The cell door didn't creak when it opened. It screamed.
Metal shrieked against stone, shattering the stale silence I had been breathing for gods knew how long.
I lifted my head from the shadows pooling across the floor. They had been whispering for hours—no, days? Time had bled strange in here, an endless churn of hunger and echoes. Their voices tangled around my ribs, promising power, promising escape.
And then she came.
Kaylan.
Her boots struck the stone like a drumbeat of war. Storm-gray armor gleamed where torchlight licked it, and her hair, braided tight, swung against her shoulder like a silver chain. The air thickened with her presence, not with magic, not with shadow—just with the force of her will. She filled the cell as if it were too small to contain her.
She stopped just beyond the bars, her gaze sweeping over me, slow, deliberate, cutting me open without lifting a blade.
"You reek of shadows," she said. Her voice carried steel. "They curl off you like smoke from a dying fire. Fitting."
My throat burned. "If you've come to taunt me, get on with it."
Her smile was slight, sharp as a scar. She didn't rush. She enjoyed silence too much, weaponized it. Then she spoke:
"You're still clinging to him, aren't you?" Her eyes narrowed, storm-light focused on me. "The boy. Liam. The one who makes you weak."
My chest tightened. The shadows inside me stirred, whispering his name, whispering vengeance.
Kaylan tilted her head, as if tasting my reaction. "I thought so." She leaned closer, both hands gripping the bars, knuckles white. "Marcus has plans for him. Do you want to know what they are?"
I forced myself to meet her eyes. "You'll tell me whether I want it or not."
A laugh slipped past her lips. Humorless. Cold. "You're learning."
She let the silence linger again before she spoke, and when she did, her words were blades.
"Liam is bait."
The shadows hissed. My stomach dropped.
Kaylan savored the pause. She enjoyed watching the meaning sink its claws into me.
"Marcus intends to dangle him before Seraphina's spies," she continued, each word slow, deliberate. "They've been sniffing too close, hungry for cracks in the Crimson Court. Marcus will give them one. A human boy—weak, frightened, connected to you. They'll think he's leverage. They'll come. And when they do…" Her lips curved in something that wasn't a smile. "…Marcus will cut them down."
The name pulsed in my skull. Seraphina. Again. The shadows whispered it back, curling around me like a chant. The true queen in the dark. The rival. The rising tide.
I swallowed hard. "And if they don't come?"
Kaylan's gaze sharpened. "Then Liam dies anyway. Slowly. Publicly. A message carved into the world: Marcus tolerates no weakness. No attachments."
My hands curled into fists against the stone floor. I could almost feel the dagger she'd pressed into my palm in the hall of judgment, the weight of choice and refusal.
"You'll kill him yourself, won't you?" I asked. My voice was quieter than I meant, a knife she could twist.
Her expression didn't change. But her eyes—storm-gray, unyielding—lit with cruel certainty.
"Yes."
The word dropped between us like an executioner's axe.
"I will kill him," she said again, leaning closer, her voice low and venomous. "When Marcus gives the order, I will drive the blade into his chest. Not because I hate him. Not because I enjoy it. But because it proves what you refuse to learn—attachments are chains. And chains are made to break."
The shadows coiled tight, pressing against my skin. My vision tunneled. For a heartbeat, I almost let them slip free, almost let them surge forward to claw through the bars, to wrap around her throat and show her who was chained and who was not.
She must have seen it in my eyes, because her smile returned—small, mocking, dangerous.
"Careful," she murmured. "Let them out too soon, and they'll eat you alive. Maybe that's what Marcus wants. Maybe that's why he keeps you breathing. A weapon that devours itself is entertaining for a while."
She pushed off the bars and began pacing, her boots echoing in steady rhythm.
"Do you know what they call Seraphina?" she asked, her tone almost conversational. "The true queen. The dark star. The thorn Marcus could never pluck." She stopped and looked back at me. "Pathetic titles for a pathetic pretender. But her faction grows. Too many whispers. Too many traitors crawling to her side."
The shadows stirred at the sound of the name again. Seraphina. The queen. The rival. The dark.
Kaylan leaned close once more, her face inches from mine through the bars. "If Marcus must bait her, he will use every piece he owns. And you, little shadow, are still just a piece."
Her breath brushed my cheek, metallic and cold. "So cling to your boy. Watch him suffer. When Marcus commands me, I'll slit his throat in front of you. And you'll thank him for sparing you the choice."
The rage in me nearly broke. The shadows surged, a tide of claws and teeth pressing against my ribs. I tasted iron in my mouth, the edges of a scream.
But I held them. I forced them down, even as they writhed and tore.
Kaylan's smile faded. For the first time, she looked… intrigued. As if she had expected me to break, to lash out, to lose control.
Instead, I met her gaze. Steady. Burning.
"You think breaking me proves Marcus's strength," I said. My voice shook, but the words landed. "But you've forgotten something."
Her brows lifted faintly. "Oh?"
"Chains don't last forever. And when mine break…" The shadows rippled up my arms, faint tendrils brushing against the bars. "…I won't start with Marcus."
The silence that followed was knife-sharp.
Kaylan's jaw clenched. Her eyes darkened. But she didn't lash out. She didn't spit or sneer. She simply turned on her heel and strode for the door.
Just before the iron slammed shut, her voice cut through one last time, colder than the grave:
"Pray Marcus kills you first."
The lock snapped. The torchlight vanished.
Darkness swallowed me again.
And in that darkness, the shadows whispered louder than ever.
Bait. Chains. Break. Queen in the dark. Kill her first. Kill her first.
I curled into the corner, trembling, clutching my ribs as if I could hold myself together. Liam's face burned behind my eyes. Kaylan's promise seared like a brand.
But the shadows?
They coiled like a storm waiting to be born.