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Caspian sighs without looking up, thumb running over the spine of one of the thick tomes like he’s trying to rub the answers out of it. “Depends. Do you count centuries of headmaster paranoia and very bad poetry?”

Luna shifts, her fingers trailing across the margin of the page she’s reading. “Some of it’s useful,” she says quietly, but there’s something brittle in her voice too—something sharp beneath the softness. “The early ones… they knew about the Pillar. Not all of it, but enough. There’s references. And something about sacrifices.”

My gut coils tight. “Sacrifices?”

She nods once, the movement small but certain. “We’re piecing it together. Slowly.”

I drag a hand down my face, teeth grinding becauseslowlyisn’t good enough. Not when the Council is breathing down our necks and Lucien and Orin are still out there, and I’m stuck trying to hold this fractured thing together before it splinters beyond repair.

“You shouldn’t be the ones doing this,” I mutter before I can stop myself.

Luna’s eyes lift to mine, and something in them softens—infuriating and gentle all at once. “Then who should?”

I don’t answer. Because I don’t have one.

The candlelight flickers across her face, and gods, she’s so much more dangerous than she knows. Than any of themrealize. She’s the gravity keeping all of us here, whether we admit it or not.

I exhale slow, dragging my gaze away before the bond burns straight through me. I start to turn, already thinking about how the hell I’m supposed to keep this house, this group, this war from crumbling beneath me—

“Riven,” Luna says softly, and I glance back over my shoulder.

Her eyes meet mine like she can see straight through me. Like she knows exactly what I’m holding together just to keep breathing.

“We’ll find them.”

She stretches like a cat when she stands, arms high above her head, her shirt lifting just enough to show a sliver of skin. Like she doesn’t know what that does to me. Or maybe she does. Maybe she always does.

She doesn’t ask if she can follow—I hear her bare feet against the hardwood, soft as a heartbeat behind me, and I don’t stop her. Won’t. I could pretend I’m surprised, but Luna never needs permission, not with me.

The door clicks shut behind us, and the house seems to hold its breath, the sound of the others muffled beyond the heavy wood. My room is as stripped down as I am—no softness here, nothing to suggest comfort. Just the sharp edges I keep around me like armor.

She lingers near the door, watching me with that look she reserves only for me—like she’s seeing something I’ve spent centuries hiding and doesn’t think it’s ugly. Like I’m not ugly.

I pull my shirt over my head, tossing it toward the chair in the corner, and I catch her eyes dragging over me before she flicks them away like she wasn’t looking. Like I didn’t see the heat flash in them.

“You coming to stand there all night?” I ask, voice low, pulling open one of the dresser drawers without looking at her.

She huffs, but there’s a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth when she pads forward. “Maybe I like watching you undress.”

That pulse inside me flares, the bond twisting sharp beneath my skin, but I keep my expression neutral, rolling my eyes like I’m unaffected, even as every muscle in me hums for her.

“You’re shameless,” I murmur, dragging a black shirt out of the drawer.

Her fingers brush my back before I even hear her move—barely a touch, featherlight, but it burns through me anyway. I stiffen, jaw tightening against how easily she can do this to me without even trying.

“I like this version of you,” she says quietly, and when I glance over my shoulder, she’s closer than I expected, eyes pinned to mine, something open and devastating in them. “The one who doesn’t pretend he’s made of stone.”

I swallow around the heat curling up my throat, dropping the shirt without thinking.

“Yeah?” My voice scrapes like gravel. “You like me soft, sweetheart?”

She smiles, but it’s not sharp this time. It’s quiet. Honest. “I like you real.”

I don’t move when she reaches for me, slipping her fingers around my wrist, her thumb grazing that spot inside my arm where the bond thrums the strongest. She’s the only thing that’s ever felt like home and ruin at the same time.

“Riven,” she says softly, and fuck, I hate how she says my name—like it’s a tether and a promise all at once.

“I’m here,” I rasp, like I mean it.