Beside me, Nolan glances over. “You okay?”
I nod, but my voice catches. “Yeah. Just a little…off.”
I haven’t told him about last night yet. About finding the book or Kael showing up. I’m still trying to absorb it all myself.
Professor Marris is already pacing between rows, her heels echoing like a metronome. “Focus, Miss Blake,” she says as she passes. “If your glyph falters, we’ll all feel it.”
I inhale slowly. Focus. Just draw the glyph.
I extend my fingers, pulling a thread of magic forward, mimicking the professor’s earlier motion. But the moment I connect with the magic, something tugs—hard.
A sudden pulse bursts through the air. Like something justtore. Every rune in the room flickers. Then a thin, jagged tear opens in the corner of the ceiling, like the fabric of the world itself split wide. Bright blue magic mixing with inky shadows seep from it. A shimmering rip in reality. The Veil.
Gasps fill the classroom. One student screams, her chair clattering back as she jumps to her feet and runs for the door.
Professor Marris turns instantly, casting a containment ward that crackles and holds, but only barely. I can see it resisting her spell. Bowing out in the middle. “Everyone out,” she barks. “Now.”
The class scrambles. But I’m frozen, staring at the breach, the way it pulses like a living wound. My mark is glowing bright white, lightning-hot against my skin. I don’t even have to think.
I move toward it.
“Lindsay!” Nolan calls behind me.
But I don’t stop. The Veil is calling, vibrating through my bones. I lift my hand. Magic pours from me without permission, a raw surge that wraps around the rip like stitches. It’s blue like what seeps from the edges flowing like electricity between me and the Veil.
A howl sounds from the other side of the breach. Something furious at what I’m doing is just on the other side. I falter—but push through, forcing more of my magic into the tear. A rush of wind tears through the classroom, and the lights dim.
My knees buckle. It’s too much. I can’t hold it, then I feel it. A connection. Not the bond with Raiden—this is different. Nolan’s hands grip my arms, steadying me. His magic flows in like grounding current, running through my body with every beat of my heart.
“I’ve got you,” he whispers, even as he shakes. “Just do what you need to do.”
With that, I throw every ounce of focus into sealing the breach. One last pulse of energy, one final surge, and it closes.
Silence falls over the room as papers float to the ground. I drop to my knees, panting and trembling. Nolan lowers with me, wrapping his arms around my shoulders as Professor Marris crosses the room slowly, her expression unreadable. A few students hover near the door, stunned, halfway between fleeing and watching. No one speaks.
They saw it.
All of them.
My skin still glows faintly. Not just the mark, but all of me, like I have a light lighting me up from the inside out.
Professor Marris kneels. “That was Veil magic,” she says quietly. “And not the kind anyone should be capable of channeling alone.”
She stares at my mark. Everyone left in the room does. And I know, I’m not just Lindsay Blake, the unwanted human, anymore.
The silence doesn’t last long.
Boots strike the floor running toward the classroom. Not one set. Two.
Kael appears first, stepping through the door as if he already knew what happened. He takes in the still-flickering air, the ripped-open energy, and me, glowing like a lantern on the floor with Nolan’s arms still bracing me.
His eyes narrow.
A breath later, Raiden bursts in behind him, gaze sweeping the room until it lands on me. His entire body tenses. “What the hell?—”
Kael doesn’t let him finish. “She touched the Veil again.”
“I didn’t mean to,” I whisper, the words tumbling out before I can stop them. I try to rise, but my limbs still feel like they’re made of smoke. “It just happened.”
