The implication sends a chill down my spine. “You think someone made her disappear because of what she knew?”
“I think your mother is a smart woman who understood when it was time to step back from dangerous situations,” he says. His voice is carefully neutral. “The question is whether she chose to leave, or whether the choice was made for her.”
I take a moment to digest his words. There’s so much she didn’t tell me, so much I didn’t know…
“I did try,” he continues, his voice almost softening. “I had search teams out, spared no expense searching for any trace – anyhintof her whereabouts…” His eyes meet mine now. “I wish I had more to tell you.”
For some reason, I believe him. Maybe it’s the honesty behind his eyes, or his truthful tone. I push my spiraling thoughts away, focusing on the work I’m about to do.
“Where does it hurt?” I ask.
He reaches to undo the top buttons of his shirt, slowly exposing the place where his shoulder meets his neck. The tan skin there is slightly luminous, red veins creating branching patterns that look almost like molten cracks, as if heat is trying to break free from beneath the surface.
I feel my cheeks flush. I’ve healed countless bodies before, naked and broken, but the deliberate way he reveals himself makes my pulse skip. I press my hand to his exposed skin. Our eyes catch, and for an instant I think I see gratitude … but then it’s gone, shuttered behind steel again. He doesn’t want me to see weakness, even as the sickness pulses beneath my palm.
Then, magic blooms through my hand. My power stirs, hungry and ready.
But I hold it back, letting it trickle slowly, deliberately, into him. The hunger continues to grow, chilling me to the bone, desperate to unleash the extent of my power. I fight to keep it controlled, contained, filling up on the small ecstasy being created. It’s enough to satisfy my craving.
I watch as Lord Zevran’s eyes move to the top of my chest, noticing the crescent moon sigil glow beneath my clothes. “Your mother had the same crest.”
I glance down, a small smile breaking through my lips as I bask in the faint glow. “It’s a sign you’re marked by the moon.” I whisper.
A long silence makes itself at home between us. I let the magic trickle through my fingers until the pulsing beneath his skin fades.
When I pull away, he doesn’t speak. He just watches me, chest rising and falling slowly.
“Thank you,” he says. The words sound stiff, as if dragged from him. His rigid posture slackens by a fraction. He’s letting me see only what he can’t control: the relief that betrays him.
I raise a brow. “You should try saying that more often, Your Grace. It makes you seem almost human.”
A crooked smile touches his lips, quick and guarded, as if it surprises even him.
“Don’t push your luck,” he mutters.
The words sound reluctant, like he regrets taking part in the levity. But they spark something dangerous in me … a possibility. Not freedom, not yet. But a reminder that even prisons have cracks in their walls.
It’s been days since I arrived at the palace, and already I’ve fallen into a rhythm I shouldn’t trust. Every night, after the corridors empty and the servants retire, I meet Lord Zevran in the atrium. Not because I choose to – I’m his personal healer now, bound to the palace by an arrangement I never agreed to but can’t escape. He summons me, and I go.
I tell myself it’s obligation. Duty. But there’s a darker truth coiled beneath my rationalizations: I have a steady source now. Regular access to that ethereal rush that floods my veins each time I heal him. The addiction has a chokehold on me here, dressed up in the convenient disguise of necessity.
This morning, I requested permission to attend the court session in the Hall of Judgment. I told the steward I wanted to understand how justice was administered in these foreign palace walls. All true, technically.
What I didn’t say was that I want to see how His Grace rules, how he works. Not the exhausted man who sits in silence while I heal him, but the Lord who holds the fate of his people in his hands. Mother always said a leader’s worth was measured in how they wielded power over the powerless, not the powerful.
The Hall of Judgment sits in the oldest wing of the palace, carved from red stone that predates the current dynasty by centuries. No windows pierce the walls, just iron sconces burning low, their smoke curling toward vaulted ceilings lost to shadow. The temperature drops noticeably as I enter, the stone walls holding onto the morning chill despite the torches.
I take my place in the upper gallery with the other staff and minor court members, far enough from the throne to fade into the stone. Below, the chamber floor spreads wide and bare, designed to make whoever stands at its centre feel exposed. The sigil of Mars hangs above the dais – crossed swords ringed in bronze flame, each edge sharp enough to catch the torchlight.
The chamber fills slowly, conversation humming low and echoing off the stone. The acoustics are strange here, designed to amplify the voice of whoever speaks from the throne while turning everything else into indistinct noise.
Lord Zevran enters without announcement. He doesn’t need it – the room falls silent the moment his boots hit the floor, the sound of his footsteps sharp and clear in the sudden quiet.
He wears black today, the fabric cut close to his frame in a way that suggests function over finery. No ornamentation except the blade at his hip. When he climbs the steps to the throne – volcanic glass, jagged and cold – every movement is intentional.
I’ve seen him tired. I’ve seen him in pain. I’ve seen him with his defences lowered in the privacy of the atrium.
This is different.
