Page 13 of Broken Fates (Severed Flames #3)

Chapter 13

Idris

T he cold bit deep, but it wasn’t what chilled me.

We moved through the trees, our footfalls muffled by the thick hush of night, but every step felt heavier. The silence here wasn’t natural. It pressed in, writhing beneath my skin, slithering through the cracks in my armor, like hands reaching for something buried.

I tightened my grip on my sword, flexing my fingers around the hilt, as though that alone could steady the sinking weight in my chest. But it wouldn’t. Nothing would.

Not when I’d already made a promise I wasn’t sure I could keep.

Vale walked just ahead, her golden magic pulsing faintly beneath her skin, a beacon against the dark. She looked steady, composed, but I knew better. Knew the tightness in her jaw, the way her shoulders set too stiff, the way her power curled inward, as though she was trying to hold herself together by sheer force of will.

I’d failed her before. I would not fail her again.

Clenching my teeth, I forced the thought down before it could take root. But it was there—festering, lurking. I’d nearly lost her more than once, and if I let that happen again…

No. I wouldn’t let it.

Ahead, Talek led the way, his movements strained but determined. He hadn’t fully recovered, but there was no stopping now. Xavier and Kian flanked Vale on either side, close enough that their magic brushed against her own. She wasn’t alone. None of us were.

Then why did I feel like I was?

I exhaled slowly, forcing my focus forward. The sanctuary was built into the cliffs of the northern mountains, an abandoned temple carved into the stone. The air was thinner here, the weight of old magic pressing down on my skin, slithering through the cracks in my armor. But the closer we got, the worse the air felt. Heavy. Rotten.

Vale slowed, her steps faltering. Hesitation rippled through the bond. Not mine— hers .

I rolled my shoulders, trying to shake the weight pressing against my chest. My magic felt sluggish—distant, almost. Like something was pulling at it from the edges, gnawing at the frayed parts of me that hadn’t healed.

Maybe it was just exhaustion.

Maybe it was something worse.

I swallowed hard and refocused on the path ahead. We were getting close.

"Something’s here." Her voice was barely a whisper in my mind, but it struck like a hammer against my ribcage.

I met her gaze, nodding once. We all felt it—that quiet, lingering wrongness in the air. And I should have listened to it sooner.

The first arrow came too fast.

I barely had time to shove Vale down before it slammed into the tree where she’d been standing, the splitting bark echoing through the quiet.

“ Move .” Xavier snapped, already drawing his sword as figures erupted from the trees.

I spun, blade meeting metal, knocking back the first attacker before he could land a strike. They moved fast—too fast—but there was something wrong with them. Their movements were erratic and uncoordinated.

Kian’s magic flared beside me, warping the air, making the world twist, tangling around the nearest enemy, wrenching him back. Xavier took the opening, driving his sword through the attacker’s chest.

The man didn’t scream. Didn’t react.

He simply turned his head, looking directly at me with empty, vacant eyes. Something cold slithered down my spine. Vale’s magic flared, and for the first time, I saw the faces of our attackers.

Not soldiers. Not trained fighters.

" No. " The word scraped from my throat, raw and disbelieving.

The man in front of me wore a butcher’s apron, the leather tattered and smeared with old stains. His eyes—glazed, unfocused—locked onto mine, but there was no recognition in them. The woman Vale had thrown back clutched a broken pair of shears, her knuckles bone-white. A seamstress. Not a warrior.

Not an enemy.

But they kept coming.

Kian’s illusions snapped, bending reality around them, but it didn’t slow them down. Xavier cut one down clean through the chest, but the man barely staggered before righting himself again.

Their bodies twisted, bones cracking, wounds sealing with unnatural precision.

Talek let out a sharp curse as his opponent stood back up, his arm hanging at an impossible angle.

“They’re not alive,” Vale breathed, horror seeping into her voice.

And I knew she was right. I’d seen this before. Zamarra didn’t need soldiers. She needed bodies.

They whispered as they moved, their lips forming soundless words—prayers, pleas, half-formed screams. And then, the cold came. Not the wind. Not the night.

Her.

A sick, clawing pressure snaked through my mind, slipping through the cracks of my defenses like poison through a wound. I staggered back, gasping, pressing a trembling hand to my temple. No. No .

This feeling—I hadn’t felt it in centuries. Not since the day she cursed me.

A scream built in my throat, but I swallowed it down, slamming a barrier between us, forcing her out with every shred of strength I had left. My magic lashed back, raw, seething, fighting to keep her from pulling me under.

"She’s here," I rasped, my voice barely my own.

Zamarra wasn’t just sending her puppets.

She was watching.

Vale’s magic crackled, brighter now, her fear bleeding through the bond. Xavier wrenched her back, shielding her as Kian threw his hands outward, his illusions expanding in a twisting veil of falsehoods.

