Wes shifts beside me. “But she’s okay, right? Shehasto be okay.”
Rhett growls, “She didn’t look okay.”
The words carry more weight than he probably intended. Because he’s right. She looked confident, yes. Stronger. But there was something underneath that strength that felt borrowed rather than earned.
“What do you mean?” Wes asks, and the desperation in his voice makes something twist in my chest.
“Something’s off,” Rhett says bluntly. “The way she moved. Talked. All of it.”
Stellan’s gray eyes are unreadable in the pre-dawn light. “I don’t know,” he says finally. “But something happened in the chamber.”
“Do you think she took the Oath?” Rhett presses.
“I’m not sure.” Stellan’s voice carries that careful precision he uses when he’s weighing his words. “But the chamber felt alive this time. More alive than it did yesterday.”
That sends a chill through me. I’ve felt ancient magic before—the kind that pulses with its own hunger, its own agenda. The kind that makes bargains in languages older than memory and always collects what it’s owed.
If the chamber is waking up, if it’s responding to whatever Bree did…
“The chamber,” I say suddenly. “Did anyone notice how different it looked?”
“What do you mean?” Gray asks.
“All the mirrors were intact. Perfect. And the ash…” I pause, letting the implication hang. “The ash piles were gone.”
The silence that follows is heavy with implications none of us want to examine too closely. Because yesterday, that chamber was a graveyard. This morning, it looked like it had been waiting for her.
Stellan goes still—too still. “I saw it,” he says, and nothing else, though it looks like he wants to.
“She’s here,” Gray says, but his tone lacks conviction. “That’s what matters.”
“Is it?” The words slip out before I can stop them.
Gray’s attention snaps to me, sharp and dangerous. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
I choose my words carefully. “I’m saying maybe we should be asking who came back from that chamber, not just celebrating that someone did.”
“That’s Bree,” Wes says fiercely. “You saw her. You heard her voice.”
“Did I?” I let the question hang in the air. “Or did I hear someone using her voice?”
Rhett takes a step toward me, heat radiating from his skin. “What the hell are you implying?”
“I’m implying that ancient magic doesn’t work without consequence. And if that’s what she did—if she attempted an Oath like that—something else might have answered instead of the chamber accepting her.”
The words are harsher than I intended, but they needed to be said. Someone has to be willing to voice the doubts we’re all carrying.
“You think someone else is wearing her face?” Gray asks quietly.
“I think we should be prepared for possibilities beyond ‘she’s finally healed,’” I reply. “Because if there’s one thing I’ve learned about magic this old, it’s that it always has teeth.”
Wes wraps his arms around himself. “But the way she looked at Jace. That was real.”
“Emotions can be mimicked,” I point out. “And the way someone looks at you depends entirely on who’s doing the looking.”
Theo staggers suddenly, one hand flying to his temple. We all turn toward him instinctively, but he waves us off even as his eyes lose focus.
“What do you see?” Wes asks, voice tight with worry.
