Page 27

TWENTY-SEVEN

SERAPHINE

S he didn’t remember screaming.

She remembered the moment before —Cassian’s back turned, fire roaring from his skin as the Hollowborn closed in.

She remembered the way he moved like he’d already made peace with it. Like he’d chosen it.

He fell. And everything broke.

His body hit the stone like it had been cut from the sky. One moment fire, the next— nothing.

The Hollowborn descended on him like carrion. That was when the scream tore from her throat.

Raw. Animal. Grief didn’t wait. It devoured .

She sprinted toward him, but the shadows moved faster. Wrapped around him like claws, mouths gaping, hissing with stolen breath.

“ NO! ”

She dropped to her knees ten paces too far, the weight of it crushing her.

It didn’t feel real.

Couldn’t.

She had survived everything— they had. Only for this? To watch him be swallowed by the thing they were fighting to destroy?

Her hands slammed into the ground. And the flame answered. Not Whitefire. Not magic. Blood.

The shift came without warning, bones cracking, muscles tearing, fire ripping from her spine like wings forged in pain. Her body blurred, blurred until there was only light —a woman wrapped in dragonsong and grief and rage.

The fire burst from her like a supernova. The blast was cataclysmic.

It didn’t burn the Hollowborn—it erased them. Shadows shrieked as they were obliterated mid-lunge. Bodies turned to ash mid-air. The entire tunnel shook, and the stormfire inside her spiraled into something ancient. Something forbidden .

She didn’t care. She just wanted them gone.

When the dust cleared, when the shadows were finally silent—Cassian lay in the chamber.

Untouched. Unburned. Unmoving.

“Cassian…” Her voice cracked.

She stumbled forward. Fell to her knees. Her fingers brushed his cheek.

Cold.

“No, no, no… ” she whispered, cradling his face. “You don’t get to leave me. Not after everything. Not like this. ”

His chest didn’t rise. His skin was gray beneath the blood.

She collapsed against him, sobbing into his shoulder, the fire flickering uselessly at her fingertips.

“Why?” she choked. “Why did it need you? Why couldn’t the blade be enough? ”

No one answered. Not the gods. Not the magic.

Not him.

She pressed her forehead to his, whispering through clenched teeth. “I love you, damn it. And if you think I’m going to let you vanish without a fight?—”

Her voice trembled.

His skin was cooling too fast.

Her heart was splintering under the weight of something she couldn’t name—grief, fury, helplessness. All she knew was she couldn’t let this be it.

Not like this.

Not after everything.

The fire behind her pulsed. A low hum, almost sentient. And in that thrum of flame and memory, something stirred—old and forgotten.

There was one thing left.

A magic older than Whitefire. Older than blood. Older than even the Hollow.

It was the magic of oaths, legacy, and debt.

Malrik owed her.

She pulled Cassian’s body into her lap, her hands shaking as she reached for the shard still sheathed at his side. Her fingers curled around it with purpose. The edge bit into her palm. Blood spilled hot and sharp.

She didn’t hesitate.

She smeared it across his chest, over the scars and sigils burned there by fate.

“ Malrik! ” she screamed, her voice echoing like a war cry across the hollowed chamber. “ Malrik, come to me! ”

Nothing answered.

Her eyes burned. She slammed her bleeding hand to the stone.

“ I invoke the blood right, ” she shouted. “ House Sablewing. House Drakar. I call the pact due! ”

The air stilled. Magic cracked. A wind swept through the chamber from nowhere, and every shadow bent.

Folded. Knelt. Then, from the curve of the flame where light and dark danced dangerously close, he stepped through.

Malrik. The memory-weaver. The whisper collector.

He looked the same—black hair wind-swept, crimson eyes silvered by old truths. His wings folded behind him like veils made of ink and sorrow. But there was a new weight to his stare as it landed on her, on the body cradled in her arms.

“I knew you’d call,” he said softly.

“I didn’t have a choice,” she replied, voice shaking.

His gaze dipped to Cassian.

“You do know what this costs?”

She didn’t blink. “ Help me. ”

Malrik tilted his head, feline and cruel. “You’re invoking a rite your father buried.”

“I’m not him. ”

“No,” he agreed. “You’re not.”

A beat passed.

“You’ll kill yourself,” he warned again, quieter now.

“I don’t care,” she hissed. “My father is the reason he’s the last one left. He killed his line. And yet, Cassian… He saved me. Over and over. Let me return the favor.”

Malrik stepped forward, shadows parting like silk.

“This magic is older than the Hollow. It was built on sacrifice. Memory-for-blood. If he comes back—he might not come back the same.”

“He’s not dead,” she snapped. “Not yet. I can feel him. His fire—it’s not out. It’s trapped. ”

Malrik studied her.

Then knelt opposite her, his fingers already weaving in the air, leaving trails of glimmering sigils suspended in the dark.

“You only get one shot,” he murmured.

She nodded once.

“I’ll need your blood,” he added.

“Take it.”

“No hesitation. Drakar to the core.”

“Malrik,” she growled.

“Fine, fine.”

He drew a knife with a blade as thin as shadow. Sliced a clean arc across her other palm. The blood spilled over Cassian’s chest, steaming against his cold skin.

Malrik began to whisper words in a language that had no vowels—only memory.

Seraphine repeated them. She didn’t know what they meant. But they tasted like promises her ancestors had broken.

With one bleeding hand, she traced the runes Malrik whispered—symbols seared into her bones from her mother’s old prayers, half-forgotten lullabies that once tucked her into bed with firelight kisses.

She pressed her palm to Cassian’s lips. Then to his sternum. Then to the shard, which began to glow again—slowly, then violently.

The moment she whispered his name— Everything stopped.

The fire vanished. The shadows coiled tight. And the world blinked. Darkness swallowed the chamber.

Blinding light.

Cassian’s body arched like lightning had struck it.

His mouth opened on a scream that never came out—his back bowed, muscles locking, fingers twitching. The shard pulsed wildly against his ribs.

Seraphine held him tighter, whispering his name over and over.

“Cassian. Cassian, come back. Come back. ”

Fire surged beneath her hands.

Shadow swirled through his veins.

Light stitched through his broken bones.

Stillness.

His body collapsed back into her arms.

She froze.

“Cassian?”

Silence.

Then he gasped. A rough, pained, real sound.

One broken breath. One sound. But it shattered her world.

“Cassian…” she whispered.

His eyes fluttered open, dazed.

“...what the hell…?” he rasped.

She sobbed again as Malrik disappeared into smoke, just as he had came.

But this time, the sob was hope that choked her, not grief.