Lightning cuts the horizon in a crooked slash of silver, illuminating the spires and twisted iron of the school like a cathedral built by devils.
This place has never been holy, but tonight it feels more cursed than ever.
The fight is in a few hours.
The final trial.
For power. For pride. For blood. For family.
For me… for her.
I light a cigarette with shaking fingers. Not from fear. Not yet. My body still feels wrong from training, muscles pulled tight like wire, chest sore where Nico drove his elbow in again and again until I learned how to block it. His voice still echoes in my head:“Fight like it’s already over. And then win anyway.”
This night isn’t just about the ring.
It’s about proving I belong in it.
It’s about making my family proud. My father. My grandfather. Marco. Milo. It’s about making them see I’m not just the triplet with the temper. I’m the one who doesn’t break.
And it’s about Aoife.
The wind shifts behind me.
I don’t need to turn, I know her steps now, softer than anyone else’s. I know the way the air changes when she’s near. Even in a storm, I know.
“Didn’t think you’d be out here,” she says, voice small and sharp, like the first drop of rain before the sky falls open.
I don’t answer right away. Just pull in another drag and nod for her to come closer.
“It’s cold,” she says.
I shrug off my coat and drape it over her shoulders.
“You shouldn’t be here,” I say. “Too many people are looking for cracks in us.”
She lifts her chin, hair whipping across her face like strands of silver thread. “Let them look, we don’t have any cracks, and I’m not afraid of what they’ll find anymore.”
She looks so fucking beautiful up here, wrapped in a storm and my coat, standing next to me like she belongs on this roof and nowhere else. She was on the edge way before I even met her. She danced with the storm, and now we dance with it together.
“Are you ready?” she asks.
I almost laugh. “Doesn’t matter if I am,” I murmur. “It’s happening, and I can’t lose.”
“You won’t.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I’ve never seen you lose anything that matters,” she says. “And this matters.”
I turn and really look at her. Her eyes are full of worry she’s trying to hide, her fingers clenching and unclenching like she’s working through the urge to scream.
“What if I lose?” I whisper, hating the words the second they leave me.
She doesn’t flinch. “Then I’ll find you,” she says. “No matter what happens, I’ll find you.”
I take a step closer. “So, this is what we are now?” I ask. “Storms and war and promises in the dark?”
“It’s always been this,” she says. “You just didn’t see it.”
