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TWELVE

EVRYN

T he wind shifted just before Thalia arrived.

It carried something unnatural with it—too sharp, too still. The hairs on the back of Evryn’s neck lifted, and the air around her thickened.

Lucien noticed it too.

He stepped forward, jaw tightening, hand twitching instinctively toward his hip even though he wasn't carrying a blade openly. He didn’t speak, didn’t warn—but Evryn had started learning the language of his silence.

She rose from the bench, brushing dust from her jeans. Her gaze cut toward the broken window just as the shadows bent and opened .

And there she was.

Lady Thalia Shadeborn.

She stepped through the breach with the ease of someone who had walked into many places she didn’t belong and made them hers anyway.

Silver hair fell like liquid silk over her shoulder, her deep-gray coat lined with layered leather and metallic accents that shimmered faintly with spell-borne enchantment. She moved like she was weightless and rooted at once—graceful, dangerous, elegant as frost forming over stone.

Her gaze landed first on Evryn.

Not Lucien.

Evryn stood straighter, biting down on the strange spike of nerves in her gut.

“Found you,” Thalia said, voice warm but edged. “Took me long enough.”

Lucien didn’t speak.

Evryn did.

“You said you’d be back.”

Thalia smiled slightly. “I didn’t lie.”

Lucien stepped in between them before she could get any closer.

“You weren’t invited,” he said flatly.

“Neither were you,” she answered, brushing past him like he was just another shadow. “But I’m not here to fight. I’m here to talk.”

Evryn folded her arms. “Talk about what?”

Thalia didn’t hesitate. “You.”

Evryn blinked.

Thalia gestured toward the cracked sigil beneath their feet. “This place belonged to the beginning of the rebellion. We’ve fallen quiet in recent years—outnumbered, outmaneuvered. But now?” She stepped closer, gaze piercing. “You’ve returned. With the First Mark. With the fire in your blood.”

Evryn shifted uncomfortably. “I didn’t return. I’m only here looking for Eamon.”

“Ah, but your search has brought your return. The Veil, the Dominion has felt it. You are the heir of a line long thought extinct,” Thalia said softly. “You carry a legacy that terrifies the throne. The people remember stories of a queen born under both moon and shadow. They need someone like you.”

Evryn glanced at Lucien, then back to Thalia.

“I’m not a story,” she said. “I’m not a symbol.”

“But you could be,” Thalia countered. “You should be. You have power, Evryn—real power. And the Veil is waking because of it. Selyne is stirring her armies. If we don’t rally now—if we don’t strike with something they can believe in—we lose.”

Evryn’s breath came fast. “You want me as a banner.”

“I want you as a beginning.”

She looked at Lucien again.

His expression didn’t change, but his stance shifted slightly—closer to her. Guarded. Tense.

“Say something,” she muttered to him.

Lucien spoke quietly, but without hesitation. “Don’t trust her.”

Thalia’s lips thinned. “Still loyal to your mother, are you?”

“No,” Lucien said. “But I know how you operate, Thalia. You use people until they break. Then you dress the ruins in silk and call it revolution.”

Thalia looked at Evryn. “That’s rich, coming from the Queen’s favorite knife.”

“I haven’t killed her yet,” he said. “Which makes me unreliable. You, on the other hand…”

Evryn’s voice broke through before they could spiral.

“Stop.”

Both turned toward her.

She rubbed her temple. “I didn’t ask for any of this.”

“I know,” Thalia said gently.

“Do you?” Evryn snapped. “Because it sure as hell doesn’t feel like it. You didn’t tell me what I was. You let me walk into the Veil like I had any idea what the cost would be. You let them take Eamon?—”

“I didn’t order that,” Thalia cut in, just a little too fast. “If they did, it was rogue action.”

Lucien scoffed.

Evryn clenched her fists. Her voice lowered. “You told me I had a choice. You made me believe I could trust you.”

“You can ,” Thalia insisted.

Evryn stepped back. “Then why do I feel like you’re already planning how to use me?”

The silence after that was long. Heavy.

Finally, Thalia exhaled. “I will return with an offer. You deserve time. But don’t wait too long.”

And just like that, she was gone.

The air felt colder after she left.

Evryn sat again, slower this time, like her body was catching up to the weight of it all. The choice Thalia had dropped in her lap pressed into her bones—heavy, aching.

Lucien remained a few feet away. Still. Watching her with that unreadable face he wore like armor.

She looked up at him. “Were you serious?”

He nodded once. “She’s dangerous.”

Evryn narrowed her eyes. “And you’re not?”

His gaze didn’t flinch. “I’ve never promised to be anything else.”

She snorted, sharp and bitter. “So my choices are to be a banner or a bargaining chip.”

“No.” His voice was steady. “Your choice is whether you become what they say you are, or stay who you know you are.”

Evryn studied him. “And what if I don’t know that either?”

He stepped closer. Not a threat. Not exactly. But there was something coiled in him, something that never stopped watching the exits.

“Then we figure it out together.”

Before the moment could settle, her mind replayed something else. Something he’d said earlier.

Evryn’s brows furrowed. She tilted her head just slightly. “What did you mean back there?”

Lucien stilled.

She didn’t blink. “You said you hadn’t killed me yet.”

Silence. Cold. Crackling.

“You said it like it was a decision you’d already weighed.”

Lucien’s jaw flexed.

“Did the Queen send you?” she asked quietly.

Still no answer.

Her voice dropped further. “Were you following me back then because you were meant to...?”

He turned away, shadows curling tight around his boots.

Evryn stood, heart pounding. “Lucien.”

He looked over his shoulder, face shadowed, voice low.

“I didn’t know what you were. Only what I was told.”

Evryn felt something twist in her stomach—rage and betrayal and fear colliding.

“So you were supposed to kill me.”

He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to.

Her arms wrapped around herself like armor. “And now?”

Lucien stepped forward, voice like a fracture.

“Now I’d kill anyone who tried.”

She didn’t move. Didn’t speak. But she didn’t run, either.

And Lucien, for the first time, looked afraid. Not of her, but of what she might say next.