“I know them,” I said quietly, looking up at him. “It’s fine.”
Something unreadable flickered. He exhaled once, turned to leave before pausing to say, “I’ll find you later.”
“Ok,” I whispered, though the words sat wrong in my mouth as I watched him walk out the door.
Malachi buckled the last strap and slung his satchel. “Ready?”
I nodded, even as my chest pulled tight.
We saddled the horses. By the time we reached the pines, the light had edged to a clean brightness. The road to Synnex lay ahead, familiar and foreign at once. I kept telling myself Aeryn would be waiting at Colette’s counter, or lounging by the library steps. But with each step, the knot in my chest coiled tighter.
Malachi rode beside me without speaking, shadows clinging at his shoulders. The pines gave way to stone beneath the hooves. Smoke curled from chimneys, spiced bread sweetening the air,iron biting beneath it. A heartbeat I knew too well. A place I had missed—and hidden from.
We tied the horses at the edge of town and walked the rest of the way. The library rose first—white stone, tall windows glowing even at midday. Half my childhood lived between those stacks.
But the square pulled us forward.
Nobles clustered on the council steps in winter silks, their rings flashing. Their laughter held an edge. My stomach turned. Nothing here had changed—except me.
“Not that way,” I murmured, steering us toward the market. “Come on.”
I almost made it. The crowd shifted—and there he was.
Draven Navarro.
A man carved from his own ambition. Gray at the temples. A gaze with the hard glint of tempered steel. Santiago’s father.
His stare found me first, then slid to Malachi, narrowing as recognition struck. “Well,” Draven said, his voice carrying, disdain curling every syllable. “If it isn’t the old general of the Keepers.”
My pulse stumbled.How did Draven know him?I looked at Malachi. He didn’t flinch. He stood taller, every line of him carved from quiet defiance.
Draven descended the steps, two nobles at his shoulder and a third figure behind them, cloaked in black so deep it seemed to swallow light. He moved differently than the others, unhurried, each step a study in quiet authority. The nobles kept pace like they were orbiting him, the cloaked figure, without realizing it. When he reached the bottom, the crowd’s hum dulled to a hush.
“It has been a long time since Nyxarran men set foot in this square. Tell me—” Draven’s smile was thin, calculated—“is it true? Talon’s son sits the throne at last? A king crowned. The houses will be scrambling to offer brides, no doubt.”
A murmur rippled through the crowd.
“He’s already chosen,” Malachi said, tone final, the weight of it leaving no space for question.
The murmur split into whispers that moved through the crowd like wind through reeds. The stranger’s attention hooked on me, and the noise dulled to the sound of blood in my ears. The air felt heavy, charged, as if every watching eye waited to see what I’d do.
Draven’s brows rose. “Already chosen? Surely not—not when the goddess’s offer still waits at the patron ceremony.” He let the silence stretch, savoring it. “They’ve begun the process of gifting us children of their own. Half god—what ruler could want more?”
The stranger stepped toward me and removed his gloves. Ink bled from the veins of his hands to his wrists, lines and sigils that pulsed faintly violet when they caught the light. My breath hitched.
His face came into focus, sharp and wrong in the way beauty becomes unsettling: dark hair falling over high cheekbones, eyes black where white should be, winter-bright irises like stars drowning in midnight. Silver rings gleamed at his ears, and at his throat an onyx pendant flickered with faint violet light that pulsed in time with the sigils on his skin.
He looked at me, not like a stranger, but like someone reacquainting himself with a memory.
Then he extended his hand—to me. “Let’s try this again, hm?”
I’d seen that hand before. A bride veiled in blood. A whisper promising,I told you I’d find you.
Recognition must have flashed across my face; I couldn’t hide it fast enough. Malachi noticed. He stepped forward, intercepting the offered hand with his own. Their palms met.
The air shifted, sharp as a blade drawn through water. The torches faltered. Shadows recoiled. Malachi’s jaw clenched, a muscle ticking near his temple.
The man’s smile deepened. “Interesting,” he murmured.