The morning sun slipped through the cracks in her curtains, but it brought no warmth.
Jane rose from bed with a strange sense of heaviness in her chest. It was quiet—too quiet. No knock on the door. No tray of breakfast waiting. No John's voice greeting her with a dry comment or an update on her parents' morning routine.
She walked to her door and reached for the handle.
It didn't move.
She blinked, tried again—this time with more force. The knob turned, but the door held firm.
Jane frowned.
"John?" she called out. "Is this some kind of joke?"
Silence.
No footsteps. No reply.
Her heart thumped.
She yanked at the door, rattling it in its frame. Something heavy scraped on the other side. Metal. Cold and unforgiving.
They had chained her door.
"John!" she shouted now, pounding on the wood. "Open the door! What the hell is going on?!"
Still nothing.
A thread of panic coiled around her spine.
Her breath grew shallow as her mind spun. This wasn't an accident. This wasn't a mistake.
They were keeping her in.
Like a prisoner.
"No. No, no—" She stumbled back from the door, heart racing. Her thoughts flew to the glowing in her palms, the violet fire, the way she made the door slam shut that night. The way John had looked at her afterward.
He had promised to keep her secret.
He promised.
She turned, pacing. Her skin buzzed with energy she hadn't felt before, not since the night she touched the book in her dream. And then—
Her eyes fell on her reflection in the mirror.
Hair wild. Eyes too bright. Skin humming beneath the surface.
Something inside her whispered.
Try.
She lifted her hands and closed her eyes. Focused.
Not on light. Not on flame.
But on distance.
Outside. I want to be outside this room.
The moment she exhaled, the air around her shifted. Warm. Electric. Alive.
Then—
The world folded inward.
A flash of violet.
And suddenly—she was standing in the hallway, barefoot on cold marble, staring at the shut door behind her.
Still chained.
Still locked.
But she was free.
Her eyes widened in disbelief. She stumbled backward, breathing hard. She did it. She actually—
A voice in her head whispered again.
Witch.
But she had no time to think.
She ran.
⸻
Her feet flew down the corridor, her nightgown fluttering like wings behind her. Servants gasped as she passed—one even dropped a vase.
She didn't care.
She reached the family hall where her parents took their tea each morning and burst through the doors.
Lord Eddric and Lady Maerina both rose in alarm.
"Jane?" her mother gasped. "You—how—?"
"You locked me in," Jane said, voice trembling with fury and confusion. "You chained me."
Eddric's face went pale. "That's not possible. You were—"
"In my room?" she snapped. "Yes. Chained. Like some beast."
A guard ran in behind her a moment later. "My lord, the door is still sealed. No one's touched the chains."
Maerina's eyes narrowed, her lips trembling. "Then how…?"
"I don't know what's happening to me," Jane said, her voice cracking. "But I'm not sick. I'm not cursed. I can feel things now. I have a Gift. A real one."
She held out her hands.
Nothing happened.
No glow.
Just skin. Warm. Human.
They stared at her as if she'd sprouted horns.
Her father stepped forward, voice like a blade. "What did you do, Jane?"
"I don't know!" she cried. "I didn't ask for this. It just woke up in me. I thought you'd be happy—I can feel. Isn't that what you always wanted?"
But Maerina shook her head slowly. Her expression was no longer motherly. It was cold. Terrified.
"Gifts don't teleport you through sealed doors."
The words struck Jane like a slap.
She stepped back.
"I'm not—"
"A Witch," her father said, voice low. "You are a Witch."
The word turned the room to ice.
"No…" she whispered.
Eddric turned to the guards. "Bring the iron restraints."
Jane's breath hitched. "Wait—what are you—?"
Before she could run, hands grabbed her arms from behind—strong, unkind. She screamed, kicked, her magic flickering weakly—but not enough.
Not yet.
The restraints were cold iron. Heavy and burning against her wrists.
Chains looped down from her elbows, long enough to drag on the floor. Weighing her with every step.
They brought her back to her room.
But the room was no longer hers.
The floor was dusted in coarse white salt.
The walls had fresh garlic braided into bunches.
As if that would protect them.
As if she was evil.
They shoved her inside and locked the door again.
She stumbled forward, heart racing, wrists bruising under the weight of the iron.
And then she saw him.
John.
Standing in the far corner, eyes cast downward.
Her heart shattered.
She knew.
"You told them," she whispered.
He didn't deny it.
Didn't look at her.
Didn't speak.
And somehow—that silence broke her more than any words ever could.
She took a trembling step forward. Chains clinked behind her. "You promised me."
Still nothing.
"You promised me."
His jaw clenched. But he said nothing.
And in that moment—surrounded by salt and garlic, her wrists burning, her chest hollow—Jane Ardent stopped believing in love.
And started believing in rage.
———
Outside the room, the door clicked shut behind him. The sound echoed in the hallway, far too loud in John's ears.
He didn't look back.
Couldn't.
He stood there for a long moment, breathing hard, palms still tingling from the feel of the iron chains he had helped fasten.
She had looked at him like he was a monster.
And maybe, he was.
He had told himself it was the right thing. That this was for her own good. That the moment he overheard the Ardent lords whisper about the sacrificial ritual to save her—about how his blood would be the offering if she remained Giftless past her twentieth year—he had no choice.
She wasn't Giftless anymore.
But she wasn't Saved either.
Footsteps approached. Lord Eddric himself, flanked by two knights, regarded John with something new in his eyes.
"Your loyalty to House Ardent will not be forgotten," the lord said. "Your instincts were sharp. Your timing—perfect."
John forced himself to nod.
The nobleman's voice dropped lower. "You have a future here, John. I see it clearly now."
A pause.
Then: "Effective immediately, you are promoted. You will serve as Captain of the Ardent Guard. Head of security. Your first task—make sure no word of this leaves these halls."
John swallowed the bitter taste rising in his throat.
"Yes, milord."
He didn't look back at the door.
Didn't let himself imagine what Jane was doing behind it—if she was crying, if she was staring at the walls, if she still thought of him as someone she could trust.
His hands wouldn't stop shaking.