Page 64 of Academy of the Wicked: Year Three

And that's why the others can't reach me.

They're all male.

Every one of my protectors, my bonds, my anchors—all forbidden from entering waters meant only for those who would walk the paths of Deathshire.

I look back toward the platform, searching for the one person who might be able to help.

"Nikki!" I try to scream, but the word dies in my throat.

Because I need Nikki—female, Fae, capable of entering these waters. But Nikolai stands on the platform, locked in his male form by his own choice or by the realm's demands. And even if he could shift, would he? After nearly dying, after choosing to live as himself, would he transform just to save me?

The question becomes moot as a wave rises from nowhere.

Not gradually building from the water's surface buterupting—fully formed, impossibly tall, aimed directly at my small form with the particular precision of intention rather than nature.

My scream barely has time to form before the water crashes down.

The impact is devastating. Not just physically—though my small body is thrown from the boat like a discarded toy—but magically. The waterburnsdespite being liquid. It freezes despite carrying no ice.

It invades every sense simultaneously:tasting of copper and starlight, smelling of endings and beginnings, feeling like being unmade and reformed with each second of contact.

I hit the water's surface, and it doesn't yield.

For a moment, I lie on top of it like it's solid, the impact driving all breath from my child-lungs.

Then, with the particular cruelty of physics delayed, it parts.

And I sink.

Water fills my vision—not dark like it appeared from above but filled with impossible light. Colors that don't exist in normal spectrums paint patterns through the liquid, creating corridors of luminescence that lead in all directions and none.

I try to swim, but my child-body doesn't know how. Arms flail with desperate instinct rather than technique. Legs kick with no coordination. And all the while, I'm sinking deeper into waters that shouldn't exist in this realm.

My lungs burn, demanding air that isn't there. My chest feels like it's being compressed, pressure building from inside and out simultaneously. The irony isn't lost on me—I who command fire and shadow, who've been called guardian and royal, am going to drown because this body doesn't know how to swim.

Darkness creeps in at the edges of vision—not the comfortable darkness of Cassius's shadows but the absolute black of consciousness failing.

The last coherent thought before everything goes dark is a prayer:

Please. Not like this. Not when we're so close.

Not when I finally have people worth living for.

Then there is nothing but water and the slow descent into depths that have been waiting for me since before I was born.

Waiting since two academies were split like twins, each given their own path through the same waters.

Waiting for someone bold enough—or desperate enough—to cross between them.

The water embraces me like one who’s returning to the root of it all.

The Heir Of Solace

~NIKOLAI~

The scream cuts through everything—barrier, distance, the roar of impossible waters—piercing straight into my consciousness with the precision of a blade finding the gap between ribs.

"Nikki!"