The silence after the storm was the loudest sound Seraphina had ever known.
She sat on the cold stone floor of Lucien's chamber, knees pulled to her chest, wrapped in a wool blanket she didn't remember accepting. Her body ached in ways she couldn't name, like her magic had been peeled back and soldered together wrong.
Lucien sat across from her, quiet. Not touching her. Not speaking. Just watching. Waiting.
Riven was gone, but his anger hadn't left the room.
Neither had Ilyra.
Not fully.
Seraphina closed her eyes. Inside her, she could still feel it: a flicker of something foreign curled beneath her ribs. Not a voice this time, not a scream. Just… a presence. Dormant.
Ilyra's not dead.
Not anymore.
"She's quiet," Seraphina said, her voice rough.
Lucien flinched like she'd struck him.
"I think I pushed her back."
"You did more than that." Lucien's voice was hoarse. "You overpowered her magic. That shouldn't have been possible."
"Guess she underestimated me."
A thin smile flickered across her lips. It didn't reach her eyes.
Lucien reached for her hand. She pulled it back.
"I need the truth now," she said.
He went still.
"All of it," she added. "What did she do to me? What did you let happen?"
Lucien stared at his hands. Then, slowly:
"She began the ritual before she died. The Hollow Crown. A spell to bind two magical cores, hers and someone else's. You were meant to be her vessel. But I thought I stopped it."
Seraphina's breath caught.
"You thought?"
"I severed the threads," he said. "I thought I'd destroyed it."
"You thought wrong."
Rage rose up in her chest like bile.
"You knew something was still there. You knew she was inside me."
Lucien didn't deny it.
"I didn't want to believe it. I thought, if I didn't name it"
"Then it wouldn't be real," she snapped.
He nodded.
"I trusted you," she whispered. "And you let me carry her ghost."
"I was trying to protect you"
She stood, the blanket falling away. "No. You were trying to protect yourself."
He flinched.
And said nothing.
That night, Seraphina couldn't sleep.
Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Ilyra's face. Not as a ghost, but as a reflection. Something that could be her.
She went to the mirror.
Stared.
Searched.
And saw it. The shimmer.
Behind her eyes.
"He'll always choose you."
The voice wasn't spoken. It was felt.
And it was smiling.
Across the manor, Riven stood at the gates to the archives again.
The door had been magically resealed, but he didn't need magic to break it now. He had knowledge, and fury. He lit the sigils with a flick of shadow-fire and descended again.
He didn't want more answers.
He wanted leverage.
He found it.
A letter.
Unsent.
Addressed to a name he didn't know, Liora.
If I don't survive this, tell Seraphina the truth. Ilyra was not just my fiancée. She was my chosen queen. Our union would have crowned her. That power,
It wasn't meant to die with her.
Lucien had known. Every piece.
And still, he'd stayed silent.
Riven burned the letter into memory.
Then put it back.
He wasn't ready to use it.
Not yet.
Morning came cold and brittle.
Seraphina didn't join Lucien for breakfast. She didn't eat at all. Instead, she walked the perimeter of the manor grounds, barefoot again, her magic dragging against the earth like a silent storm.
Lucien watched her from the tower window.
"She's changing," he said aloud.
"She always was," Riven answered behind him. "You just didn't want to see it."
Lucien didn't turn. "She'll never trust me again."
"Good."
Lucien turned sharply.
"Trust has to be earned," Riven said. "And you broke it."
Lucien's jaw tightened.
"Don't pretend you wouldn't have done the same."
"I wouldn't have lied to her."
Silence stretched.
Then Riven added:
"Not about that."
Seraphina didn't cry.
Not when her magic sparked uncontrolled in her palms. Not when her reflection blinked at the wrong time. Not even when the wind whispered her name and she couldn't tell if it was hers anymore.
She cried when she found the old rose bush.
It had once been Ilyra's.
Now, the petals were blackened at the edges, like something had burned them from within.
She touched one.
And it shuddered.
Alive.
Still connected.
Just like her.
That night, the dreams came.
But they weren't dreams.
She stood in a glass garden, moonlight staining the leaves silver. Ilyra sat on a bench in a gown of smoke and stars, her hands folded neatly.
"I should hate you," Seraphina said.
"You do."
"You tried to steal me."
"I did."
Seraphina's hands curled into fists.
"Why aren't you fighting me anymore?"
Ilyra looked up, eyes luminous.
"Because I don't have to."
Seraphina woke in a cold sweat.
The mirror across the room was cracked, just slightly. A line down the middle.
One eye hers.
One not.
She didn't scream.
Didn't move.
Just whispered:
"I'm still me."
And somewhere inside, Ilyra's echo answered
"For now."