Page 21

TWENTY-ONE

SERAPHINE

T he morning felt wrong.

Seraphine knew it before her eyes opened—like the world had shifted just slightly on its axis, quiet in all the wrong places.

The fire was down to embers.

Alek sat sharpening his blade, Lira paced like a caged animal, and Brann was muttering something into his tea. Normal things. Familiar.

But not him.

Cassian’s spot near the ruins was empty.

No blanket, boots, and a trace.

She stood slowly, brushing dust from her palms, already knowing what she’d find before she reached his usual perch.

Nothing.

Just a ghost of warmth in the stone where he’d been.

“Where is he?” she asked, too sharp.

Lira looked up, brows pinched. “Gone.”

Seraphine’s stomach dropped. “What do you mean, gone?”

“He left sometime before dawn,” Alek said without looking at her. “Didn’t say a word.”

She swallowed against the rising knot in her throat.

Of course he left. Of course he didn’t say goodbye. He thought he was protecting her.

The arrogant, noble, stupid bastard.

She stormed back toward the center of camp, grabbing her blade, her satchel, anything she could carry. Her hands trembled as she strapped the shard pouch to her belt.

“Where are you going?” Brann asked, voice small.

She didn’t look at him. “To bring him back.”

“He doesn’t want?—”

“I don’t care.”

Her words cracked like a whip.

Lira stepped forward, uncertain. “You think you know where he went?”

Seraphine nodded once. “The next shard. It’s the only thing that makes sense.”

Alek frowned. “You’re not cleared to move. Orders were to remain here until further instruction from the Court.”

She froze. Turned slowly.

“You think I give a damn about the Court right now?”

“The Emperor?—”

“Can burn, ” she snarled. “I’m done letting that man dictate who I stand beside.”

The others fell silent.

Suddenly, a sharp noise split the air. Clapping.

Not from the camp. From the trees.

Dozens of figures emerged from the mist. Clad in obsidian armor with the Drakar crest gleaming like fresh blood across their chests.

At their head was a man with eyes like molten silver and a cold, elegant smile.

Captain Varros. Her father’s favorite blade.

“Lady Seraphine,” he drawled. “So nice to see your defiance is still intact.”

Her hands curled into fists. “You’re not welcome here.”

He stepped closer. “I think you’ll find that, as heir to House Drakar, you are never not under the Emperor’s watch.”

Two soldiers moved to flank her.

She didn’t flinch. “If he’s trying to drag me back to the Citadel, he’ll have to send more than couriers in costume.”

Varros smiled wider.

“Oh, we’re not taking you back,” he said. He nodded.

The soldiers surged forward.

“We’re locking you up. Oh, and your cousin, Vaela sends her regards.”

They shackled her in sigil-forged manacles that suppressed her flame. They wrapped her eyes with silk marked in Veil ink to blind her from glamours. They caged her magic with a cruelty only her House had perfected.

They didn’t take her far.

Just to a sealed tent north of the ruins—enough to silence her, humiliate her, remind her who owned her blood.

“You brought this on yourself,” Varros had whispered before they left. “All that fire. All that rebellion. It was only a matter of time.”

She said nothing.

Not to him.

Not even when the tent flaps sealed shut and the light died.

Because inside her chest the burn had only gotten hotter.

She didn’t sleep. Didn’t cry or beg.

She sat cross-legged on the cold earth, breathing slow, counting heartbeats. Because she knew.

Cassian was out there. Alone. Headed into whatever nightmare the Hollow had laid in wait. And she was wasting time.

So when the sigils on the manacles began to flicker—when her Whitefire pulsed in her veins like it wanted to fight —she smiled in the dark.

“I’m coming for you,” she whispered.

“To hell with thrones.”