Chapter Forty-Three
It slams through me, sudden and pulsing, pleasure laced with poison. My breath jerks as a spark of heat sears up my spine, crashing into my chest causing my back to arch from the chair.
Air leaves me in a thin, helpless gasp and I clench my thighs together, tight. Desperate to force it down. It doesn’t help. The need’s already molten—licking through me like wildfire, devouring and claiming.
Every muscle locks, nerves catching fire with pure bliss. He hasn’t touched me. Hasn’t moved.
But god, he doesn’t have to.
Because my body? It’s not mine anymore.
It’s his.
Every tremor’s deliberate. Every spike calculated.
My inhale cuts short, panting now as pressure building tight and cruel—like he’s the one deciding when I get to breathe. I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to ground myself, but my hips still roll forward, chasing friction that isn’t there.
No contact, no touch, but my body’s reacting anyway. Hungry and helpless for more.
And I know, I know, he’s watching.
Still, my mouth opens on a sound I can’t stop—a cry, raw and broken, stripped to the bone and just as I'm about to tip over the edge—right as the last thread snaps—
He lets go.
Slams the door shut.
Instantly, sound crashes back in—too loud, too fast, all at once. Professor Quinn talking, chairs scraping, scrolls rustling, voices rising.
The world around me returns in one violent sweep and my eyes snap open, like my body’s just remembered where it is. How public this is. And that I’m not alone.
My skin is flushed, chest still rising too fast. A few students glance back, brows raised, confusion flickering across their faces. Heat rushes to my cheeks. I sink down lower in my seat, spine folding in on itself, trying to disappear.
When I finally glance his way, Talen’s not even looking. He’s turned slightly, pencil in hand, casually drawing something in his sketchbook.
But I can’t move, can’t breathe. Because he didn’t just win. He dismantled me.
God, this was never a game. It was a massacre. And I just walked right into it—
Okay, maybe my plan isn't going to work.
“I can’t find it,” the shorter cadet grunts, squinting under the sun as he rummages through a bush, fingers red with dust and thorn-pricks.
“Then look harder,” the taller one snaps.
Patrol ended an hour ago, but we haven’t made it back to the outpost yet—because one of these idiots lost the key. The ground’s so dry the thing disappeared on impact. We’ve been combing this stretch for thirty minutes, kicking at loose rock and dead scrub like it might be hiding out of spite.
We’re somewhere on the outskirts of Ravenscross for an overnight patrol assignment—just south of Ashvale, far enough to feel the distance but close enough that my chest still tightens if I let my mind drift north.
I don’t. Ashvale’s a box I can’t open. Not yet. I have no answers, and until I know who’s responsible, what’s going on with these attacks, the grief stays buried, worry too, push it down. Keep moving.
“Here, oh. No, wait, just some metal.” The shorter one walks over holding a twisted scrap, eyes already dull with disappointment.
Great.
I was meant to be on patrol with Strannt today, the Weasel, but I was swapped out last minute. Now I’m stuck with two cadets I barely know, their names already half-forgotten, and one officer who hasn’t said more than ten words to me since we left the Citadel this morning: Talen.
He sent us back to the outpost ahead of him, stayed back in Ravenscross, said he had something to check. Surprised he trusted me not to run, though god knows I’ve got nowhere to go.
I let the tension drain out of my chest and turn away, eyes tracking the horizon. Past the edge of town, out toward the Void, toward the Ravine, and the Innerland wall beyond it.
It’s been almost two months since the ball, and so far nothing, no answers and no sex.
I'm so tired of it, of him. From the constant push and pull that’s led absolutely nowhere. I’ve spent weeks trying to wear him down, tear through whatever wall he’s hiding behind. But all I’ve done is exhaust myself and watch him inch further out of reach.
And I’m tired of pretending. Pretending that I only want the part of him I can touch, that he’s just a distraction, a stress relief, when the truth is—I want all of it. Every maddening, guarded, impossible part.
And worse—I’m tired of pretending I don’t trust him. Because I do. And honestly... I have for a while now.
I just didn’t want to admit it before. It was easier not to. Safer to lie to myself, keep the line drawn clean. I said I’d be a fool to trust him blindly. But I guess I’m a fool, because I do, I trust him.
Still, I don’t know if I should tell him that. Thinking it is one thing. Thinking it doesn’t cost anything. But saying it out loud—admitting it, to him? That’s letting him hold the knife. And I don’t know if I’m ready for that.
Either way, doesn’t matter; he hasn’t looked at me properly since we left for patrol this morning, and now I’m stuck out here sweating through my shirt on the outskirts of Ravenscross, sun beating down at that cruel, late-summer angle—no shade, no key, no sex, no answers—and Second-year Trials are in two days.
