The scent of blood still clung to my hands.

I scrubbed them harder, not because it would help, but because I didn’t know what else to do. The basin water had long turned pink, then rust-red. Her magic hadn’t just cut — it had burned. It had torn. The gash in my shoulder was sealed now, but the memory of her eyes — too dark, too hollow — stayed sharp.

Aria had run. I let her. No, I’d watched her go, barely able to breathe.

A knock at the chamber door cracked the silence. I didn’t answer. It opened anyway.

Vaelorth guards stepped aside as my mother entered, draped in midnight-blue silk, golden rings glinting at her fingers. She looked like the storm she commanded — precise, cold, and ready to strike.

“I summoned you an hour ago,” she said flatly.

“I was bleeding,” I said, without turning.

“You’re not now.”

She stepped closer. I dried my hands with a cloth that was already stained.

“Sit,” she said. A command, not a request.

I did.

She studied me for a moment, eyes narrowing. “What happened?”

I stared at the fire. It popped once, a small, sharp sound. “We were ambushed. Someone tracked us. Maybe more than one.”

“You said you could handle this.”

“I did handle it,” I snapped. “She got away.”

“She ran,” she corrected. “From you.”

I didn’t reply. My jaw clenched.

Seraphine folded her arms. “You’ve grown soft.”

“I’m not soft,” I hissed.

“You’re limping.”

“I’m fine.”

Her voice turned lethal. “What did she do to you?”

I looked at her then — really looked. And for the first time, I saw it: the suspicion underneath the control. The curiosity. The fear. My mother feared very little. But whatever she thought Aria was becoming… she feared it enough to call me in.

“She’s not who she says she is.”

The words tasted like ash as they left my mouth.

My mother’s brow arched. “Explain.”

I hesitated. If I told her the truth — about the shadows in Aria’s eyes, the power that flared dark as void, the voice that wasn’t quite hers — she’d send every mage in Vaelorth after her. Maybe even try to kill her herself.

And yet… if I said nothing, what was I doing? Protecting her? Protecting what?

“I don’t know what she is,” I said slowly. “But there’s something inside her. Something she’s hiding.”

“Then why haven’t you brought her in?”

“Because she saved my life,” I shot back. “More than once. Because she’s dangerous — yes — but not evil. Because I don’t think she even understands what’s happening to her.”

Seraphine was quiet for a long moment.

“You were supposed to find the heir. Control the heir. Not fall for a wild, unhinged girl with unknown magic and half a dozen lies in her mouth.”

I stood. “I didn’t fall for her.”

She stared me down. “Didn’t you?”

My silence was answer enough.

Finally, she said, “Then you’d better figure out what she’s hiding before someone else does. And Alec—” Her voice lowered. “If you can’t bring her to heel, I will.”