I can’t say it. Not with him right there.
My breath stutters. My fingers twitch—still tingling with residual magics. Like it hasn’t fully left me yet. LikeIhaven’t fully come back to myself.
“I’ll be fine,” Thane says suddenly. His voice is steady. But there’s something under it. Not cold. Not dismissive.
Just . . .final.
I look down at my hands. The magics’ still there. Not just power. Not just anger. Something new—and it’s mine.
The air crackles around me, faint traces of magics curling at my fingertips—waiting.
For permission. For release. For me.
Valen glances at me—once—then turns to Thane. He studies him for a long, quiet moment before stepping forward.
“Come with me,” he says quietly. “You need to be healed.”
Thane doesn’t argue. He doesn’t look back at me. Doesn’t offer reassurance. He simply nods and follows Valen toward the infirmary.
And I . . . watch. Breath uneven, body still tingling with the remnants of what I unleashed. Alone, in the center of the wreckage just like when my magics erupted the night my village was attacked.
I should say something. I should do something.
But I don’t.
I can’t stand here—in this shattered field—with all these eyes judging me.
So I turn. Sharp. Stiff.
I storm away—past the scorched earth, past the staring soldiers, past the ruins of what I just did. My boots crunch over blackened ground as I head for the only place that still feels like mine.
The old oak tree by the lake.Myoak tree.
I drop heavily against the bark, limbs aching, head tipping back as I close my eyes and try—gods, I try—to breathe. To steady the chaos inside me. But it’s still there.
All of it.
The intensity of my powers. The way they keep shifting, changing,growing. I can barely keep up, always two steps behind—surviving one revelation before the next crashes over me.
I close my eyes and see the faces of my parents. What would they think of their daughter of destruction?
Is that what I’ve become?
I open my eyes and press my palms to the ground, trying to steady myself.
Instead, the earth stirs beneath me, not resisting, not recoiling—just waiting. My magics linger. In the air. In the soil. Inme.
I exhale, dragging my fingers through the dirt.
What the hell is happening to me?
And how much longer before I lose control completely?
A shadow shifts nearby, footsteps crunching softly over the dry grass.
I tense, bracing for Valen, or worse—Thane.
Or maybe it’s not worse if it’s Thane.