Tension’s crawling under my skin, slow and sharp, like it knows something I don’t.
I let out a long exhale. For a second, everything holds.
Then—
A scream cuts through the air behind me.
I whip around.
Four men, armed, closing in. One’s already got the smaller cadet by the throat, blade pressed tight. The other three fan out, flanking fast. Eyes cold. Movements practised.
Not a mugging. Not random. This is an ambush.
“Well, well, well… look who we have here.” The voice slithers down my spine, familiar in the worst kind of way. The cadet jerks, barely, but it’s enough. I catch a glimpse past the hand at his throat. Kael.
My stomach drops. What the actual fuck, he shouldn’t be here. Not this far out.
“What do you want, Kael?” I snap. “What the hell are you doing here? Let him go.”
My fingers twitch, Threads flaring, ready. But Kael doesn’t move. Neither do I.
“Was gonna ask you the same thing,” he sneers, tone too casual to be anything but a threat. “We just happen to be passing through for the market tomorrow. Nice to see you’re still in white…”
My eyes drop to the Citadel uniform. I hadn’t even noticed it, hadn’t felt it, a chill drags down my spine. God, am I starting to become one of them?
Kael shifts beside me, boots dragging across the dry ground, and my gaze snaps back—his hand clamps the cadet’s neck, blade pressed firm to the pulse point. But it’s the missing fingers I notice next. Two gone. Jagged scars, half-healed.
“Oh yes,” he mocks, catching the look. “I should thank you for that. A lovely gift from those officers you were with the last time I saw you.” His grin twists, hungry and hollow. “I was wondering how I’d catch up. How I’d return the favour. And now here you are.”
Behind him, one of the others lets out a low chuckle.
“My friends,” Kael adds, without looking away from me, “also have a few things they’d like to say thank you for.”
Beside me, the taller cadet shifts, barely. Fingers twitching, Threads pulling close, readying. Kael clocks it immediately.
“Don’t you fucking dare.” His voice drops, lethal. “You try to use magic, and your friend here bleeds.”
He drags the knife tighter against the cadet’s throat, the skin dimpling beneath. The taller cadet goes pale—panic, swallowing whatever plan was forming.
I shoot them a look. Don’t. Don’t fucking do it. But too late. They bolt.
Kael’s three friends don’t even hesitate—they're on him in seconds, blades flashing as they give chase.
Fuck. Do I go after them? I don’t move. The cadet who ran, he’s got magic. Kael’s friends don’t, still… three against one isn’t nothing.
But Kael’s the real problem. Always was. He’s the only Outerlander here who knows how to use his Threads just enough to be dangerous. Unpredictable, chaotic. The same kind of reckless I used to be.
“Just let the cadet go,” I call, shifting my weight slightly, just enough to keep balance if this goes sideways. “We can forget this happened. No officers here. You release the cadet and walk free.”
Kael tilts his head, eyes glittering. “Where’s the fun in that, Lyra?
” He presses the blade tighter. The cadet’s shaking now, jaw clenched, terror plain across his face.
“No. Now that you’re here, there’s something I want.
” My jaw tightens. I don’t respond. That grin crawls back across his face.
“I want you to teach me how to use my magic.”
“You want—what?” It slips out before I can catch it. “Are you kidding me? How the fuck do you expect me to do that?”
“You’ve been learning,” Kael says, eyes narrowing. “All that fancy shit they teach you behind the wall. Tell me how to do it. Tell me how to control it.”
“It takes months, Kael,” I snap. “There’s no spell that just suddenly makes it work.”
“Ohhh, come on,” he drawls, blade digging in until a thin line of red slips down the cadet’s neck. “There’s got to be something you can share, something that makes giving him back worth it.”
There is. Probably a few things, if I’m honest. But I’m not giving someone like Kael more power. Not over good people. Not over anyone.
Quietly, I start unknotting my Threads, slow and silent, letting the magic rise under my skin.
“Last warning, Kael.” My voice goes low. Steel-flat. “Let the cadet go. Turn around. And fuck off home.”
“What home?” Kael spits. “Ashvale got burnt to the ground. Didn’t you hear?
” His voice frays at the edges. “Those Innerland pricks, letting dragons loose up north. I know it was them. Shit’s been happening in the Northern Peaks for months now.
That’s why I need my magic, Lyra. They cast us out.
Took our power. Took everything.” His eyes lock on mine, hungry and hollow.
“I want it. And you’re going to help me. ”