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As the minutes ticked by, she lost herself in the happy memory, wandering so deeply she began to relive it, remembering bits of the conversation she’d had with the man she loved with her whole freaking heart. The man who did not deserve all this pain, all this suffering.

“Do you think Tanya’s right?” she asked him. Now that she was lying down, Darien only looked taller and more intimidating.

Blood rushed to her face as she imagined what he would look like directly on top of her, instead of beside her like this.

Darien said, “About what?”

“That this could hurt me? Or you?”

“It won’t hurt me,” he said with resolution. “And I’ve already been in here with you twice. I don’t know if it’s related, but you didn’t wake up until I was in the chamber with you.”

She hadn’t woken up until he was in the chamber with her.

She hadn’t woken up until he was in the chamber with her.

Loren bolted up, so quickly her head spun. “Dad?” Her shout echoed.

Roark peered through the window at her, his eyes brimming with worry. He flicked on the intercom. “Loren? Is everything?—”

“Turn black on,” she said.

Confusion flickered across his features. “I beg your pardon?”

“Turn black on. Keep every color on, but add black.Onlyblack.” Not gray—just black. The color of Darien’s magic.

“Loren, I don’t think we?—”

“Dad,please,”she said, a sob rising in her throat. She swallowed it down and whispered, “Just trust me. Just this once.”

For a long moment, Roark stared at her, conflicted.

“Please,” she mouthed.

His nostrils flared as he drew a sharp breath, then he turned his focus to the screen and activated black.

The balls of color floating through the room were soon joined by a new shade: pitch black. Shadow magic, death magic—call it what you wanted, but Loren was not afraid of it. This was the type of magic Darien had, and while it could indeed be used to destroy, kill, and blind, she knew it would not hurt her.

She had not woken up out of her coma until Darien had come into the chamber with her. No matter what excuses anyone tried to hurl at her, no matter what facts they had in their arsenal of knowledge to back them up, that spoke volumes. Black magic—shadow magic—was what she was missing.

She was sure of it.

With a deep breath, she lay back on the table, shut her eyes, and finished her treatment. This time, as those fuzzy spheres of shadow magic bobbed around her, she felt calm. She breathed deeply, focusing on relaxing every tense muscle, one at a time. Letting as much magic in as her body would allow.

Fifteen minutes passed quickly—and by the time she got out, the tattoo on her forearm was not blue, not red.

It was white. A solid, softly glowing white.

She had not seen this shade since she was small. Since the day she’d lain upon an examination table in Angelthene General Hospital while a nurse carefully drew the medical symbol on her arm. She could still remember the sour taste of the lemon-flavored lollipop the nurse had given her to help distract her from the pain.

It wasn’t just the serpent tattoo that’d changed, either; the bead of light that had been pulsing through the Caliginous on Silverway tattoo for days on end had also been absorbed into her skin, leaving the ink black and ordinary. She felt energized. Brand new.

Whole.

Her father’s jaw fell slack as he beheld the tattoo of the serpent-entwined rod. The tattoo he’d brought her to the hospital to receive when she was only a child.

“My gods,” he breathed. “It worked.”

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