9.

  Spook

  The hush of the underwater city wrapped around me like silk. Soft and strange. The quiet of the night settled in as we all lay in our dreamlike beds. I lay still in bed, eyes fixed on the ceiling above. The light filtering through the open window across the ceiling, pale and silver.

  After the kiss we went back to the room and we hadn’t spoken since. Not because I didn’t want to, but because words felt too heavy. This kiss. It should’ve filled me with fire or certainty or… something.

  But all I felt now was quiet. A terrible, aching kind of quiet. I turned on my side, curling in slightly, my eyes seeing the vague shape of Faelwen sleeping in the other bed next to me. This kiss with Elora it had been different than our other kisses.

  Slower. Softer.

  Full of something she hadn’t dared say aloud.

  It wasn’t Faelwen.

  And gods help, I was grateful for that. But…

  I squeezed my eyes shut. Faelwen had been my first real love, though I’d never said it to her.

  Couldn’t. Not when her soul was already bound to Ash in that strange, unbreakable way. She had never given me false hope, never led me on. She was kind.

  Honest. And completely unreachable. But it hadn’t stopped the wanting. Hadn’t stopped the ache every time I saw her smile at Ash like he held the stars in his palms. I thought the ache might never end. Until Elora.

  I never expected her to look at me the way she did, sharp-tongued and playful, yes, but lately, something softer had bloomed between us. Her teasing touches. The way her laughter came easier around me.

  The kiss tonight had felt like a beginning. A window cracking open where a door had closed. And secretly I hoped it could become something real. Not just because I want to be loved. But because I wanted a place to put the love still tangled inside of me. I never had that kind of love growing up. After losing my parents at such a young age...

  Anyway. She wasn’t Faelwen. She didn’t have to be.

  Elora was wild, brilliant, and maddening. She challenged me, stood toe to toe with me. And she chose to let me get closer to her, if only in pieces. That had to mean something. But thinking back about the kiss, a darker truth pressed in. “We can’t be together for the long run,” she had said. Not just because I’m not elven or her life was bound in rules and alliances. But because her heart might never be fully his. And maybe my heart, still a little bruised and tender, wasn’t quite hers yet, either.

  Still… I wanted it to be. Wanting to fall in love with her. Wanting the way her hand had touched my cheek to be the beginning of something that didn’t end in silence and sacrifice. If Faelwen had found her forever in Ash, then maybe, just maybe, Elora could be my beginning again.

  I sat up slowly, pressing the heels of my hands to my eyes. The air smelled faintly of lavender and moss. Outside, a ripple of a distant chanting drifted through the archways. I let it pass. Let everything pass. And sat in stillness, clutching a fragile hope like a flickering flame cupped between trembling fingers.

  My heart still fought between my love for Faelwen and Elora. I wasn’t in love with her. Not yet.

  But I could be? And maybe… if the world didn’t break her first… she could love me back.

  A high-pitched scream split the silence like a blade through velvet, yanking me out of the mire of my own thoughts. I sat bolt upright, heart thudding. The others hadn’t stirred. Faelwen lay curled in sleep, her brow furrowed as if still caught in a dream. Artemis, unmoved, his ears twitching only slightly. Elora slumbered in a twist of linen blankets. But one bed was empty.

  Ash.

  A terrible cold clenched around my heart like a sin. Chanting. Screaming.

  Necromancer.

  Once a necromancer, always a necromancer. And with that mysterious book of his, who knows what he’s up to.

  I jumped from the bed, snatching my daggers from beneath the mattress, pulling on my tunic and cloak in one frantic motion. I slipped into the hallway. It was deserted, haunted by silence. No flicker of candlelight, no trace of life. The chanting was gone now, like a dream receding beneath the waves, but I had heard it. I knew I had.

  I followed the echo of the cry to a glass-in veranda, now drenched in moonlight and shadows. The scent of night-blooming lilies lingered thick and sweet. The doors to the garden stood wide open and beyond them the stone platform shimmered with magic, or the remnants of it.

