My pulse spiked. Ninety seconds to reach her, run the test, and pull her out. Tight didn’t even cover it.
Keane nodded. Which is why Cyrus has final call.
He didn’t say it, but I heard it. Don’t make me choose for you.
Cyrus calls it, Keane finished. And we move. Immediately.
I turned to Cyrus.
His expression didn’t soften. It never really did when the stakes were this high. But something had changed in him lately—something quieter than confidence. A kind of acceptance. Like he’d stopped believing he could control how this ended, and started focusing on what he could still protect. Me.
Cyrus stepped closer. If the corruption reaches for you, he said, steady and low, I burn the link. Even if it’s still attached to her. He didn’t blink. Even if it hurts her. I won’t let it take you. His gaze locked on mine like a promise. I will not let it take you.
The room felt too warm. My throat tightened hard enough to sting.
This was Cyrus, in his clearest form—fire as mercy, fire as brutality, fire as boundary.
The words should’ve terrified me. Instead, they made something in my chest loosen, just a fraction. Like my body recognized safety even when my heart wanted to argue.
I know, I said.
Cyrus stepped closer. Close enough that the heat of him reached my skin through my sweater, close enough that it felt less like command and more like… grounding.
And you’re okay with that? he asked.
No, I said honestly. But I accept it’s necessary. You protect the team. That’s your role.
Something settled in his expression, like agreement without needing to discuss it further.
What, exactly, is the consciousness test? Elio asked.
I pulled out a small object—a pin Raven and I had found together in September, during orientation week. Silly thing, shaped like a raven with purple stones for eyes. We’d laughed about the on-the-nose symbolism. And we’d never told anyone else about it. Not because it was a secret—just one of those dumb, perfect things that stayed ours. It had been a joke. Now it was a lifeline.
I show her this through the necromantic connection, I said. If her core self is reachable, she’ll recognize it. Give me the exact phrase we said when we found it. If the corruption has consumed her consciousness completely, there’ll be nothing. No response at all.
Binary, Keane said approvingly. Pass or fail. No ambiguity.
What if there’s partial recognition? I asked quietly, voicing the fear I’d been carrying. Uncertain response?
Then you decide in the moment, Elio said, not unkindly. But the operational standard is binary. She either gives you the phrase or she doesn’t. Anything else is corruption trying to buy time.
The harshness helped, making the decision clearer.
I hate this, I admitted. I hate that we’re going in knowing we might have to leave her. That the best we can hope for is recoverable with massive intervention and the worst is mercy killing before she’s completely lost.
Four months is what it is, Elio said. We didn’t choose the timeline. The master did by holding her this long.
We should practice the extraction sequence, Cyrus said. Make sure the timing works.
We spent the next three hours drilling until we could execute it without thinking, using muscle memory, instinct, and trust.
We were as ready as we’d ever be.
THAT NIGHT, BACK AT WICKEM after Keane had portaled us home, I found myself drawn to the wellspring.
I hadn’t planned to come here. But my feet had carried me down the familiar corridors, through the secured doors—my heir access overriding the new restrictions Cyrus had implemented after the student incident last week—into the chamber where ancient magic pulsed beneath stone.
I knelt beside the wellspring’s edge. Scout nudged my collar with his skull and then settled there, still as a charm meant to keep me from falling apart.
