I was wrong to even hope again.
31
— • —
Percival
The palace corridors hadn’t changed in two hundred years. Same obsidian walls, same torchlight, same echoing footsteps that reminded me I’d never quite belonged here.
Lucian and Solomon walked ahead. The king returning to his throne. The enforcer returning to his legacy. Both of them moving through these halls as men whose names were carved into the stone.
I followed three steps behind, the way I always had.
That was the difference none of us said out loud.
Lucian Valdris had a crown. The royal name that we’d all borrowed as a surname in the human world, a cover that fit him because it was his and fit Solomon and me because he’d lent itto us. Strip him of Veyndral and you’d find a man who didn’t recognize himself.
Solomon Theron had bloodline. His father had been the former king’s most trusted advisor, the name carrying weight in every chamber of this palace. Even walking three paces ahead, he moved through these corridors with ownership.
And me? Just Percival. No family name or lineage. No history in these halls beyond the one they’d given me.
A foundling in the Glowwood with a locket and no surname. Two men who’d looked at an orphan and decided to keep him around. That was my kingdom. Not the obsidian walls or the throne or the council chambers I’d never had a seat in. Just the people.
And now one of those people was on a cabin floor in a different realm, and we were here.
The muted bond sat in my chest, three frequencies dampened to almost nothing, and beneath them, the faintest echo of a fourth heartbeat.
Mira. Fading with every mile between us.
I didn’t agree with this. Couldn’t wrap my head around the logic, no matter how many times Lucian framed it as duty or Solomon justified it. But I understood they have so much to lose.
The palace halls were cold in a way the cabin never was. We’d crossed through the portal an hour ago.
“Her father will take her in.” Lucian’s voice carried the cadence of a king delivering a verdict he didn’t believe in. We were in the corridor outside the council chambers. Solomon walked three paces ahead. “She has a family now. She’s not alone.”
“Her father put her in danger just so he can get close to the lycans he wants to hunt. Do you really think she’d be safe with him?”
“She’d be an enemy to both lycans and hunters if she’s with us. The hunters might see her as a traitor but they’d be more forgiving. The pack will never accept her. We can’t protect Mira and the kingdom simultaneously. The council made that clear.”
“The council can go fu-”
“Percival.”
I shut my mouth. Not because Lucian’s tone demanded it but because the exhaustion in his voice was real. He looked terrible. Gray beneath the bronze of his skin, lines around his eyes that hadn’t been there a week ago, his hands hidden in his pockets because they wouldn’t stop trembling.
“She’s safer without us.” Solomon’s voice from ahead. He hadn’t turned around. “The hunters want us. She’s collateral. Remove us from the equation and Thiago has no reason to harm her.”
“You believe that?” I asked.
Solomon didn’t answer.
“You actually believe that a man who burned down his own daughter’s bookshop, drugged her tea, and armed her abuser is going to keep her safe just because we’re not around?”
“I believe that staying would have put her in the crossfire of a war she can’t survive.”
“She’s tougher than you’re giving her credit for.”
Solomon stopped walking.
