"I CAN SLICE YOUR FUCKING THROAT!"
The threat would be more impressive if he wasn't currently shorter than most dining tables.
Atticus joins the chorus, vampire aristocracy reduced to schoolyard tantrum: "I'LL MURDER YOU! I'LL DRAIN YOU DRY AND FEED YOUR CORPSE TO?—"
"Fuck, I'm already tired."
Nikolai's interruption cuts through the threats with exhaustion so profound it seems to deflate the anger around him. The Fae—still in child form—shuffles toward my position with the particular gait of someone running on fumes that ran out hours ago.
Jeez.
The poor being still looks drained as hell, whatever happened during the separation from Nikki apparently taking a toll that hasn't begun to recover. We're hoping for an explanation eventually—surely it has something to do with whatever happened to Nikki during all this chaos—but for now, Nikolai seems barely capable of remaining upright, let alone providing answers.
Nikki.
Gabriel.
Neither of them has appeared since... whatever happened during the trials.
I feel like we should be worried about their absence, but something in Professor Eternalis's calm demeanor suggests thatquestions will be answered in due time. We just need a moment of peace to actually have that conversation.
A "calm" moment.
In this room.
With these people.
Right.
My only real concern is having this inevitable discussion without Gwenievere.
The thought surfaces with weight that would have surprised me months ago—back in Year One, when she was just another competitor in trials designed to kill most participants. Back when her fierce independence irritated rather than attracted, when her reckless bravery seemed like foolishness rather than the courage I now recognize it to be.
But now...
Now I'd dare admit I love the woman too much to leave her out.
The acknowledgment settles into my chest with warmth that Duskwalkers aren't supposed to feel. We're beings of shadow and void, creatures of darkness who exist in the spaces between what light can touch. Emotion is supposed to be muted for us, dampened by the fundamental nature of what we are.
And yet.
And yet I love her.
Fiercely. Completely. In ways that make my shadows ache when she's unconscious and unreachable in her stasis sphere.
She's clearly the key to all of this—the centerpiece, as Mortimer called her, around whom everything else revolves. Whatever happens next, whatever waits on the other side of these trials, she needs to be part of the conversation.
It's odd that I can confidently say I want to be by her side when it happens.
When we see what's on the other side of graduating Wicked Academy.
When we finally understand what all of this has been building toward.
Odd, but true.
Nikolai reaches my barrier, feet practically dragging across the conjured floor. The Fae's child-form slumps with exhaustion that transcends physical tiredness—this is something deeper, something fundamental, as if the separation from Nikki has cost them more than either understood it would.
I feel sorry enough for him to let my shadows respond.
