit hard, too loud, too damn exposed.
I don’t move. Just stand there, facing Beth, everything inside me locked.
Please don't tell me Ezzy heard that...
But I feel it, that shift in the air behind me. The stillness. I already know. I turn, slow, like I’m bracing for impact.
She’s in the doorway. Smile gone. Brows drawn, mouth tight. Eyes wide, and worse—hurt.
“So it is fake?” Her voice cracks over the word. Not angry. Just… broken.
Behind me, Beth lets out a breath. “Shit, sorry, I thought… You two are so close, I just figured she already knew. Really should’ve kept my voice down. I'd better go.” Beth claps a hand to my back, awkward but not unkind. Then she slips past Ezzy and disappears into the corridor outside.
I take a step forward. “Ezzy, I can—”
“You know, I thought something was off.” She doesn’t raise her voice; that’s the worst part. “Little things that didn’t make sense. But I figured maybe you had a reason. Maybe there was something you couldn’t say.” She swallows hard. “It’s not even the lie, Lyra. It’s that you told her. Not me.”
“It’s not like that,” I rush out. “It’s—”
“Then what is it?” Her voice trembles now.
“You’ve been acting strange for weeks. Distant.
Always in the library with Rowan,” She shakes her head.
“And then yesterday, I bumped into Brian. He handed me a stack of books, said you’d asked him to get them for me.
Books on dragon strike patterns, Thread corruption, historical Reassignments.
” She looks straight at me. Eyes glossy.
“I told you to stop. Told you to leave it alone. And instead, you used my name to keep digging behind my back.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“What?” She cuts in. “Didn’t mean for me to find out? What are you trying to prove, Lyra? That the Citadel caused the dragon attack on Ashvale? That we’re responsible?” She gestures around us. “We’re here to protect people. To keep the peace. Why can’t you see that?”
I open my mouth, but nothing comes out. The words I’ve used to justify all of it—the risks, the lies—they feel so small now.
“Ezzy, please, let me explain.”
She holds up a hand. Shaking her head, her sparkly hairpin catching the light.
“No.” She steps back. “I don’t want to know. Not right now. I’m too angry.”
Then she’s gone, down the hall and out of reach. Finn lingers, just long enough to look at me, just one glance, and whatever’s still intact inside me—whatever I thought I’d salvaged—cracks wide open. He doesn’t even try to hide it. The disappointments plastered across his face.
I could chase them. The instinct’s there—rising fast, legs already twitching like they might move on their own. Say something. Fix it. Do something.
But I don’t. Because what the hell am I supposed to say?
That I've been lying to her since I got here, the tunnel, the truce, the fake relationship. Yeah. That will go over well. So my feet stay planted. She’s already gone, anyway and all I’ve got is the silence she left behind, and it’s loud as hell.
Alinor Bloom Entry #205
You turned five today.
I can't quite believe it. You are so full, Lyra. So alive in a way that makes the world feel too small for you already. I see it—stars, I feel it. Your Threads hum like they’re trying to speak through your skin.
I thought we’d have more time before they woke.
I thought if we just stayed quiet they would too.
But yours were never going to stay asleep. They were always going to burn.
We stayed in the Innerlands for you. So you could learn safely.
Grow into your magic instead of being punished for it.
Peter and I—well, we made choices. Hard ones.
And he was always better at hiding. He could lie like it was a second skin.
Knew how to avoid the Citadel’s eye, how to disappear just enough to stay alive.
You remind me of him more and more every day.
He would’ve been so proud of you. I wish he could see the way you scrunch your nose when you’re concentrating, or the way you’ve already started mimicking my casting gestures when you think I’m not watching. He would’ve told you stories. He would’ve taught you to dream.
But he's gone.
And not because he was careless. Because I was.
Things had been… off. We both felt it. Reassignments were increasing, Citadel officers snooping in places they never used to. Peter kept going north for scale runs, and each time he came back he looked at me like it might be the last.
He saw something he shouldn't have, I shared it with someone I shouldn't have.
I should’ve known better.
But when you’ve trusted someone your whole life—since you were kids, since training, since you bled side by side on the sparring mats—you don’t question them when they offer help. You don’t think they’ll hand you over for a promotion.
I told Morgan everything. She was my person. I thought friendship meant protection. Turns out, it was just a blueprint.
She knew exactly how to hurt me—because I showed her where to aim.
They came for him on a quiet afternoon.
I was eight months pregnant, coming home from the market, I turned the corner and saw them dragging your father out into the street like he was nothing. Kicking him. Spitting on him. Calling him a filthy Outerlander. I couldn't breathe. I couldn’t move.
But he saw me.
Even through the blood, even through the shouting, he found me. And in that second, we both knew.
That was it. It was over.
There was no escape left, no more games to play. Our time pretending we were just another quiet Innerland couple had run out.
So when the officer turned to me and asked if I knew him... I lied.
I said I lived on the other side of town. I said I’d never seen him before in my life.
But I knew they would come back, ask more questions, figure out I'd been hiding him all this time. So I ran. To his home, to the Outerlands, to the place I swore I’d never go. I ran carrying you and a grief so sharp it still hasn’t dulled.
You’ve asked me why I don’t talk about him. Why I don’t tell you stories.
It’s not because I don’t have them, Lyra.
And it’s not because they’re too painful to share, though they are.
It’s because when you grow up, I don’t want you digging.
Asking. Looking. Because if you find the truth—if you go chasing the pieces I buried—it won’t lead to safety.
It’ll lead to the people who took Peter.
And I can’t lose you too.
You’re all I have.
I’m all you have.
