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Callum dragged me from the dungeon by a frost-laced chain. Rok emerged from the haze ahead, his expression unreadable. Without a word, he knelt and pried open my clenched fist.

“I need some of your shadows for this one, Severyn.”

I barely had time to process his words before he siphoned them with a raise of his hand.

The pain struck like a fissure splitting open inside me, and darkness spilled from my breath, my skin, until my knees buckled.

Above the institute, pearl wings cut through the sky.

Naraic was searching for me. But before he could reach me, Rok raised a hand, and a shadow tether coiled around Naraic’s neck, yanking him from the air.

My shadows . Rok was using my own shadows to chain him.

“Naraic,” I breathed, straining toward him. “Break the bond. Please. They’ll kill me. They know about my power.”

His lavender eyes met mine, wide with strain as his wings curled and heaved against the chains. “No,” he barked down our bond.

Rok’s turned to me. “How does your resurrection quell work, Severyn?”

I said nothing .

He unsheathed a dagger, spinning it lazily between his fingers as he paced down the line of guards. “Does someone have to die for it to activate?”

“I don’t have a forbidden quell,” I said.

Callum scoffed, cutting me off. “Enough lies. Our guards got to your little Serpent in prison, just before he severed his bond. But it was enough. They found out the truth. You have a necromancy quell. And severing his bond only made you look more guilty.”

“No,” I said firmly.

He stepped closer. “Talk. Or we start killing the Demetria-blooded guards. One by one.”

I looked around. There was no escaping this, not when Naraic was bound.

Rok knelt at my feet, dragging idle fingers through a sprawl of shadow across the stone. “These are lovely,” he murmured. “Pity you never learned to play with them.”

“Help me,” I whispered across the bond. “ I don’t know what to do.”

“I’ve only been chained once,” Naraic replied, calm and dry. “From you. So, I’m afraid I’m as clueless as you are.”

“You have to break our bond.”

“If you suggest that again,” he warned, “I’ll ensure your great-great-grandchildren are only eligible to bond with bottom-feeder wyverns.”

To Rok, I said tightly, “I don’t have a forbidden quell. You tested my flame. You were the one who said I had no ice in my blood, and you were right.”

A voice cut through the chaos. Caius jerked in Myla’s grip as she shoved him forward. “Get your ice-cold hands off me,” he snapped, but she only tightened her hold, refusing to let him move .

Then Bridger was dragged into the room, with Ellison’s flame coiled around his wrists like glowing, searing cuffs. But he wasn’t looking at me. His eyes were locked on Myla. And the look he gave her wasn’t just longing, it was raw and desperate.

Gods help us. A love triangle between my brother, my friend, and my... sort of maybe enemy?

Then Damien appeared, shackled and silent. Callum strode toward him and dragged a blade along his collarbone, stopping just at the base of his throat.

“You’d die for her, wouldn’t you, lover boy?” he sneered. “Too bad you’re such an easy target.”

“No one will die!” I screamed, my voice cracking with panic. “Enough with the death threats!”

Bridger was shoved forward. “What the hell is going on? You owe us an explanation, Callum. Why bring every heir in the Continent here?”

Callum’s grin twisted. “You think that pity title makes you brave? You’re nothing.”

Then a pair of heavy bootsteps echoed across the stone. Warden Sorpine emerged from the institute. “Enough, Callum,” he barked. “Release the dragon. We don’t torture enigmas.”

But Callum didn’t lower his blade. His grip only tightened. “You’d want to torture that beast if you knew the truth,” he snarled. “That dragon is the one who killed your daughter during Skyfall.”

Sorpine’s mask didn’t shift. Only something colder passed through his eyes as he looked toward the shadows coiled around Naraic’s neck.

“Siphoning a Serpent’s shadows, Rok?” he asked. “You swore an oath when I let you keep that quell when you joined the guards.”

“She gave permission,” Rok said, taut. “It was a fair barter. ”

“I don’t care if she signed her name in blood,” Sorpine replied, his voice dropping to a dangerous calm. “Whatever bargain you made, it ends now.”

Rok’s eyes narrowed. “She killed Delair.”

Maybe Archer hadn’t told him how, exactly. Maybe Sorpine had no idea how Delair died.

Sorpine stepped closer, the silver scar on his cheek catching the light. “Siphoning her shadows won’t bring your sister back,” he snapped. “She is the heir to Demetria. And whether you like it or not, Demetria is still your home.”

The truth hit like steel driven into bone. Delair was his sister. And that’s why he hated me so much. Why he carved that letter into my skin and said it stood for murderer. When he tested my flame during initiation, he didn’t just find my flame. He felt her death. He felt her .

“She is not my heir,” Rok said. “Demetria will never be my home.”

Damien’s voice cut into my thoughts. “He’s from Venissia. A Night realm that went barren almost a decade ago. He was forced to live in Demetria as a barren refugee. He never accepted it.”

“I killed his sister.”

Callum rolled his shoulders. “We don’t know what she’s capable of. We need to run a few tests on her necromancy quell. This power alone defies nature.”

“Not in front of every heir,” Sorpine snapped.

“Then we take her to second base camp,” Callum said. “If the Forgotten uncover we are keeping a necromancer alive, who knows what the hell they will do. We need to kill her.”

Sorpine’s shoulders tensed. “She stays alive. Release her dragon. We are not animals who torture.”

Sorpine may have saved my life. But what the hell was second base camp ?

“Keep the bond open, ” Damien whispered. “ You’ve done nothing wrong. Lie if you must. But don’t shut me out. Not now.”

I wanted to. I hated needing him, but I needed an anchor to the world outside of where they were taking me.

“Find your will”, Damien urged. “ Fight your flame. Burn through it. You’re the heir of Demetria, Severyn. You’ve got enough anger to fuel a war. Use it.”