“She didn’t know what would happen,” Liam bites out. “It’s not like she chose for any of that to happen.” His hands curl at his sides, trembling just slightly, not from weakness, but from the weight of every memory we share. “Don’t make it sound like she wanted this.”
Locke doesn’t rise to the anger. If anything, the frustration drains from him, replaced by something older and heavier, exhaustion edged with dread.
“That’s precisely why it is so dangerous,”he says quietly. “She doesn’t understand it yet. She can’t predict it. And that lack of understanding is something your father has always counted on.” His attention returns to me, studying the shadows beneath my eyes, the tenseness in my shoulders, the way I keep swallowing against a throat gone tight. “Which means you must learn to control it before he senses even a whisper of it waking.”
My stomach twists.
My breath thins.
A tremor crawls up the back of my neck.
This is the part he didn’t want to say.
This is the part Liam wasn’t ready to hear.
Locke moves closer to the desk, resting one hand against its edge, and the shift in posture brings something new into the room, caution, yes, but also accusation.
“And Sebastian Harwood?” Locke turns his gaze on me fully, one brow lifting in pointed disbelief. “What part ofstay out of troublewas that?”
The mention of Sebastian hits harder than it should. The memory of him, too close, too warm, too steady, flares beneath my skin, unwanted and impossible to ignore. My chest tightens as if something in me recoils and reaches for him all at once.
Liam’s head snaps toward me, confusion written plainly across his features.
“What is he talking about?” Liam asks, brow furrowing, voice pitched with something between anger and dread. “Harper...what happened with Sebastian?”
And just like that, the room feels even smaller.
I can barely answer before Locke presses on, his voice rising, frustration boiling past the calm façade. “Do you simply not care about the consequences of your actions? Is putting your life, and your brother’s life, at risk worth it for a moment of indulgence? For the chance to-”
He doesn’t finish before saying something that shatters the last piece of composure I have left.
“-to spend a few moments whoring yourself out-”
“YOU ARE NOT MY FATHER!”
The words rip from me so violently it feels as though something inside snaps clean in half. Every lantern erupts into darkness at once, sucked dry by the surge of magic that floods outward from my chest. The room plunges into a suffocating shadow, thick and pulsing, as though the air itself recoils from the force of my voice.
A ringing fills my ears.
The temperature drops.
Something electric skitters over my skin.
Liam inhales sharply, stumbling back a step, not out of fear of me, but of the memory this moment mirrors too closely. Locke freezes where he stands, breath caught in his throat, eyes adjusting to the dark as though he expected this, dreaded this, and still wasn’t prepared.
“You have no idea what is happening to me,” I say, the tremor in my voice rising, my emotions biting into each syllable. “You lecture and you guide, but then you disappear and return only to accuse me of failing some test you never even explained.”
The shadows pulse again, responding to my heartbeat.
Respondingto me.
“What you saw in that room was the first breath I’ve taken since I arrived in this place,” I continue, the tightness in my chest threatening to crack me open. “A moment where I wasn’t surviving or hiding or waiting for something terrible to happen. A moment where I felt…” My voice falters, shame and longing twisting painfully together. “Alive.”
Locke opens his mouth, but I cut across him, the words pouring out faster than I can anchor them.
“Next time you feel like dragging me in here, have thecourage to tell me what you really think. That I am just like him. That no matter what I do, all you see when you look at me is his blood.”
The last lantern, the faintest spark in its wick, dies completely.