  There, crouched at the water’s edge like a phantom torn from the void, was Ash.

  He was hunched over a body. A creature.

  No, that creature Faelwen told me about.

  The axolotl.

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  The water-born wonder with translucent skin like sunlight on glistening water. It lay limp now, its body dulled and quiet. Pale limbs splayed, eyes dimmed. Ash was whispering, cursing, frantic. He clutched the black spellbook, its red ink glowing faintly in the dark. His hands trembled. “Why does it die?” he rasped.

  “Ash?” My voice was cautious, brittle as ice. He whirled. Red light flickered in his eyes, veins crawling across his skin like black vines from some cursed grove. The sight of him, half shadow, half sorcery, froze my blood.

  “Spook?” He hissed, like a cornered thing, his voice hoarse and too quick. The glow in his eyes began to fade. The black lines retraced, slowly, as though ashamed to retreat.

  I raised my hands, palms open, signalling I meant no harm. But I was already backing away. “I… I heard the scream.”

  My gaze flicked to the axolotl. It looked like a broken dream lying there at his feet. Ash rose to his full height, too slowly, as if careful not to provoke me.

  “This creature was already dead. I tried to save it.”

  A lie. Too easy, too smooth.

  “Who killed it?” I asked sharply, eyes narrowing, testing his story. He shrugged, that same too-casual gesture that only deepened the dread clawing at my spine. He took a step toward me. Something in his gaze made my skin crawl.

  “We should just forget about this, shouldn’t we, Spook?” His voice was gentle, almost melodic. A shiver ran down my back, and somewhere beneath the fear, rage began to unfurl like a coiled serpent. Faelwen. She trusted him. She loved him. And he played with forces that turned good things to ash.

  “What did you do Ash?” My hand drifted toward the hilt of my dagger, fingers trembling. His voice dropped to a warning growl.

  “That would be unwise, my friend.” His eyes flicked to my blade, then back to mine. He lifted his hands, palms outward, and began to mutter, the words twisted and slippery, heavy with unnatural power.

  “Let’s forget about this, shall we?” He crooned between his incantations. Panic burst through me like wildfire. I drew my dagger in a flash.

  “What were you doing?!” I hissed, the magic already curling around me like smoke. My mind blurred. My thoughts felt fogged, drenched in some silken haze I couldn’t shake.

  “Stop this!” I yelled, but the words barely escaped before Ash made a sharp motion with his fingers. My lips fused shut. The spell clamped over my mouth like iron. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t scream. My thoughts slowed, drifted like leaves on a still pond. And then, like a sudden storm, Faelwen.

  She burst into the space between us, radiant in her urgency, grabbing Ash’s arms and forcing them down. “Stop, my love!” She cried. “Please. Don’t hurt him.”

  Ash’s expression twisted from anger to disbelief and then tenderness. The spell shattered. My lips came free, the fog in my head lifting like morning mist.

  I gasped, breath returning with a tremor. But I didn’t lower my blade. Faelwen turned to me, her eyes sweeping over me in alarm. “What happened here?”

  “He killed the creature,” I said, voice tight, raw and pointing with my head to the dead creature. “He’s been using that book. Practicing dark magic. Gods know what he was trying to summon. This isn’t safe, Faelwen. It’s not safe.”

  She turned to Ash. “Care to explain?”

  Ash looked away, jaw clenched.

  “It backfired,” he muttered. “I was practicing that spell I told you about. I didn’t mean to kill it.”

  Faelwen gently touched his cheek.

  “Magic is volatile, Spook. Remember the inn? The chaos I caused just trying to control lightning?”

  “You didn’t kill anything!” I snapped.

  “I could have!” she barked back, startling even herself. Ash rested a hand on her shoulder, grounding her. She took a breath, closing her eyes.

