“Of course, you don’t.” Selene exchanges a look with Aisling that I’m clearly meant to see. “Just like I didn’t know what I was feeling when Drayke spent three weeks teaching me defensive stances and I couldn’t stop noticing how his hands felt on my shoulders.”
“That’s different.”
“Is it?”
No words come to me. Because the truth is, I have been noticing things. The careful way Zyphon moves around me, always giving me space to retreat. The patience in his voice when I lose control and he talks me back from the edge. The way his shadows reach for my fire like they’re trying to protect it, even when I’m the one throwing flames at his head.
“The denial phase is adorable,” Aisling says to Selene. “Remember when I was in the denial phase?”
“You threatened to stab Rurik with a scalpel.”
“Multiple times. And yet here we are.” She gestures vaguely at herself. “Mated. Happy. Occasionally still wanting to stab him, but in an affectionate way.”
“There’s an affectionate way to want to stab someone?”
“You’d be surprised.”
Selene snorts into her tea. I find myself smiling despite my best efforts not to.
“For what it’s worth,” Selene says, her voice gentling, “no one’s expecting you to figure out your feelings on a timeline. Whatever happened between you and Zyphon before—whatever’s happening now—that’s yours to navigate however you need to.”
“We’re just here to make inappropriate comments and offer unsolicited opinions,” Aisling adds. “It’s a service we provide.”
“How generous.”
“We’re givers.”
The conversation shifts to lighter things—Rurik’s latest attempt to convince Aisling that setting things on fire is a valid form of stress relief, Drayke’s ongoing territorial behavior whenever another dragon looks at Selene too long. I listen more than I contribute, but the warmth of it settles into my chest anyway. This easy back-and-forth. This assumption that I belong at this table, in this conversation, in their lives.
A week ago, I would have been waiting for the trap. Now, I’m starting to believe there isn’t one.
“I should go,” I say eventually, rising from the table. “Training starts soon.”
“Have fun,” Aisling calls after me. “Try not to set anything important on fire.”
“And if you have any ‘moments,’” Selene adds, grinning, “we expect a full report.”
I’m still shaking my head as I cross the courtyard, their laughter following me into the morning light.
I’m thinking about Zyphon—about the dream, about the memories, about the confusing tangle of feelings I’m no longer sure how to name—when the sky tears open.
Shadow dragons pourthrough the rift.
Dozens of them, maybe more. Their darkness swallows the morning sun, turning dawn back into night. They move wrong—flickering between spaces, there and gone and there again, making them nearly impossible to track.
Lakhu’s forces. He found me.
Alarms shatter the quiet. Shouts echo from the walls. Dragons burst from windows and balconies, shifting mid-leap, their roars shaking the stone beneath my feet.
And I’m standing in the middle of the courtyard. Exposed. Vulnerable. With enemies between me and every possible shelter.
No choice, then.
The shadow-flame comes easier now—a week of training has given me something approaching control. Dark fire blooms in my palms, hungry and eager, responding to the threat with an intensity that should frighten me.
It doesn’t. Right now, I’m too busy being terrified of everything else.
The first shadowdragon dives for me.
