Chapter Thirty-Nine
The Healers’ Wing stinks of blood and herbs. Too many cadets crammed into too few beds, groaning through half-mended bones or still unconscious from matches earlier this week. I’m one of the lucky ones, apparently.
I should be relieved. I should be grateful. The fight’s over, but the wreckage hasn’t settled as all I can think about is how badly I messed things up—with Ezzy, with all of them. I want to fix it. But to do that, I’d have to be honest. Really honest. And I don’t know how.
"Don’t move," the Healer mutters, dabbing a foul smelling ointment along my arm. I hiss through clenched teeth as the sting flares—sharp, acidic—but it fades fast, the burn already cooling as she leaves the private room.
It's crazy, I nearly died, yet most of my wounds are superficial, no internal ruptures. No fractures. No irreversible damage.
At least not the kind a Healer can see.
Beth wasn’t fighting to draw blood, she was bleeding me slow. Wearing me out. Letting me burn myself down so she didn’t have to. Got to give it to her, it’s smart. Easier. Cleaner.
I watch as the skin of my arm pinks over. It should be worse. All of it should. I should feel hollow. Rattled.
Instead, I feel—
Full.
My Threads hum beneath the surface. Not fraying. Not sparking. Not trying to rip me apart from the inside. Just… there. Settled. Like I finally said the right thing and they’re waiting for the next order.
It's wrong.
It should feel wrong.
But god, it doesn’t.
I don’t need it anymore, but I hold the duck in my hand anyway, my fingers find the place Talen fixed—the crack in the wing he sealed so carefully—and I can’t stop tracing it.
It’s comfort. It’s memory. Habit, hold the duck, breathe through the pressure, try again.
Except now?
There’s no pressure.
I stopped pulling, and everything opened. Clean, controlled, more powerful than anything I’ve ever touched, and it didn’t break me. That should be a good thing. So why does it scare the shit out of me?
I stare at my fingers. They don’t look any different, but I know better. I felt it. All that power. Mine. Just waiting for permission to strike, and I nearly took it.
I wanted to.
I wanted to kill her.
God, I would have.
Beth's lifeless face flashes behind my eyes—slack, sightless, mouth open like she never finished the thought.
That’s the part that sticks in my throat now, lodged like splintered bone. Not the bruises. Not the burn.
I thumb over the duck’s wing again. Linger there.
God, can I accept this?
This version of me, made of something darker, heavier, sharper?
Across the ward, someone cries out, painful, raw, like the guilt building inside me. The one thing I can’t burn off or bandage over.
I pushed everyone away—the ones who mattered—and gave everything to the one person who planned to break me. And now I'm alone. Not just now, not just in this bed. I’ve been alone for months now. How the hell did I get here?
My throat tightens and tears sting before I can stop them. I grip the duck tighter. Not from pain, or even grief, but shame. Because it wasn’t bad luck, it wasn’t fate, it was me.
My choices.
My lies.
Over and over again.
I said I came back to be different, to be better, but what did I actually change? I didn’t tell Ezzy. I didn’t trust any of them with the truth. I kept secrets because it was easier, because it let me stay in control.
I told myself I came back because I had no choice, that it was survival.
That there was no other path but this one.
But that’s not true, is it? I chose this version of me, the one who closes doors instead of opening them.
Who fights first and trusts later. Because becoming the version I wanted—the one who’s truly honest, vulnerable, real?
That would’ve been harder; that would’ve cost me something.
And maybe it still will.
My fingers loosen around the duck, letting go briefly to wipe my tears with the edge of the blanket. This power—this strength—it means nothing if I end up alone on the wrong side of it all.
So what now?
Run? Go back to Ashvale with empty hands and let the pressure, the guilt, the silence, eat me alive from the inside?
Or fight. Not on a mat. Not with magic. But here, with the truth, with the fallout.
To become someone better, even if it means bleeding in a different way.
Even if it means letting people see the ugliest parts.
Another moan splits the air down the corridor—raw, guttural. Bone reset, by the sound of it. The kind of pain that demands witnesses.
I exhale slowly and look down at the duck again, not sure why I'm still holding on so tight. Then my gaze lifts to my arm, the blisters are gone. Pink, clean skin in their place. I flex my fingers—testing for pain, tightness—nothing. Just smooth, healed flesh. Back home, we’d have killed for ointment like this.
Might’ve saved a few limbs, hell might’ve saved a few lives.
“Not too bad for an Outerlander.” The voice hits me before the footsteps, familiar, teasing, Finn. I blink, head snapping up.
