“I never lied,” my mother answers, her voice trembling. “I just didn't tell youeverything.”
“Didn't tell me?” His laugh is bitter. “That you're one of them? That you can—that you've been?—”
“I've never used it to harm anyone,” she pleads. “Never.”
“It doesn't matter. They hang people for less. And now our daughter?—”
“Leave Veyra out of this. She has nothing to do with my choices.”
Something crashes. A plate, maybe, or a cup. I flinch, pressing myself against the wall.
“The empire hunts people like you,” my father says, his voice lower now, dangerous. “And I won't be caught harboring a witch.”
“Don't call me that,” my mother whispers. “What I can do, it's simple. Natural. Beautiful. If you'd only let me show you?—”
“No.” The word falls like a stone. “I won't be part of this. I can't.”
Their shadows dance on the wall, elongated and monstrous in the lamplight. My father's arm sweeps out, and my mother steps back.
“Then go,” she says, her voice suddenly steel. “But know this—what flows in me flows in her too. One day, she'll wake to her own gift. And I pray she finds someone braver than you to stand beside her when she does.”
Heavy footsteps. The scrape of a bag being dragged across the floor. The door opens, letting in a gust of cold night air.
“Goodbye, Isanna.”
The door slams shut with such force that the walls seem to shake. I don't understand what's happening, only that something precious has broken beyond repair. My mother's sob cuts through the silence, a sound so raw it makes my own chest hurt.
I startle awake to a strange, high-pitched sound. A whistling, like wind through a narrow opening, but more deliberate. Disoriented, I sit bolt upright, my heart hammering. For a moment, I don't recognize where I am, then reality floods back: Zeriel's room. The Ironhold. Alone.
The whistling comes again, sharper this time. A faint light dances on the wall, not from within the room, but from outside. Iswing my legs over the edge of the bed, every muscle protesting, and move cautiously toward the open window.
The light grows stronger as I approach, a warm orange glow that flickers like flame. When I reach the window, I have to stifle a gasp.
Byron's face hovers just beyond, illuminated by the torch he holds. His unruly blond hair is whipped by the night wind, his amber-gray eyes intense in the firelight. What he's sitting on makes my jaw drop lower: a small drake, no larger than a horse, with deep forest-green scales edged in bronze that gleam in the torchlight. Its wings beat steadily, keeping them both aloft outside my window, which must be at least two hundred feet above the ground.
“Byron?” I whisper, bewildered. “What are you?—”
He shakes his head, pressing a finger to his lips. Then he leans forward, extending a folded piece of parchment. I take it, my fingers brushing his briefly. His skin is warm despite the chill air.
I unfold the note, squinting to read in the unsteady torchlight:
Climb through. I'll catch you.
I look up, meeting his eyes. “Are you serious?”
He nods once, firmly.
“Why?” I whisper.
Byron shakes his head again, more emphatically. Something in his expression—urgency, perhaps, or conviction—makes me hesitate. I've never spoken to him, know next to nothing about him beyond the way he seems to speak to dragons like I do. Yet here he is, perched outside my window on a drake that has no business being near the Ironhold’s boundaries, asking me to trust him with my life.
The sensible part of me warns I might regret this. But another part, the part that’s tasted magic and possibility, says I might regret it more if I turn away.
I glance back at the door, securely locked. Zeriel won't return until morning. No one will even know I'm gone.
“This better be worth it,” I mutter, climbing onto the windowsill. The space is hardly wide enough for my slim frame to fit through.
The drop below is dizzying. The small drake shifts, positioning itself closer to the window. Byron extends his hand, his eyes steady on mine. A promise, without words.