I shoved her from my mind with a snarl, slamming a mental barrier between us, my magic crackling in protest.

"We can’t win this." Vale’s voice was sharp, her magic surging brighter.

Xavier’s grip on her arm tightened. "We need to move. Now."

Talek stumbled toward us, one arm wrapped around his middle , blood trailing down his side. He looked ashen. “We have to go .”

The sanctuary loomed ahead—a massive, jagged doorway carved into the cliffside—gaping like a hungry maw. I gritted my teeth. We had no other choice.

I forced my body to move. “Inside! Now!”

Vale hesitated, but Xavier was already dragging her forward. Kian sent another wave of warped magic behind us, obscuring the battlefield, buying us seconds. Not much, but enough. We reached the entrance just as the first of them stepped through Kian’s illusions, their glassy eyes locking onto us.

But they didn’t charge. They didn’t chase. They were waiting. And I didn’t have time to figure out why.

As soon as the last of us stumbled into the sanctuary, a pulse of magic rippled through the stone, sealing the entrance. I exhaled hard, shoving my sword back into its sheath. My body ached, my magic still raw from forcing Zamarra out.

Silence crashed around us, thick and suffocating.

Vale turned to me, breathless. “You felt it, didn’t you?”

I met her gaze, something raw clawing up my throat. I forced it down and nodded. “She was watching.”

Kian ran a hand through his hair, his whole body wound tight. “She didn’t send an army.”

Xavier’s jaw clenched. “She didn’t need to.”

This wasn’t war. This was Zamarra sending a message. And we had just walked straight into her hands.

The moment we stepped inside, I knew we’d made a mistake.

The air pressed down, thick and wrong, clinging to my skin like unseen hands. It wasn’t just the stink of blood—though that was bad enough. The stone beneath my boots felt slick, wet. The sigils carved into the floor weren’t just dried marks—they were deep wounds in the rock, filled with flaking, blackened gore.

Some were familiar—wards, protection sigils, things meant to keep something in. But others? Others looked twisted, like whatever magic once lived in this place had been reshaped by something far older. Far worse.

This wasn’t just an abandoned sanctuary.

It was a graveyard.

Something shifted in the walls. Not stone. Something deeper. Something alive.

I sucked in a slow breath, trying to steady my hands. They were shaking. I clenched them tight, but it didn’t help.

I had already failed Vale once.

If I let her lose her sister, she’d never forgive me. I’d never forgive myself.

Kian let out a sharp breath beside me, his amber gaze flicking over the walls. “Yeah, great fucking idea coming in here.” His voice was sharp, but underneath it, there was a sense of unease. He didn’t trust this place. None of us did.

Xavier still gripped his sword, his knuckles white around the hilt. “I hate this,” he muttered. He tilted his head slightly, listening to something none of us could hear. “Feels like the air is humming.”

He was right. The walls bulged and contracted, like something deep in the stone was inhaling, exhaling, a slow, rhythmic throb, almost as if the stone itself had a heartbeat.

The sigils flickered erratically, reacting to our presence—not welcoming us. Marking us.

I felt watched.

No—worse.

I felt expected.

Vale exhaled through her nose, her magic curling around her fingers in golden wisps. “This is the Dreaming,” she said quietly, her voice tight. “It’s spilling through.”

I felt it, too—the stretch of unreality, the feeling that I could blink, and the world would be different. The weight of it sat at the base of my skull, whispering of things that didn’t belong here.

Talek was silent, his gaze skimming the sigils on the floor, his storm-gray eyes unreadable. He was still—too still.

He stood just ahead of me, his head tilted slightly, as if he were listening. His eyes were sharp, but there was something wrong with his expression. Like he wasn’t entirely here.

Vale noticed, too. She took a slow step forward, her magic flickering at her fingertips. “Talek?”

His fingers twitched. Then he inhaled—deep and sharp—like he was drinking in the air. “They’re louder here,” he murmured.

A chill swept down my spine. “Who?”

His gaze shifted to me, but for a second, I wasn’t sure he saw me.

“The Luxa.” His voice was hoarse. “They won’t stop.”

Silence.

Xavier and Kian both stiffened. They hadn’t heard this before.

Talek exhaled through his nose, rubbing his temples as if trying to clear his head. “I tried to tell you,” he muttered, his voice quieter now. “At the wedding. But how the fuck was I supposed to say it? ‘Oh, by the way, the wind won’t shut up, and the voices of the damned are keeping me awake at night’? Yeah, I’m sure that would’ve gone over well.”

Xavier muttered a curse under his breath. “You should’ve said something.”

Talek huffed a humorless laugh. “And what would you have done?”

No one had an answer for that.