He steps through the doorway, all half-grin and cocked brow—like he’s amused, like this is nothing. But his face is too pale. There’s tension around his mouth, tightness he hasn’t figured out how to hide.
“You came?” The words leave my mouth before I can stop them.
“Yeah, well, you nearly died. Figured that earned you a visit.”
“Well, good timing. I’m just about to be discharged.” I try for a smile—small, maybe even shy but it wobbles at the edges.
Rowan follows behind, quieter. His eyes skim my arm, then flick to my face. “I’m so sorry, Lyra. I should’ve seen it coming.”
“No,” I say quickly. “Don’t do that. None of us realised what she was up to.”
Then Ezzy steps through the doorway, closing the door behind her, and everything inside me locks tight.
She hesitates at first, like she’s not sure if she belongs here.
Her arms are crossed tight, jaw clenched, and she won’t meet my eyes.
But it’s not indifference. It’s something else, worry she doesn’t know how to carry.
The boys go still; they feel it too, that shift in the air. That quiet, heavy tension that hums under the skin and says this isn’t okay yet.
I swallow hard. God, I thought I’d have more time, time to figure out what to say to them—how to spin it, soften it, make it sound less like betrayal and more like survival.
More time to line the words up so they might forgive me.
I could try and avoid it a bit longer? Make small talk, ignore the guilt, the truth, clawing its way up my throat.
But what's the use? Waiting might buy me a bit more safety, but it also buys me silence. And I’ve lived there long enough.
I said I wanted to be different, to be more vulnerable, open. So I look to check the door’s closed and then I just start talking. All of it, I tell them everything.
Bumping into Talen in the tunnels when I tried to escape.
His strange blunt knife, the truce. Interfering during Ezzy’s Demonstration.
The fake relationship. Professor Strannt’s interrogation with the Truth Strings.
What Beth told me—about Talen, his ex, her death, the magical connection between us. Everything.
The words spill out, seven months of raw and ugly truth, because hiding them has done enough damage.
The silence after is suffocating. No one moves. No one speaks.
I drag in a breath, but it doesn’t do much. The weight’s still there. Every word I just dropped sitting between us like a loaded crossbow.
I turn to Finn first. “I’m sorry for snapping at you after the interrogation cell the other week. You were trying to be funny, and I made it seem like you were in the way.”
He shifts, rubbing the back of his neck. “Yeah, well… I didn’t help by pushing. But for what it’s worth, I don’t hold it against you, especially now I understand what's going on between you and the Nightrose.”
The tension in my shoulders eases, just barely. “Thanks.” I smile at him before turning to Rowan. “You spent weeks helping me look for anything tied to Ashvale,” I say quietly. “I cut you off without explaining why. I just—”
Rowan shifts his weight, arms crossed tight across his chest. Not defensive, just holding the space between us. “Yeah, look,” he sighs. “It would’ve helped if you told me. But I get it. Professor Strannt was on your back. I understand that. But next time? Just talk to me. Okay?”
I swallow hard. The words land lower than I expect, sharp in the chest. “I will.”
My throat tightens as I glance at Ezzy. She hasn’t said a word. Arms crossed. Eyes hard. Waiting.
“We need to talk about all of this. More.” Rowan glances between the four of us.
“Yeah,” I say. “I know.” My hands are cold. My jaw aches from holding it all in. “But we’ve got time.” I look at Ezzy again. “Can I—uh—talk to you for a second? Alone?”
Rowan and Finn share a look, then slip out, the door clicking shut behind them.
The tension that follows is uncomfortable, so I break it right away. “I’m sorry,” I start, voice rough. Too rough. I swallow. “Please, Ezzy. I need you to know that. Please forgive me.”
She doesn’t move. Arms still crossed, like the words bounce right off her.
“I don’t know if I can, Lyra.” Her voice is quiet and steady, worse than shouting. “The damage is done.” It lands. Low and heavy, right under my ribs.
“I didn't tell you because I didn't know how. I was worried you’d judge me; we come from such different worlds, believe such different things. But that isn't an excuse, I didn’t try to understand yours. I just—” I let out a long breath. “I was so caught up trying to be what I thought I needed to be that I stopped being honest. Even with you. You let me in, and I didn’t let you back. That’s on me. ”
Her expression doesn’t shift. And that silence? It’s a blade pressed to my neck. My chest aches, not dramatic, just hollow, like I left something in her hands and she’s still deciding whether to drop it or not.