For a breathless instant, the tavern didn’t exist.
There was only Jakobav, the man bent beneath his grip, and the way violence seemed to breathe from him as naturally as air.
Ella should be afraid, tell him to stop before he crossed a line they couldn’t uncross, but her body betrayed her and her lips refused to shape the words. The sight of him, all power and absolute command, struck something deep and unfamiliar inside her.
It was terrifying, yes, but it was also magnetic. The part of her that had always bristled against chains now ached at the knowledge that, for once, someone had chosen to wield their fury on her behalf.
“Jake. Stop.”
The command came firm and unshaken, and Cathea appeared at the bar with a mountain of a man looming at her side. Her eyes, keen and knowing, fixed on Jakobav.
He didn’t release at once. The man beneath him groaned, sweat streaking his temple as the knife pressed a breath too close.
Then the steel kissed flesh. A bead of blood welled at the man’s throat, bright against the dull gleam of iron, and rolled slowly down, proof that Jakobav was not bluffing, that the next breath could be his last.
“That’s enough,” Cathea said, loud and firm, yet calm as still water.
Only then did Jakobav relent, pulling back with agonizing slowness. The man sagged, gasping, and his companion rushed forward to haul him upright.
Together they staggered toward the door, vanishing into the night without a backward glance.
The tavern noise began to stir again, unease humming through the rafters, but Cathea’s focus never left Ella. She wiped her hands on her apron, her expression unreadable, and said with pointed politeness, “It was lovely to meet you, dear. But I think it’s best if the two of you head upstairs.”
Jakobav drew in a deep breath, his gaze fixed on Ella, watching her intensely, as though he expected her to splinter beneath it all. She was not that fragile, only shaken by all that had just collided around her.
“She’s right,” he said at last, his tone firm but gentle. “We should get some sleep. The sooner we get our answers, the sooner we can return to the castle. I need to check in on how well Bryn has managed to fix up myfriends.”
He was likely trying to distract her by wielding the word she’d used, but she couldn’t speak, couldn’t even move, still stunned by the revelation of her mother’s health.
Jakobav’s voice carried her forward.
“Bryn is probably making a mess of the infirmary…and eager to see how we’ve managed.”
She gave a small nod as her body remembered what her voice could not, taking one last look around the tavern.
The fire cracked in the hearth, sparks leaping toward the rafters. Cathea’s black-rose pendant caught the glow of torchlight, while the smell of wraithleaf smoke lingered faintly in the air. Ella’s eyes followed Jakobav as he turned toward the stairs, his steps unhurried, leaving her thoughts to twist into a knot pulled taut by too many threads at once.
No, this was good. This was the push she needed. She hadn’t come here to crumble beneath the news she’d long expected, nor to let herself unravel over the brutal reality of finally hearing it aloud.
She wouldn’t linger on why Jakobav seemed to understand instinctively what she needed in that moment, or why he’d defended her so fiercely, nor would she try to untangle the pull between them that only grew tighter with every hour.
And she definitely wouldn’t chase the question of why they both carried forbidden gifts, power unblessed by the soil of their birth.
Ella was here for one purpose alone: to fulfill the duty laid before her by the fates. For the crown she had never asked to wear, but would take all the same, because it might save her people, might save the mortal realm itself.
And if the last weeks had taught her anything, it was that the Veil was bleeding, and such a wound would wait for no man.
She would return to Orchid soon.
Even if it broke her.
Even if it meant leaving him behind.
25
WHERE THE PROPHECY LIES
Ella collapsed onto the narrow bed in the loft above the tavern without even tugging off her boots, her body folding into the thin mattress as the past days closed in from every side. The impossible magic she’d provoked into being, Jakobav’s brutal display of power, and the whispered news of her mother’s illness collided inside her until she could hardly separate one from the next. Not to mention the look of care and concern written on Jakobav’s face in the aftermath.