He shook his head, his gaze sweeping the bloodied floor, the sigils carved deep into the stone. “It started as a whisper,” he said, almost absently. “Just… fragments. Words I couldn’t place. Names I didn’t recognize.” His hands curled into fists. “Then it got worse. They started screaming.”

Vale’s jaw tightened. “What did they say?”

Talek’s lips pressed together. Then, slowly, he turned his head—toward the empty space at the far side of the room. His eyes narrowed slightly, his brows furrowing, like he was watching something move.

“They told me to find you. Help you.”

Vale inhaled sharply, magic sparking between her fingers.

Talek’s voice dropped lower, the words slower now, like they were pulling themselves out of him. “They told me you were running out of time.”

Goose bumps rose along my skin, making me shudder.

Xavier’s stance widened slightly, his free hand twitching at his side. “And now?” he asked. “What are they saying now?”

Talek exhaled. His shoulders tightened, his jaw working. His gaze darted toward the far wall. The one where the sigils had shifted. The one where we had all felt something watching.

His voice was barely a breath when he said, “They’re saying we’re not alone.”

The air shifted—a slow, sucking pulse, like the room itself had just taken a breath. The bloodied sigils on the floor shuddered, and the walls seemed to bend inward, the space feeling too small, too tight, too wrong. The metallic scent of blood thickened, turning the air damp and suffocating.

A low, distant hum rippled through the stone beneath our feet, as if something buried deep inside the sanctuary had just woken up.

Kian took a step forward, boots squelching against the blood-slicked ground. “Okay, tell me I’m not the only one who just felt that.”

“You’re not,” Xavier muttered, his sword still gripped tight. “The air is…humming.”

Talek exhaled sharply, his shoulders going rigid. “The voices—” He winced, his hand flying to his head. “Too many. Too loud.”

Then something moved. A flicker in the shadows, a shifting of light, the suggestion of a shape that shouldn’t be there. I stilled, fingers tightening around my sword hilt. My magic itched, whispering warnings I couldn’t hear.

Vale froze, her golden light pulsing faintly against the gloom. Her breath hitched.

And then we saw her. A girl stood at the far end of the room. Unmoving. Unblinking.

I didn’t recognize the girl standing in front of us, but Vale did.

She gasped, magic flickering wildly at her fingertips. “Nyrah?”

The name struck like a blade to the chest.

Nyrah.

Vale’s little sister. The reason we were here. The reason she had started this fight in the first place.

A tremor ran through Vale’s frame, but she took a hesitant step forward. “Nyrah—it’s me. It’s Vale.”

The sigils on the walls throbbed, their glow flickering faintly like dying embers. The blood on the floor seeped deeper, as if something beneath the rock was drinking it in.

The weight of the wrongness pressed against my skin. I didn’t know her—had never seen her outside of Vale’s dreams weeks ago—but her body was too rigid, her hands clenched tight, her shoulders stiff. She wasn’t breathing like she should.

Nyrah didn’t move. Didn’t blink.

Then, slowly, too slowly, her head tilted—like she was listening to something none of us could hear. And her eyes—they couldn’t be hers. They weren’t the pale blue Vale described when she spoke of her sister—nothing like the girl Vale had spent her life protecting.

They were glowing, but not with Luxa light. The color shifted, flickering between blood red and endless black.

And when she spoke, the sound curdled my blood.

“Vale. Good of you to show up.”

But it wasn’t just Nyrah’s voice, something else was layered beneath it. A second voice, deeper, colder—older. Vale sucked in a sharp breath, her fingers twitching toward her blades.

Nyrah’s lips curled into a smile—but it was wrong. Not hers—couldn’t be. No, I knew that smile.

Nyrah didn’t hesitate. She lunged, straight for Vale—not Xavier, not Kian, not even me.

Her movements weren’t wild or desperate. She was focused. Precise. The kind of single-minded aggression that made my stomach churn. This wasn’t the frantic strike of a trapped girl. This was a killing blow of a trained fighter.

I barely had time to shove Vale back before Nyrah’s fingers curved like claws, aimed at her throat.

Xavier was already moving. His blade came up fast, a clean block between them—but Nyrah didn’t even flinch. She twisted around him like he wasn’t even there, so fast it left a blur in my vision. Kian threw up an illusion, warping the space around her, shifting the world into something impossible.

She cut straight through it.

Kian’s jaw clenched. “She sees through illusions.”

Vale scrambled back, breath sharp, magic flickering at her fingertips. “Nyrah, stop?—”

She didn’t. She didn’t even react. Didn’t blink. Didn’t even flinch at the sound of her own name. Her glowing eyes locked onto Vale like she was the only person in the room.

Xavier caught her next strike, barely managing to wrench her wrist aside before she could claw at Vale’s face. Her strength was impossible. He was twice her size, trained, experienced—and she still forced him back.

