Callum dipped his head and a spark detonated. Lightning tore up Ronan’s arm, searing heat erupting behind his eyes, like a third sight being forced open, violated into seeing.
Elysian prowled closer, steel whispering in his grip.
There was a flash and the cabin vanished.
Glass doors formed into shadows, the shadows into a chamber starved of air. And there, resting on velvet the color of dying embers, his blade—the sword of Ryuu.
It was alive in the vision, humming like it recognized him even across worlds. Ronan’s hand twitched forward on instinct, toward his claim, his blood right, then the vision snapped.
Callum reeled back, releasing him and Ronan’s palm dropped away, the heel of it throbbing as if scorched. The world rebuilt itself slowly, heat settling in layers until the room stopped spinning.
Ronan flexed his hand once. Twice. “Ah,” he murmured, rubbing the sting out of his palm. “So, fire isn’t your only talent.”
“It isn’t,” Callum said, arms folding neatly.
Ronan turned to the window, where the wide stretch of sky lead toward where the Indra peak loomed beyond, cutting the ether. The highest point in Selvarra, unmoved, eternal.
Just like the truth settling into his bones.
“I knew someone once,” he said without looking back. “Someone with a gift just like that.” His eyes slid toward Callum, then to Elysian’s shadow at his side. “They’re long dead. I haven’t seen the magic since.”
Callum didn’t flinch. “Do you accept?”
Ronan flexed his fingers, rotating his wrist as if searching for evidence of what had just ripped through him.
Nothing. No scorch. No scar.
Only the fading echo of borrowed memory, already slipping from his grasp like a dream dissolving the moment you opened your eyes.
“You’ve shown mewhatyou can do,” he said, voice low, unimpressed. “Not why you’d burn your own crown to do it.”
“It’s not the kingdom I’m betraying.” Callum’s gaze lifted to the distant mountain. “The ones I love are in danger. I won’t lose them. Not again.”
Ronan’s mouth twitched, more snarl than smile. “Always the guardian, then.” He clapped his hands once, the crack rolling off stone. “So, I unleash dragons on your precious king, and in return you hand me my heirloom?” A slow tilt of his head. “Nothing in this realm is ever that clean.”
“Yes.” Callum’s voice didn’t waver, despite all the gravity, the risk. “That sword is wasted in his grasp. Better it answers the blood it was forged for.”
The words struck Ronan like a shackle locking into place, yet the weight felt dangerously close to freedom. He knew what reclaiming that blade meant. Knew the way its power would fuse with the ink carved into his flesh.
He was already shadow-fire, ash, smoke, and destruction. The embodiment of a warrior steeped in flame.
And with the sword?
He wouldn’t just be strong. He would be unchallenged. Unbreakable. Invincible.
The true Harrowed Prince fate destined him for.
But did he want the one thing fate kept pressing into his palms?
“One last thing.” Ronan flicked a speck of lint from his sleeve, the gesture idle, his stare anything but. “The resin-iron spears in your armory, twenty or so, if I remember correctly—" Crafted for one purpose, killing dragons. “Where will Obrann raise them when your sky starts to burn?”
“They will be out of commission that day,” Callum replied, extending his hand. “You have my word.”
Ronan didn’t reach for it.
Dark tendrils curled across the floorboards, winding around boots until the air solidified into choking clouds.
Callum stumbled back, one hand jerking to the hilt at his side.
