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I heard a crack.

I started through the pain and swirling intensity as I realized the resistance around my left wrist was gone, and I brought it around in front of me to see that I’d somehow broken that cuff.

Cassius was there in the next moment, grasping my hand, his eyes wide. His know-it-all disposition was momentarily disrupted as he bore witness to what I’d accidentally done.

He didn’t speak to it, though, and instead he surprised me as he started stroking my palm, tracing soft and slow circles over and over with his magic.

It was almost hypnotic, watching his white glow draw a soothing path around and around.

The painful sparks subsided.

The turmoil calmed, like a storm receding.

“I’ve shown you a great deal, inundated you with much. It is a lot to absorb. However, your ignorance could no longer continue. It was imperative that I showed you the truth. You must understand the reality of your situation,” he spoke in a careful, almost kind tone.

It was probably just a manipulation to get me to calm, but I was taking it right now. I clearly needed the assist.

“I am not here to harm you or to cause you emotional pain either, Ariana. But until you knew the truth, we couldn’t begin our work together. Now, do you have any questions for me? Or do you require time to process what I have conveyed to you?”

“Tell me more. You’re right. I need to know.”

He eased his hand from mine. “There. You’ve calmed. Quite easily, too. You can handle this better than you allow yourself to believe. You can handle a great deal.”

All I could do was nod and utter a murmur.

“You are the only one of your kind,” he told me then. “A full Celestial being who possesses equal power to a True Celestial, but who is also free to impact the mortal plane without shattering the balance entirely and in irreversible ways.”

“Like Draco?” I asked, hating voicing the words at all.

“Your power is beyond his. Like mine is. Draco was stripped down to Fallen status the moment he betrayed us. But, yes, he could impact the mortal plane like you can without disastrous damage to the balance between realms and planes of existence.” He reached out and tipped my chin up with his thumb and forefinger, staring intently into my eyes. “But unlike him, unlike Mia, Cornelius, and Jaxon also, you do not possess that inner darkness. You are purity and light.” He released me and linked his hands behind his back as he began pacing in front of my chair. “We must keep it that way. We’ve felt your struggle andwith you now taking back your power, we need to be careful, to ensure you remain in the light. I will assist you with that. I will prepare you to fulfill your duty.”

“What exactly is this duty? What cause or threat am I supposed to champion?”

“That remains to be seen.”

“You don’t know?”

“My mission is to prepare you, to act as your Guide. And I will ensure you are ready for whatever comes your way, whatever you are assigned in the future.”

So either what I needed tochampionhadn’t come about yet, or didn’t yet exist, or it did and he just wasn’t privy to it, because the True Celestials compartmentalized information as some sort of precaution—possibly even as a means to control those under their rule.

“And that’s just a given, isn’t it? There’s no choice for me in the matter at all, is there?”

“There is not. This is what must be. I won’t leave until my mission is complete.”

“They all see me as a thing and not a fucking person, because of my great power.”

I hated it. I’d shown my hatred for it many times when I was younger. But as I’d grown older, I’d retreated into accepting that. I’d given up where that was concerned, really.

Until recently.

Until Kai, Vorzyr, and Nyx had been all up in my space with their intensity, with them actually seeing me as a person with emotions, needs, dreams, the whole nine.

“But things are different now.”

Those had been Kai’s words to me when I’d tried to explain what it was like for me and why I’d pulled away and shut down as a result.

And I’d wanted to believe in them so badly.