Xavier gritted his teeth, straining. “She’s too fast—Vale, move .”

Talek moved in to help, but Nyrah twisted, her foot slamming into his ribs and sending him staggering. Not the wild kicks of an untrained fighter. A precision strike. A deliberate, brutal move to clear the space between her and Vale.

She wasn’t fighting like a child. She was fighting like an assassin.

Something ugly and sharp coiled in my chest.

Vale gasped, stumbling back again. Kian’s illusions were useless. Xavier was defending, not attacking. Talek was already injured. None of them would strike her down.

And neither would I—I couldn’t.

I lifted my hand, golden light sparking between my fingers, raw and instinctual. I hadn’t used my magic much in this fight—not since Zamarra wormed her way into my head. But this wasn’t the time to hesitate. I forced the light outward, a shield of golden fire bursting between Nyrah and Vale.

Nyrah hit the barrier and didn’t stop, even when it singed her filthy tunic. Despite the flames, she ripped through it.

The gold sputtered, twisting, flickering—dying. The moment she touched it, something sank into my skull. A familiar, terrible pull.

Zamarra.

My breath hitched, my head snapping back.

No—no, not again.

I wrenched away, ripping my magic back before she could sink her claws into me. But the damage was already done. My knees hit the ground, a gasp tearing from my throat.

Zamarra’s laugh echoed through my head. Vale was running out of time.

Kian yanked Vale out of the way just before Nyrah’s strike would have crushed her ribs. Xavier caught Nyrah’s arms from behind, trying to restrain her—but she kept moving, kept twisting, kept fighting.

Vale gasped in pain, scrambling backward, eyes darting to me. But I couldn’t help. I was still drowning in Zamarra’s magic. And then I saw it—the truth of Zamarra’s plan.

Torture, pure and simple. She needed Xavier, or Kian, or Talek—or me—to make a choice. A choice with no way to win. If we saved Vale from Nyrah, our mate would hate us until the end of time. If we let Nyrah go, we’d lose our mate forever.

A choked breath left me. “She’s forcing our hands.”

Vale’s face twisted. She saw it, too.

Xavier’s grip slipped, and Nyrah wrenched free.

And then Vale stopped running. Her shoulders squared, her chest heaving. She took a single, steady breath—then stepped forward.

Her voice cut through the air, sharp and breaking. “Nyrah.”

Something flickered in Nyrah’s expression. Just for a second. Her glowing eyes shuddered. Her lips parted.

I saw it. I fucking saw it.

Nyrah was still in there.

And then her body jerked, muscles tightening, like a puppet caught in its strings. She lunged one last time, and Vale let her. She let Nyrah close the space—let her strike.

Vale didn’t dodge, but she moved . Her arm shot out at the last second, brutal and decisive, her fist cracking against Nyrah’s temple. The impact sent a pulse of golden magic rippling outward—Vale’s, not Zamarra’s.

For the briefest moment, the entire room flashed with golden light. Nyrah’s body shuddered. Her glowing eyes widened—just for a second, and then she collapsed.

The moment she hit the floor, the sigils on the walls stopped glowing. The pulse in the air faded—like something had been holding its breath. Zamarra’s presence vanished, lifting from my mind as if Vale had driven her out.

Vale stood over Nyrah’s unconscious form, breathing hard, hands shaking, the only sound her breaths wheezing in and out of her lungs.

Xavier knelt beside Nyrah, pressing his fingers to her throat. “Her pulse is faint,” he said hoarsely. “But steady.”

Kian exhaled sharply, dragging a hand through his hair. “Well… that was fucked.”

Talek didn’t speak. He just stared at the darkened sigils, his jaw jumping.

My own hands were trembling. Whether from exhaustion or fear, I didn’t know.

Vale brushed a strand of blonde hair from her sister’s forehead. “We got her.”

Xavier nodded, tightening his grip around Nyrah’s unconscious body. “Now let’s get the hell out of here.”

But when we turned, the door was gone. The sigils shifted again—slow, creeping, unnatural. The walls stretched, the air warped, and the world itself felt like it was breathing.

Kian swore under his breath. “The entrance was right there.”

He moved toward where the doorway had been, reaching out, and then his hand passed through it. Like it wasn’t real anymore. Like it never was.

Silence crashed over us.

The blood on the floor was dry, but the air was still thick with it. The feeling of being watched didn’t fade. The air in the room felt heavier now, like the walls were pressing in, waiting.

Watching.

Vale’s gaze flitted from me to Talek to the dark space just behind us.

She exhaled, slow and deliberate, as if the war raging in her thoughts wasn’t echoing through all of us.

“So… anyone want to tell me how the fuck we get out of here?”