Nightwraiths pour through — dozens, then hundreds, filling the air like a plague of shadows given teeth. They circle above us, blocking what little light remains, their shrieks splitting the silence Alekir created.
Torric’s fire blazes higher. Aspen’s frost spreads across the ground. Finn’s chaos crackles wild and desperate.
But there are too many. Far too many.
Lady Virath smiles.
“The preparations are complete,” she says, and her voice carries that same hollow wrongness as her eyes. “The ritual circle holds. The bloodlines are assembled.”
“And the Academy?”
“Blind. Scrambling. Exactly as planned.”
I feel something cold settle in my chest.
She was never following Alenya. Sheoutrankedher. All those board meetings, all those political machinations, all those demands that Kaia prove herself — it was never fear.
It was positioning.
“You’ve done well,” Alekir says. “The Light Faction’s representative, hiding the darkness in plain sight.”
“Someone had to ensure the path remained clear.” Lady Virath’s gaze finally slides to Kaia. Cold. Assessing. “Your Professor Lira was becoming… inconvenient. Asking too many questions. Getting too close to the truth.” Her smile sharpens. “She’s been handled.”
I feel Kaia’s reaction through the bond before I see it.
Horror. Grief. Rage so pure it makes my shadows writhe.
Kaia doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. But her shadows surge around her — Bob growing larger, Mouse’s growl vibrating through the plateau, Patricia’s notebook blazing with furious light.
I want to kill Lady Virath for that. Want to let my shadows tear her apart.
But Kaia’s darkness wraps around my wrist. Holding me back.Not yet.
Alekir is watching us. Watchingme.
And then he laughs.
It’s different from before — not cold and hollow, but bright. Almost giddy. The sound of someone savoring a joke only they understand.
“Oh, but the best part—” He gestures between me and Darian, pale fingers conducting some invisible orchestra. “The Shadow Prince and the Light Faction’s fallen star. Standing side by side. Protecting each other.”
He claps his hands together.
“Isn’t itdelightful?”
The word hangs in the air like poison.
“Did no one ever tell you, Malrik?” His voice drops, intimate and cruel. “About your father’s… indiscretions?”
My blood turns to ice.
“The Shadow King did so love his Light Faction lovers. The political advantages. The secret alliances. Thechildrenthey gave him.”
No.
“You share the same blood.” Alekir’s pale hand moves between us. “The same father. The same legacy.”
The world stops.
