I close my eyes, force myself to gather the scattered pieces, and brace for whatever comes next.
It’s the first time I’ve stepped foot in Reign’s room since that night.
Even thinking the words is like inviting a blade to my throat. My entire body tenses instinctively, a full-body flinch that ripples from the base of my spine up to my jaw. My thoughts fracture, break apart, reorganize into jumbled flashes that make no coherent sense—just fragments. Screams. Shadows. Blood. The scent of iron...fire. The sting of betrayal. And in that instant—right there—I understood that nothing was ever going to be the same again.
My hands are trembling, and I don’t bother trying to hide it. No one’s here to see. But the shame still burns hot beneath my skin. It’s always there—this sharp-edged guilt that I survived and left her all alone. That I still walk around carrying secrets and memories I can’t bear to say out loud.
The panic creeps in slow, steady, methodical. Like it knows the way. Like it’s been here before. It wraps around myribs and coils in my throat, my breath shortening, pulse racing, chest tightening with a sick familiarity. My vision tunnels, and I brace one hand against the wall just to stay upright. The coolness of the paint bleeds into my palm, but it doesn’t help much. I want to move—Ineedto—but my feet feel nailed to the floor.
I’m not just walking into a room. I’m walking into a graveyard of memories, and the worst part is, I’m not even sure what I’m hoping to find.
Clarity. Closure. Maybe some sliver of truth that proves what I felt that night wasn’t just paranoia spinning out of control. Maybe something that tells me Reign was more than missing—more than simply gone. Maybe an answer to why none of this fits together no matter how hard I try to force it to.
Instead, all I feel are ghosts crowding in from every corner, memories crawling over my skin like vines with teeth, trying to drag me under.
I press the heels of my palms into my eyes and count. Breathe. Ground myself. Survive this second so I can make it to the next. Because whatever this room is hiding can’t be worse than the version of it that’s been living in my head.
Eventually, I turn around.
Slowly.
When I finally face the room, it takes everything I have not to fold in on myself. The space is untouched, unnervingly still. Too perfect. I feel the damage everywhere—unseen butheavy—like grief has seeped into the walls, soaked the carpet, clung to the drapes. The room feels like it’s holding its breath.
And maybe I am too.
But I made it through the door. I survived the hardest part.
Now I just have to find the truth I came here for—before this place breaks me all over again.
Chapter Twenty-One
Rowen
The pixie downstairs is my torment, my curse in human form. She’s small, but she takes up every corner of my mind like smoke I can’t breathe through. I haven’t slept. Not really. Maybe thirty minutes here and there, just enough to keep from collapsing. The rest of the time, I pace. I sit. I stare at the walls with my hands twitching like they want to tear through time and undo everything I’ve done. Fire ants crawl beneath my skin, each one a stinging reminder of the choices I made, of the damage I left behind. Every hour she spends down there is another cut carved into me, deep and aching, because I know what she’s enduring—and I put her there.
At first, I thought she’d crack, thought I’d push just hard enough to get answers, to justify it all. But she didn’t. She didn’t scream or beg. She just sat there. When I realized she wasn’t going to break—when I saw that I’d already done enough to break myself—I walked away. Left her in that cold room with bruises I couldn’t justify and silence I couldn’t interpret.
I tell myself it was necessary. That we needed answers. That the threat to Ronan made it justified.
But that’s a lie.
The truth is, I couldn’t go any further. Not with her. Not when every instinct I have is screaming that something is wrong, that the pieces don’t fit, that hurting her feelswrongin a way nothing else ever has. So, I left her there—not because I had control of the situation, but because I didn’t.
And now, all I can think about is what comes next.
Our fathers are vultures. Every minute we waste, they tighten their grip, and this damn empire we were born into rots deeper from the inside out. There’s no fixing what they’ve done. There’s only destroying it before we become them. Before I become unrecognizable even to myself. We’ve been dancing around it for too long, making plans in whispers, pretending we still have time.
We don’t.
Because I can feel it—what little good remains in me is unraveling.
If we don’t act soon, there won’t be anything left of me to salvage—no sliver of conscience, no thread of humanity to cling to. I’ll lose whatever line I’ve been toeing and fully become the thing I swore I’d never be. The monster. And maybe—if I’m being honest with myself after what I’ve just done—that’s exactly what I already am.
Emerson’s voice breaks through the fog like a sudden gust of wind, scattering my thoughts before I can catch hold of them. “You alright, man?”
I blink, slow and heavy, realizing I’ve been staring at the same crack in the floorboard for who knows how long. My mouth moves before my brain catches up. “Yeah. Just tired.”
The lie tastes like metal on my tongue—sharp, dull, and hard to swallow. Emerson doesn’t respond right away. He doesn’t need to. I can feel his stare, steady and sure, like he’s waiting for the rest of it to come spilling out. When I finally glance over, he’s leaning against the edge of the doorway, arms crossed over his chest, eyes narrowed just enough to tell me he’s not buying it.