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“You shouldn’t be here,” he said. “Not in this state.”

“Oh?” I stepped closer, embers flickering at my fingertips. “Would you rather I pretend everything is fine? Pretend that I didn’t just watch Alstone command a vampire attack and nearly tear Keane apart?”

A flicker of something—real shock—crossed his face. He hadn’t known. That only made my blood boil hotter.

“Alstone wouldn’t—” he began, but I cut him off with a sharp laugh.

“Wouldn’t what? Work with the very creatures you’ve sworn to eradicate? Let his own nephew rot under his control?” My flames flared higher, licking dangerously close to the doorframe. “Because I saw it. I saw Keane fight back, even for just a second. And I saw what Alstone did to him when he resisted.”

Father’s expression darkened, but it wasn’t denial I saw. It was uncertainty. Worry.

“If this is true,” he said slowly, “then Alstone has lost control. That makes him dangerous.”

“He was already dangerous.”

Silence stretched between us, thick with unspoken words. Then my father’s eyes narrowed. “Your fire.”

I clenched my fists, forcing the flames back to gold, but we both knew it was too late.

“What’s happening to it?” he asked, voice low.

I wanted to lie. To tell him it was nothing, just a trick of the light. But the words wouldn’t come.

Instead, I turned sharply. “I need answers. And since you don’t have them, I’ll find them myself.”

His magic flared—brief, sharp—but he didn’t stop me. Not this time. He was too consumed by Alstone’s betrayal to bother holding the reins any tighter.

I didn’t look back.

My footsteps echoed down the hall, each one pulling me further from his fury and closer to something older—quieter, but just as dangerous.

The study doors loomed at the end of the corridor, still sealed. Fifteen years untouched. Fifteen years of silence behind wood and wards.

Even as a child, I’d felt the grief pressing against that threshold like a storm held back by sheer will.

But tonight… tonight the air felt different. The magic around the lock didn’t resist. It hummed. Expectant.

A pulse of magic, old and waiting. The wards rippled as I stepped closer. The moment my flames flickered blue, the lock clicked open.

I hesitated for just a breath before pushing inside. The room smelled of parchment and aged magic, undisturbed for over a decade. My mother’s presence lingered in the meticulous order—books stacked just so, quills resting in their holders, a half-finished research paper still lying on the desk as if she had only stepped away for a moment.

My heart pounded as I rifled through the documents. Most were standard research notes, but then—

A single report, tucked between the pages of an old spellbook.

H.R. expressing concerns about heir magical resonance. Further observation required.

The same words from the trials. The same words from Keane’s failing magic. My hands trembled as I turned the page.

Cornerstone remains unstable. Leylines shifting. Control faltering. We are missing something vital.

Cornerstone.

The word sent ice through my veins. Project Cornerstone wasn’t just old research. It was something she had been actively investigating before she died.

I flipped through the notes faster now, searching for something—anything—that explained why this was happening. And then I found it.

A letter. Not a report. Not a formal research note. A hastily written message tucked beneath the pages.