Page 1

I was dead.

I had to be. The darkness around me was too thick. Too quiet. Too absolute.

Then pain shot through my chest, radiating outward like a flame catching paper, and I knew I wasn’t dead—nothing hurt in the afterlife, right?

I jerked upright, heart hammering in my chest, but a hand pressed firmly against my shoulder, easing me back onto the pillows.

“Easy, sweetheart. You’re okay. You’re safe.” Levi’s voice wrapped around me, low and soothing, but it barely cut through the fog in my head.

I blinked, struggling to make sense of my surroundings. Shadows flickered across the ceiling, cast by the dim candlelight, and the air was thick with the scent of herbs, smoke, and old wood. My head pounded, and a dull ache throbbed deep behind my eyes.

“W-where…?” My voice came out rough, barely more than a whisper.

“The warlock’s safe house,” Lacey said from somewhere near my bed.

Her voice sounded warm but tight with worry.

I turned my head, wincing at the pain that shot through my skull, and found her standing there, her face pale and drawn.

Behind her, Abbie paced across the rug, her arms crossed, her eyes darting between us like she was waiting for something to go wrong.

“What’s going on?” I asked, still a little out of it.

“You’ve been out for almost two days. Your heart… it stopped, Ariella.”

The words sank in slowly, hitting me like a blow to the chest. My heart had stopped? I turned my gaze to Levi, who was still holding my hand, his expression shadowed with something I’d never seen on him before—fear.

“I did what I could until Lacey got here,” he said, his voice uncharacteristically quiet. “Tried to keep you breathing.”

A flicker of something haunted crossed his face, and I realized his hands were trembling slightly. The thought of Levi—cocky, unflappable Levi—fighting to keep me alive sent a shiver through me.

“Thank you,” I whispered, my voice cracking. It felt so inadequate, but I didn’t know what else to say.

Levi’s expression softened, but before he could say more, Lacey stepped closer, her blue eyes locking onto mine with an intensity that made my skin prickle. “There’s something you need to know. When I was healing you… I sensed something strange inside you. A kind of magic I’ve never felt before.”

My brows furrowed, confusion cutting through the haze. “What are you talking about?”

Lacey exchanged a glance with Levi before turning back to me, her expression serious.

“It’s not just your magic, Ariella. I think that when you absorbed that energy from the dragons, you took in more than just their essence.

Paimon had been hoarding power—magic stolen from countless other supernaturals—and when you absorbed your magic from the dragons, all of that came with it. ”

“But… I’ve had that magic for a while now. Why is this happening?”

“Rhodes’s attack threw everything off balance,” she said, her voice gentle but firm. “It’s like you were a dam, holding back a flood. Your own magic was the only thing keeping it all contained, but now it’s like the dam’s cracked. Everything’s mixing together—chaotic, unstable.”

The room seemed to tilt, and I clutched the edge of the blanket, trying to keep myself steady.

My magic churned inside me, a wild, whirlpool pressing against my ribs and burning beneath my skin.

I could feel it now—the way it strained against the boundaries of my body, too big, too wild to be contained.

It was like trying to breathe with lungs full of fire.

I squeezed my eyes shut, forcing myself to take deep, steady breaths. But with every inhale, the pressure built, as if I was drawing in more than just air. The foreign magic twisted through me like thorns, catching on every breath and tearing me apart from the inside.

“It feels… wrong,” I whispered. “Like there’s too much inside me. It’s crushing me from the inside out.”

Levi’s grip on my hand tightened, grounding me, but I could hear the concern laced in his words. “You don’t have to push yourself right now, sweetheart. We’ll figure this out, but you need to rest first.”

I shook my head, even though the movement made me dizzy. “I can’t just lie here. We don’t have time for that.”

Ignoring the burning in my chest, I pushed myself up on my elbows, determined to sit up properly.

But the second I moved, a sharp, searing pain lanced through me, like a live wire sparking beneath my skin.

I gasped, clamping a hand over my chest as the magic inside me surged, slipping free of my control.

A wave of power pulsed out from me like a heartbeat, rattling the windows and knocking over a nearby candle. The flames flared, casting wild shadows across the walls as the pressure built higher and higher.

“Ariella!” Lacey’s voice cut through the noise, sharp with alarm.

Lacey and Abbie moved quickly, their hands weaving intricate sigils in the air. A shimmering barrier wrapped around me, pressing back against the wild magic crackling in the air, the energy snapping and sparking like a trapped storm.

The pressure eased, just enough for me to drag in a shuddering breath, but I could feel the bindings straining. They were like a flimsy bandage over a deep wound, barely holding back the magic that thrashed inside me, desperate to break free again.

“It won’t hold for long,” Abbie said, her brow furrowed with concentration. “This is only a temporary solution. We need something stronger, or it’s going to tear her apart.”

Frustration flared hot in my chest, mixing with the fear that lurked at the edges of my mind.

I’d fought so hard, survived so much, and now I was being undone by the very thing I had wanted back for so long.

My hands shook as I dragged them through my tangled hair, my breaths coming faster and more ragged.

“We don’t have time for this,” I said. “Rhodes has the dagger. He’s in Elysium.” I inhaled deeply. “Two days? I was out for two days? He could have done anything by now.”

“We haven’t heard any news from Elysium,” Levi assured me. “So far, Rhodes has been quiet.”

“Which means, we have time to help you,” Lacey said.

I opened my mouth to argue, but quickly shut it again. I was ready to shout that I would march to Elysium like this right now and to hell with my erratic magic.

But they were right, of course. I couldn’t go like this. If I did, I would only be another problem they would have to deal with.

“You don’t have to carry this alone, sweetheart,” Levi said softly.

For a moment, I leaned into his touch, letting the warmth seep through the layers of fear and pain. But a dark thought lingered at the back of my mind, whispering fears I didn’t want to acknowledge.

What if this was beyond fixing? What if the magic inside me was too much, too wild, and no one—not Levi, not Lacey, not even me—could stop it from tearing me apart? From tearing everyone around me apart?

I swallowed hard, shoving the thought back into the shadows where it belonged. I couldn’t afford to think like that. Not now when we had so much on the line. This wasn’t about me. This was about doing what was best for Elysium.

And right now that was to find a way to either control or take all of this crazy magic out of me so I could fight!

“All right, we’ll fix this,” I said, forcing steel into my voice. “Somehow. But then we’re marching into Elysium, no matter what.”

Levi’s lips quirked into a small, crooked smile, but his eyes held shadows. “That’s the stubborn angel I know.”