Not explosively. It didn’t shatter or release. It simply withdrew, the way water pulls back from the shore. The pressure against the walls eased. The vibration in the stone dropped, eased, and then disappeared. The frost on the window stopped forming and slowly thawed.
The candles burst into flame, casting the room in a yellow glow.
One by one, not all at once, starting with the small one on the shelf nearest the nest door and moving outward, each flame igniting at exactly its previous height, as if the tower were methodically restoring what had been interrupted. The warmth returned more slowly, but it came.
Thane exhaled.
I realized I’d been gripping his shirt with both hands and made myself release it.
Malric’s footsteps came on the stairs. His pace was even again, measured, not frantic. He appeared in the doorway and looked at me first, then at Thane.
“The circle is broken through,” he said. “Not just cracked. Both rings, the anchor marks, all four of them. The central sigil has split clean in half.”
“He couldn’t get through,” I said.
“No.” He came back into the nest and sat. “Whatever the tower did, or whatever you did, or both, the portal had nothing to connect to. It’s now completely broken and unable to be repaired unless it’s recast.” He looked at me steadily. “He can’t come through the portal anymore.”
Something loosened in my chest and I exhaled shakily. I was safe.
Then immediately tightened again, because Malric’s expression was still grim.
“He knows,” I said.
“Yes.”
“He felt the array go.”
“He would have sensed it the moment the circle cracked. A connection that long, that established—it wouldn’t go quietly.” He toyed with a dagger that was never far from his hands. “He’s known something was wrong since at least this evening. When he couldn’t reach through the portal just now, he knew it wasn’t a malfunction.”
Thane shifted beside me. “How long before he moves?”
“He was already planning a campaign,” Malric said. “He has forces assembled. The rebellion has been pushing him toward a final engagement for two months and he’s been positioning for it.” He sheathed the dagger. “Aveline was his secret weapon. Now he’s lost her, but he doesn’t know who is here, or so we hope. He may change tactics and come here with his army orstay the course and come with a smaller guard. Either way, he’s coming for her. For all of us.”
“How much time do we have?” I asked.
“Days,” Malric said. “The tower is not far from the capital, maybe a week of easy riding. But he’ll ride hard once he can mobilize.”
The words sat heavy in my chest.
“How can we escape? The tower won’t open for any of us. We need a plan.”
Both of them looked at me.
“Don’t do that,” I said. “Don’t look at me like I’ve surprised you. I’ve been in this tower for many years and I know every stone of it. I know how he thinks and what he values and where he’s afraid, and those things are useful.” I looked at Malric. “You said you needed a weapon. Start treating me like one.”
Malric held my gaze for a long moment.
Something shifted in his expression. Not softened—sharpened, but differently than before. The way a calculation sharpens when a missing variable finally resolves.
“All right,” he said. “There is only one way for you to be a weapon. You have to bond with an alpha.”
Thane
Idragged Malric to the stairs before he said anything else and I didn’t give him the option of deciding whether to follow. Our pattern had been that I followed where he led, but this was too important to wait. I heard Aveline settle in the nest behind us, but I didn’t look back.
Not yet.
I took him down into the dining room, into the room with the broken circle and the displaced table and the cold residue of whatever her father had tried to push through the walls. The candles were back but lower than they’d been before, the room not entirely itself yet, and that was appropriate. Nothing in this tower was entirely itself tonight.