Remember Lyra. Every betrayal begins with a hand held in trust, and the closer they stand, the easier it is to fall.
I’m running late today, barely slept last night, and then overslept. Reading Mum’s journal didn’t help. And Ezzy didn’t wake me, though I don’t blame her for that. So many questions, but they will have to wait as today is the last day of Call Week.
The Rec Hall stinks as I shove the doors open.
Sweat, fear, burnt magic. No windows low enough to open, just slits near the ceiling where a bit of light sneaks through, but the seats are built in rings around the centre mat, so no matter where you’re sitting, you’ve got front-row tickets to the bloodbath.
It’s already packed when I get here—the first fights started, guess it wasn't my name that was called. Yet. I slip inside and spot an empty seat halfway up the rows.
No Finn. No Rowan. Definitely no Ezzy, of course not, I tore everything apart.
Now I get to sit here by myself, in the middle of a goddamn death pit, waiting to find out if the Citadel’s sense of justice decides if I’m next.
Head down, I shift past cadets as I make my way up the rows toward the seat, alone, just like I’ve done for the past four days.
The first day of Call Week was brutal. It sank into my bones like rot. It started at dawn. Cold air, tight silence. Then a name was called, and someone died.
Everyone acted like it was just another drill. A test. A game, even. But under the forced grins and thrum of energy, there was something wrong in the way they cheered. Something fractured in the way cadets leant forward when a name was called, like dogs scenting blood.
And the worst part?
Most of them liked it. No—loved it.
Watching. Nominating. Fighting. Killing.
No one called my name that day.
The next three days were worse. The fights started faster. Someone burned alive on the mat, screamed until their throat gave out. And the crowd cheered like it was theatre.
I couldn’t tell if it was fear or disgust curdling in my gut. Probably both.
Still, no one called my name. Or Ezzy’s. All week, I’d been scared that Elijah or Ryven might try to hurt me by going through her again. But this isn’t Non-Magical Combat. This is just a fight with no rules. No limits.
And Ezzy? She’s deadly with her Threads.
Rowan and Finn can handle themselves too—enough to make anyone think twice before trying something stupid. Besides, no one’s gunning for them.
Not like they are for me.
Elijah and Ryven have had their eyes on me all week, but they haven’t called me yet. Maybe they lost their nerve. Or maybe they’re just waiting for the perfect moment. Either way, it’s not over.
God, I just want to get through this final day without my name being called.
That’s it. That’s all I want. Just survive.
One more day. My hands are shaking, so I shove them under my thighs before anyone notices.
Then maybe I can drag myself back to my room, close the door, and stare at the walls until I can figure out how to claw my way out of this wreck I’ve built around me.
Because the old plan?
Out the fucking window.
Everything I thought I was doing—how to get answers, how to get revenge, how to be a good friend, how to get Talen to stop avoiding me and talk about whatever this strange bond is between us—gone. Just gone.
I thought coming here would make me stronger. But right now every thread of hope I was holding feels like it’s fraying, slipping through my fingers.
I’m so tired of clawing for answers. I’m so tired of being the one who pushes, who fights, who pays for it.
A scream tears through the hall just as I drop into my seat—high, gurgled, and final.
By the time I find the source, it’s already over.
One cadet’s sprawled across the centre mat, blood leaking from a split in their side. Legs twitch once, then go still.
The other is standing, but just barely. Shoulders heaving, face a mess of sweat and bruises.
One arm limp at her side, the other clutching a soaked shirt that used to be white.
She stares down at the body like she’s trying to figure out how she’s still the one standing.
Then she turns and limps back toward the benches.
Drops into a seat. Doesn't say a word. Just stares at the floor like it might give her answers.
The crowd erupts a second later. Shouting.
Clapping. A few whistles. That tense, rabid edge of celebration.
But it’s not as clean as day one. Now some don’t join in.
Some just watch. Quiet. Faces too still, too pale.
One girl near me keeps looking at the body like she knows them.
Like she didn’t think that fight was real until it ended like that.
Because yeah, they’re all clapping like it’s a show. But every single person in here knows they could be next.
Sometimes it’s someone you hate. Sometimes it’s someone who wronged you. But sometimes... It’s your friend. Your roommate. Your sister.
And we’re supposed to watch. We’re supposed to celebrate. We’re supposed to pretend that this is normal.
A thin, bitter pulse curls through me, the kind that settles deep and refuses to fade. My legs twitch to run, but I force myself to stay.
I should’ve left this morning. Just walked out and not looked back. But I didn’t.
I’m still here. Sitting in the aftermath, hoping that somewhere in all of this, I haven’t destroyed the last scraps of anything worth holding on to. That this wasn’t all for nothing. But I'm starting to doubt it, maybe this is just how it ends, maybe I deserve whatever’s coming.
The room around me settles.
Silence falling like ash after fire—slow, choking, impossible to ignore—as a pair of officers step on to the mat, dragging the body off by the arms. Blood smears in a long, ugly streak behind them.
Once the mat is clear, Professor Strannt moves into the centre, slow and unbothered, like this is just another day on the timetable. He pulls out his list—a long scroll of thick parchment—unrolls it with a snap, crosses off the dead cadet’s name, then scans the next line.
A cough breaks the stillness. Then—
“Our next caller is Cadet Beth Malven, Air Realm.”
A few rows down, I catch a flash of shiny black hair as Beth rises. Smooth. Calm. She walks to the mat like she’s headed to a lecture.
Weasel Senior lifts his head again. “And she will be calling...”
A pause. A smirk.
“Cadet Lyra Bloom, Air Realm.”
What.
The.
Fuck.