Page 40

Dahlia

I couldn’t stop staring at the bowl.

The water had turned a soft pink. Like it was trying to be delicate. Like the eye sitting in it wasn’t real. Like it wasn’t Silas’s.

The note was still clenched in my hand. The words were burned into me—each line sharper than the last.

Henry was a warning. Silas is a promise. Which do you choose?

I hated her.

I hated her more than anything I’d ever hated in my life.

Because it wasn’t just the cruelty. It was the calculation. She knew exactly how to wound us. Not with pain. But with choice.

I sat down at the table slowly, the stone chair cold under my thighs, the note trembling in my fingers.

“Dahlia,” Kieran said, voice quiet. Careful. “Look at me.”

I did.

And I hated how easily the tears came when I did. Like he was the only safe place I had to fall apart.

“She’s trying to split us,” I said. “She’s trying to make us choose—”

“She knows we’ll try to save them both,” he said. “Which is why she’s forcing the timeline.”

I swallowed hard. “If we go to Silas, and Henry—”

Kieran sat across from me, his eyes burning with something that wasn’t quite rage. “If we stop Calliope, we cut off the source. The curses, the bindings—whatever’s holding them—it all comes from her. ”

I nodded slowly. “And if we waste time trying to break her spell first…”

“She’ll just send another part of him.” His jaw tightened. “Or worse.”

The silence pressed down like stone.

My heart wanted to go to Henry. To fix it. To hold his hand and demand that the world give him back.

But the part of me that had seen war—the part that had watched Kieran rise from shadow and fire and still choose mercy—knew the truth.

We can’t save either of them if we don’t end this.

I looked at the eye again.

Then at the man across from me, who had lost his home, his brother, his time—and somehow still chose me.

“Okay,” I said. “We go after Silas first.”

Kieran didn’t say anything. He just reached across the table and took my hand.

And I let him.

Because this was the moment it shifted. Not just the war.

Us.

“I am not looking forward to this phone call.” I sighed, but I had to do it; I had to call Thea and tell her everything.

I kissed Kieran’s hand and stepped out onto the villa’s back terrace, where the air smelled like old citrus and stone. The sun was low and red, bleeding into the hills like something wounded.

My hands wouldn’t stop shaking.

I pulled out my phone anyway and called Thea.

She answered on the second ring. “Dahlia?”

Her voice was sharp. Alert. Scared.

I swallowed hard. “We got a message.”

“From?”

“From Calliope. ”

There was a beat of silence. Then: “What did she do?”

“She sent us… a piece of Silas.” My voice cracked. “And a note. She’s got him.”

I heard Thea inhale slowly. “And Henry?”

I sat down hard on the stone step, one arm wrapped around my stomach. “She said Henry was a warning. Silas is a promise. She wants the locket. And me.”

Thea cursed under her breath. “So what’s the plan?”

I closed my eyes. “We’re going after Silas first.”

Silence.

Then her voice—sharp, furious. “ Are you out of your mind? Henry is dying. You’re seriously going to run off on a suicide mission with only Kieran ?”

“I have to,” I whispered. “Calliope’s the root of this. If we don’t stop her, we won’t save anyone. ”

“You don’t even know where she is. You don’t know what’s waiting for you!”

“We’re close. There’s a lead. We don’t have time to argue.”

“No,” Thea snapped. “You don’t have time to walk into this alone. At least let me meet you—let me help. ”

Tears slipped down my face before I could stop them.

“I can’t wait for backup. If I do, we’ll be getting pieces of Silas until there’s nothing left. And if we fail—if we’re too late—then you’re the only one I trust to take care of what’s left.”

“Don’t you dare talk like that—”

“I’m just saying it in case,” I whispered, voice cracking again. “If something happens… Take care of Henry. Sunny. Oleander. You tell them I love them.”

Thea’s breath hitched.

“Dahlia—”

“I’m sorry.”

I hung up.

The silence afterward was louder than anything she could’ve said.

I sat there for a long moment, letting the weight of it crush me. Letting it burn through every part of me that wanted to run the other direction.

Then I wiped my face.

Tied my hair back.

And stood.

Because no one else was coming. And I had a war to walk into.