Lyra felt something cold settle in her stomach as she listened to them debate her fate like she wasn't sitting right there. "Excuse me," she said, her voice cutting through the argument.
Everyone turned to look at her, and she could see the moment they realized how their discussion had sounded from her perspective.
"Are you actually going to ask what I want?" she continued, her magic beginning to spark around her fingers. "Or are you just going to keep arguing about what's best for me like I'm not capable of making my own decisions?"
"Lyra," Cade started.
"No, I'm talking now." She stood, and the air around her began to shimmer with heat. "You want to know what I think? I think you're all so busy protecting me from having to make hard choices that you're forgetting I'm the one who has to live with the consequences."
"We're trying to find a solution that doesn't require you to sacrifice your autonomy," Dr. Vasquez said carefully.
"My autonomy?" Lyra laughed, and the sound held edges that made several council members shift uncomfortably in theirseats. "I gave up my autonomy the moment I touched that rune. I gave it up when I inherited founder blood. I gave it up when I decided to stay in this town instead of running away from magical responsibility."
Her magic was building now, responding to her emotional state with the kind of dangerous instability that had been plaguing her for days. The lights in the chamber began to flicker, and she could see people exchanging worried glances.
"So here's what's going to happen," Lyra continued, her voice held a command that brooked no argument she hadn't known she possessed. "You're going to stop debating my life like I'm not here. You're going to give me all the information—all of it, not just the parts you think I can handle. And then you're going to let me make my own choice about what I'm willing to sacrifice to keep this town safe."
"Lyra," Ruth said, her voice holding a warning.
"I'm not finished." The magic around Lyra intensified, and now the windows were starting to rattle. "I'm especially tired of you," she said, pointing at Cade, "acting like I'm some fragile flower who can't handle the reality of what we're dealing with. You think the bond between us is some kind of magical coercion? Fine. Maybe it is. But that doesn't mean you get to make unilateral decisions about whether or not we explore it."
Cade's eyes had gone completely gold, and she could see his wolf struggling against his human control. "I'm trying to protect you."
"I don't need protection," Lyra snapped. "I need partnership. I need someone who trusts me to make my own choices instead of making them for me."
"And if your choice gets you killed?"
"Then that's my choice to make!"
The words rang out so powerfully it cracked the windows, and suddenly everyone in the room was on their feet. Magiccrackled through the air like lightning, and Lyra could feel mark on her palm burning with intensity that suggested she was about to lose control completely.
"That's enough," Ruth said, she spoke with the steady power of someone used to being obeyed that made even Lyra's chaotic magic pause. "Miss Whitaker, you need to calm down before you bring the building down around our ears."
"I need everyone to stop treating me like a child," Lyra shot back, but she could feel her magic starting to settle slightly.
"Then stop acting like one," Cade said, and the sentence slammed into her like a slap.
The silence that followed was broken only by the sound of Lyra's chair hitting the floor as she stood so abruptly it toppled over.
"You know what?" she said, her voice deadly quiet. "You're right. I have been acting like a child. I've been waiting for permission to make my own decisions, hoping someone else would tell me what's right."
She moved toward the door, her magic still sparking dangerously around her. "Well, I'm done waiting. I'm done asking permission. And I'm done listening to people who think they know what's best for me better than I do."
"Where are you going?" Sheriff Torres asked.
"To make my own choice," Lyra said without looking back. "And to deal with the consequences myself."
She was out the door before anyone could stop her, leaving behind a room full of shocked faces and the lingering scent of ozone.
Behind her, she could hear Cade start to follow, but Ruth's voice stopped him.
"Let her go," the elder said quietly. "She needs time to process, and you need time to figure out whether you're going to keep fighting this bond or accept what it means."
Lyra didn't wait to hear his response. She was already walking away, her magic snapped and sparked across her like visible armor and her mind made up about at least one thing.
She was done being protected from her own life.
12