  “You don’t understand, Spook,” she said more softly. “He’s… dark, yes. But he wouldn’t hurt me. I know that. I feel it through our bond.”

  I clenched my jaw, struggling to rein in the fire in my chest.

  “No! You don’t understand,” I snapped, jaw clenched as the swell of fear and fury burned in my chest like wildfire. “His magic is dark, Faelwen. Yours isn’t.”

  Her eyes flashed, the moonlight catching the storm in them.

  “So what?” she retorted, voice sharp as a blade’s edge. “Because he’s a necromancer, he’s dangerous? Is that what you think?” her voice cracked like thunder, the words bitter with frustration. “Not all necromancers are evil. Most of them, most, just wanted to shield us, all of us magic users, from the rot in the Crown’s rule. Hell and on top of that, Ash has saved me before from the clutches of the Fiend!”

  I stared at her, stunned, the ground shifting beneath me. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

  “Do you even hear yourself?” I breathed. “They killed your family!”

  “Stop this! Both of you!” Ash stepped in between us, his hands raised in a futile attempt at peace seeing Faelwen about to blow up. His voice, gentle and steady, was a tremor against the tempest building between us.

  “I’m trying to protect you!” I shouted, voice breaking. Faelwen’s eyes narrowed, pain etched in every line of her face.

  “Then protect me from real enemies,” she shot back, her voice shaking as well with suppressed emotion. “Not from my friends. Or have you lost the ability to tell the difference, because your feelings for me are clouding your judgement?”

  The words struck like cold iron to the heart. I faltered, breath catching. A silence fell, heavy and cruel. And in that silence, Faelwen’s expression shifted, her defiance crumbling as regret flickered across her face. The sting behind my eyes came fast and sharp, and I blinked hard, willing it away. I don’t cry. I can’t. Not for her. Not again.

  “You…” I tried to speak, but the words snagged in my throat. I turned, ready to disappear into the darkness, away from her, from this , but she seized my arm, her grip desperate, trembling. In a heartbeat, I was in her embrace. Her warmth wrapped around me like sunlight through winter fog.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, her breath against my ear. “Spook, I didn’t mean it. I didn’t. I just…” her voice broke into a sigh. “I let my emotions speak. You were only trying to protect me. I know.”

  My fists curled at my sides as I pressed my face against her shoulder, breathing in the scent of wildflowers and ashes. Tears slipped down my cheeks, silent and stubborn. Damn her.

  “Darling,” Ash’s voice reached us, tender and uncertain.

  “Not now, my love,” Faelwen said gently, still holding me. “Please… just give us a moment.”

  I heard Ash frustrated exhale and retreat into the shadows.

  “Great,” Faelwen muttered sarcastically under her breath. Then she pulled back just enough to reach for my face, thumbs brushing the tears away. I gently caught her wrists, lowering her hands.

  “I was trying to protect you,” I said again, voice thick with ache.

  “I know,” she whispered. “And I was trying to protect Ash. He’s… yes, he hasn’t always been a good guy and he’s obsessed with that cursed book. But I just know he wouldn’t hurt me. Like I said before, I can feel it.”

  “I’m sorry too,” I murmured. “Just… promise me you’ll be careful. Around him.”

  “I promise, Spook,” she said, soft as moonlight on water. Then she leaned in and kissed my cheek. It was light, barely there, but it sent a tremor through my spine. I felt her shiver too. I had to summon every shard of discipline not to pull her closer, not to kiss her back and say all the things I thought I’d buried deep within myself. She lingered, her gaze flicking over my face as though memorizing me, every line, every scar. Her hand rose halfway, fingers twitching with the urge to touch, but she hesitated. Her smile faltered, and slowly, she drew her hand back.

  “Are we good?” she asked, her voice unsure now, stripped of fire. I nodded.

  She smiled again, a quiet one, and gave a single, solemn nod. Then she turned and walked away, leaving me alone in the dark with only the echo of her presence and the hollow thud of my heart.

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