“That’s what I thought.”
I lower my arms, and it feels like closing a book.
“I’m not asking for your trust anymore,” I tell them, and the words feel like stepping into something I should have claimed a long time ago. “You lost that chance. But here’s the thing—I don’t need it. I don’t need permission.”
The sanctuary responds like it’s been waiting for me to say exactly that. Walls hum with approval. Doors that were closed swing open. Pathways become clear and bright.
Wes makes a small sound. “Bree, please—”
“Please what? Please go back to being small? Please pretend I don’t see how you all step back when my power shows? Please keep letting you decide what’s best for me?”
I shake my head, and it feels like shaking off something that never fit right anyway.
“You’ll have to decide if you can handle all of me,” I tell them, already moving toward the deeper corridors where I know thesanctuary’s heart is waiting. “Because I won’t go back to being managed. I won’t go back to being less.”
The black threads in my Ether pulse once, and I taste something that isn’t mine—approval, pride, hunger that goes deeper than want.
Good,something whispers where only I can hear it, and the voice definitely isn’t mine.Let them see what you really are.
The thought should disturb me more than it does.
“You wanted to keep me small,” I say over my shoulder as I walk away from them. “But I was never meant to be small.”
My footsteps echo in the corridor, and I don’t look back to see if they follow.
Chapter 28
Theo
I’ve been lying here for three hours, staring at the ceiling of my bedroom while guilt gnaws at my chest like something alive. Every time I close my eyes, I see Bree’s face from yesterday—the careful blankness in her green eyes when I finally cornered her in the hallway, the way she said“It’s fine, Theo. Really”like she was reading from a script.
It’s not fine. Nothing about this is fine.
I broke something between us when the truth about Phil came out. When she realized we’d all been keeping secrets, that we’d decided together she couldn’t handle the truth. When she looked at each of us like we’d chosen to betray her instead of protect her. The memory makes me want to punch something—preferably myself.
Two days of watching her avoid eye contact. Two days of feeling like I’ve lost her trust right when she needs me. Two days of knowing we all failed her when it mattered most.
And two days of visions that keep getting worse.
That’s the part that’s eating at me. Ever since Phil showed up and everything went to hell, my gift has been showing me fragments that feel darker, more fractured. Like the future itself is responding to the cracks we put in her trust. We’ve always been a unit, us and Bree. Even with the recent additions to our group, it was still Bree at our core and us circling around her—protecting, caring, keeping her safe.Now all she sees when she looks at us, looks at me, is someone she can no longer trust.
And the visions reflect that. Each one worse than the last, showing possibilities that make my chest tight with dread.
The sanctuary hums; tonight it feels like a living thing tugging at my skull. I can feel it pulling at the edges of my consciousness, the way it always does when visions want to come.
I roll over, pressing my face into the pillow. “No,” I mutter into the fabric. “Not tonight.”
But the pull intensifies, that familiar electric tingle behind my eyes that means my gift won’t be ignored. The Ether in this place amplifies everything—Bree’s power, our bonds, and apparently my ability to see things I don’t want to see.
The vision takes me before I can fight it.
Flash—
Bree in chains, silver and delicate but binding. Her head bowed, Ether pooling at her feet like spilled mercury. She’s not fighting them. Just… accepting.
Flash—
Bree before a mirror, hand pressed to glass. Dark hair, familiar build, but when she turns—her eyes hold a certainty I’ve never seen before. Confident where she usually hesitates.
