His breath came ragged.
He wanted to scream. To fight. But the truth hit too fast, too hard.
The part that terrified him most was that hebelievedher.
Mirael stepped closer, almost tender.
“Tell her, and she will be forced to choose. Between her crown… and your life.”
He stared at her, trembling with fury.
“You think I won’t?”
Mirael smiled. “I think you already know how this ends.”
Cassian sat there for a moment, dumbstruck, unsure of what to do next. He wanted to go back to Seraphine, tell her what happened, but what really could he say? He knew too little.
The truth had only opened more hollows.
He reached for his pack, but Mirael spoke again—low and laced with smoke.
“If you want to know the rest… you’ll come. There’s more, Stormborn. About your mother. About the blade and the girl you’d burn the world for.”
His jaw tightened.
Mirael’s voice—or the Hollow’s—he couldn’t tell anymore. It slid through him like cold mercury.
“Bring us something. Give us a memory you’ve never spoken aloud. We’ll give you a glimpse of your fate. And hers.”
He looked back at where camp lay if he had to turn back. Where Seraphine was. Then down at his hands, the same ones that had bled for her, burned for her, held her when she collapsed. The same hands that still trembled from the vision.
He didn’t move. Not yet because he knew—deep in the marrow of him that he’d have to pay that price. Because knowing the truth might be the only way to save her…
Or doom them both.
He turned to Mirael and straightened his stance now with determination and focus. No more hesitating or fear of the unknown. He had faced enough.
“Show me.”
SEVENTEEN
SERAPHINE
The dreams wouldn’t stop.
Every night since Cassian left, she saw his face.
Not smiling. Not burning.
Just...gone.
She’d reach for him and come back with ash. Wake with her fingers curled around her blanket like they were his shirt, clutching a memory instead of a man. The scent of smoke still clung to her skin, even when the fire had long gone cold.
She told herself it was exhaustion. A temporary fracture in her mind, worn down by battle and blood and choices that bled more than they healed.
But something deeper gnawed at her.
In every dream, the shadows whispered his name—but not the way she knew it. The whispers were older. Weightier. Liketheyhad known him before she did.
