His jaw shifted. “I cannot.”
“Wonderful,” I muttered, rubbing my temples. “Everything in this cursed place is always ‘cannot say.’”
The words cracked out of me, raw with exhaustion rather than confidence.
“I don’t suppose you can come with me?” I added under my breath, only half-serious.
I was so tired of this place, tired of circling conversations that led nowhere, tired of not being on my way back to Aeryn with something that could save him. Masks were heavy, and mine was cracking. I longed for Hayat’s steadiness. For Aeryn. For family. For the small, carved-out space where I could be myself.
Both their heads snapped toward me. Malachi spoke first. “Aurelia. Don’t?—”
But it was too late.
Gabriel whispered, voice breaking like a vow. “I will wait for you after the ball, shadow-maker.”
Before I could even process it, he slipped back into darkness. I hadn’t meant it as an invitation. Gods, it hadn’t even been a real request. But something in the way he said it told me Shadow Elves didn’t hear words the way mortals did. Stories whispered of their instinct to protect, to bind themselves to purpose without hesitation. They heard intention. Need. Fear. And mine had spilled out whether I’d wanted it to or not.
Malachi turned on me slowly. “You have no idea what you just did.”
“Then why don’t you tell me?” I shot back, already turning from him. I didn’t wait for an answer. I spun on my heel and stalked toward the staircase, shouting the words over my shoulder.
I climbed the spiral stairs two at a time. Training had always been my escape, and though I hadn’t trained in over a week, I welcomed the sting of muscle movement now. The rhythm grounded me.
I reached my room and pushed through the door, shutting it firmly behind me.
The sound of a thud cracked through the silence. A boot blocked the frame. Malachi forced the door wide and stepped in, slamming it behind him. I staggered back, hitting the edge of my bed.
“You mortals,” Malachi snarled, his voice a blade in the dark. “So quick with your words. So careless with promises you can’t possibly keep. You don’t understand what they cost. You don’t understand the weight of them when time doesn’t run out.” Hisgaze burned into me. “A short life doesn’t excuse throwing chains you can’t carry. You’re selfish.”
“Ah yes,” I bit back. “The girl who crossed the woods alone in the middle of Darkfrost to help someone she loves? So sorry I inconvenienced you with my heartlessness.”
A flare of disbelief spiked through me. Of all the things he could accuse me of, selfishness was the one that scraped deepest.
He stepped forward, fury rolling off him in waves. “Do you even know what Gabriel is? What he was? What that meant?”
“I’m sure you’re going to teach me, oh wise one.”
He growled low in his throat and firmly grabbed my face. His palm was warm. “To a Shadow Elf, invitation is vow. Purpose. And once they’re given purpose, they have no choice but to follow it. To the end.”
Shadows poured from his skin, curling around my arms, my throat. Not quite touching, but close enough that I felt the pressure of them pressing in.
His golden eyes, once gleaming like polished metal, darkened at the edges—molten turning to obsidian. I watched his face shift, the fine angles tensing with restraint. Fury warred with something else behind his expression, something that looked a lot like grief. Like guilt.
Malachi stepped in slowly, close enough that the air between us vanished. His hand slid from my jaw to my throat. Tightening. His shadows curled around my hips, my ribs.
My breath hitched. He was furious and unraveling.
And gods help me if a part of me didn’t flinch. I wanted to understand the storm behind his eyes, to meet it head-on and ask what it cost to carry that kind of fury. What it meant to hold so much power and still be so breakable underneath it all.
“Is this supposed to scare me?” My voice dropped, low and sharp.
The shadows stilled. Just for a breath.
I met his gaze and steadied my breathing, forcing calm into my limbs.
I snapped my arm up, trying to thread it through his, the maneuver Hayat had drilled into me a hundred times. A clean slip. A way out without escalation. The angle was right. Weight to the outside. Elbows tight. Hayat would’ve praised the form.
But Malachi was faster. He stepped inside my timing as if the room tilted for him, intercepting the counter before it existed.