“I don’t want to be someone they fear,” I whisper, voice cracking. “I wanted to matter. I wanted tobelong. And now I’m the girl with broken magic and an accidental harem of magical men tethered to her soul.”
My laugh is dry and humorless. “This was never the fantasy I signed up for.”
She doesn’t try to comfort me. Doesn’t feed me platitudes or offer weak reassurances. Instead, Professor Marris simply says, “Then let’s rewrite the ending.”
Something in my chest flinches.
“I can’t promise it’ll be easy. But you’re not alone in this—even if the council wants to pretend otherwise. Let me help.”
And for the first time since waking up in this sterile, cold circle, I consider it. Not because I trust the Council. Not because I believe in whatever broken system led me here.
But because I don’t want to become the thing they already see when they look at me. Because I want to learn how to hold this power without breaking. Because maybe, if I can survive this…I’ll finally stop waiting for someone else to save me.
NINE
LINDSAY
Sleep comes in fits,like my mind doesn’t know how to rest without unraveling.
But this time, I jolt awake not from a dream, but from the flicker of shadows curling across the walls. Not natural ones, either—these move like they’re alive, ink bleeding through air.
And then he’s just… there.
Kael.
Not an illusion or a hallucination, which I’ve had a few times in the last day or so. Honestly, I don’t know how long I’ve been locked in the chamber.
But he’s here, fully here. Fullyhim.
His wings stretch behind him, ink-black and veined with starlight. His horns curl low and back from his temples, polished obsidian with veins of silver catching the low magical glow in the room. And his eyes—gods, those eyes—are the same molten shadow I remember from our dance before everything went to hell.
He’s devastatingly handsome.
Of course the demon prince who never flinches when I’m overloaded with power would show up like this.
I sit up too fast, instantly aware of hownotpresentable I am. Still wearing the black dress from the dance. Barefoot. Hair a mess. Hope he enjoys the discount hostage look.
“You’re not supposed to be in here,” I say, voice still heavy with sleep.
He cocks his head, eyes flicking over the glowing ring of runes encircling my little magical prison. “You say that like the rules have ever applied to me.”
“Right. My mistake,” I mutter, brushing hair out of my face. “I forgot you’re above containment. Must be nice.”
He smiles, but it’s not playful. There’s something tightly wound beneath it. Something I don’t think he wants me to see.
“You should be asleep,” he says. “You need your strength for what is coming.”
“Kind of hard when shadow demons sneak into your magical holding cell at night.”
“Technically I didn’t sneak,” he offers, stepping just close enough that the runes hum like they sense him. “I was invited.”
“You absolutely weren’t.”
“I’m extending myself the courtesy retroactively.”
“You’reinsane.”
His grin widens. “Maybe. But now that you’re awake…I have a warning.”
