Even I did not know what it would look like. But I was feral for the sight of it.
Dark clouds gathered above the castle, nearly invisible against the night, but I felt them. They called to me. My skin prickled as the air thickened with static.
Eight.
Thorne’s eyes met mine as I crossed the gate. He cackled like a crow, mocking, blind to what stalked his fate. His baptism by storm. Behind me, the streets lay empty.
Nine.
Our guards fell back toward Lionel, forming a wall of steel around him. And when the king saw me, they all fled inside.
I began the release. Slowly. Undoing each chain around the wolf’s cage. Lightning crackled across my skin. My vision glowed.
The sky above shifted and twisted, answering me. Clouds raced, clawing into shape as if descending to meet the earth. They merged into something feral. Something howling.
Wind rose. Dark rain began to fall.
Thorne watched, his scowl fading. I smiled at him before everything vanished and I didn’t see a single thing anymore.
Only white light.
Ten.
Lightning split the sky. Thunder roared through me. The wolf stepped out of the cage and greeted the world, a shockwave ripping from my body and annihilating everything in reach.
That was my magic at its purest—white, explosive, untamed.
I was the one they could not explain, the one they could not control. The wolf’s impossible cub. The elves’ mystery. The academy’s protégé. The king’s secret weapon.
I was a conduit for a storm they either feared or craved, but none could wield.
And I was perfectly fine with that.
Because as I stood at the eye of my storm, my true self bared, my skin mirroring the dark, cracking sky above, I was at peace.
I was one with the storm, and the storm was one with me.
When the wolf was finally bored of its play, it slipped back into its cage, curled into a ball, and slept. It would sleep until sleep itself bored him again.
The light faded. Rain tapped against my skin, tugging me back into the world. My vision settled into what it had been.
I stood there, naked, at the courtyard’s heart, ruin and ash spread around me. Everyone lay dead. Part of the castle had collapsed. Part of the outer wall as well. A few lucky limbs were scattered like grain cast through soot.
The scent of roses reached me. Her hand brushing along my back made me jump.
Evie.
I turned to her. Her eyes were white, her power lit like mine had been. How long had she been standing there beside me while I unleashed the storm?
Color seeped back into her irises. She looked at me, shy and uncertain, lips parted. There was no fear, only pure admiration. And something I dared not name.
And in that breath, the world held still. Ash fell around us like winter snow.
Chapter 28
Kael
The doors to my quarters swung open, one push of my magic rippling through the halls as tiny bolts of lightning melted into the walls. Evie clung to me so she wouldn’t fall as I pushed her inside.
