Aria's POV
The shadows in my apartment were moving wrong.
I stood frozen in the doorway, my hand still on the light switch, watching darkness ripple across my living room wall like water. It shouldn't be doing that. Shadows didn't move on their own.
Unless someone was making them move.
"Kael?" I whispered.
He appeared beside me so fast I jumped. His hand clamped over my mouth before I could scream, and he pulled me back into the hallway, closing my apartment door silently.
"Someone's inside," he breathed in my ear. "Stay here. Don't move. Don't make a sound."
He let go and reached for the doorknob, silver fire already dancing on his fingertips.
"Wait—" I grabbed his arm. Through the bond, I felt his cold determination mixed with anger. "What if it's more bounty hunters? You're still hurt from earlier."
Three days. We'd been running for three days since the fight in the Fractured City. Three days of hiding in my tiny apartment while Kael healed and I tried to make sense of my Oracle powers. Three days of him sleeping on my lumpy couch, flinching every time I offered him food or asked if he was okay.
Three days of feeling him slowly dying from the curse.
"I can handle bounty hunters," Kael said quietly. "Stay here."
He opened the door and slipped inside before I could argue. Typical.
I counted to ten, then followed him anyway. This was my apartment. My life that kept getting turned upside down. I wasn't going to hide in the hallway like a scared child.
The living room was a disaster. My couch—where Kael had been sleeping—was torn apart, stuffing everywhere. My bookshelves were emptied, books scattered across the floor. Someone had gone through everything, searching for something.
But the worst part was the wall.
Written in something dark and wet—please let it not be blood—were three words:
WE KNOW WHAT YOU ARE
My stomach dropped.
Kael stood in the middle of the chaos, his whole body tense. "I told you to stay in the hall."
"It's my apartment. My mess." I stepped over a torn cushion. "Who did this?"
"I don't know. But they're gone now." He knelt and touched the writing on the wall. His fingers came away red. "It's blood. Animal, I think. Meant to scare you."
"Mission accomplished." I hugged myself, suddenly cold. "How did they find us? We've been careful. We haven't left the apartment except for food runs, and you made sure no one followed us."
"The bond." Kael stood, wiping his hand on his jeans. Through our connection, I felt his frustration. "Divine power leaves traces. Anyone with the right skills could track it. I've been trying to mask our signatures, but—"
He broke off, pressing a hand to his chest. The curse flared, and I gasped as phantom pain shot through my own heart.
"You're getting worse," I said, moving toward him. "That's the third time today."
"Don't." He held up a hand, stopping me. "Don't come closer. Don't—" Another spike of pain made him grit his teeth. "Don't look at me like that."
"Like what?"
"Like you care." His voice was rough. "Every time you show concern, every time you try to help, the curse activates. It thinks—" He laughed bitterly. "It knows I'm starting to care about you, and it's punishing me for it."
My chest tightened. "I'm not trying to make it worse. I just—"
"I know." He turned away, his shoulders tense. "That's the problem. You can't help being kind. It's who you are. And I can't help responding to it, which means we're both trapped in this slow death spiral until—"
A knock at the door made us both freeze.
"Aria?" A familiar voice called through the wood. "Aria, are you home? It's James."
James. My only friend from the library. The grad student who'd never believed the lies about me, who'd snuck me extra shifts when I was desperate for money, who'd worried when I disappeared three days ago.
Safe, normal, human James.
Who shouldn't be here.
"Don't answer it," Kael said quietly.
"It's just James. He's harmless—"
"No one is harmless right now. This could be a trap."
The knock came again, more insistent. "Aria? I know you're in there. I can hear you moving around. Please, I just want to make sure you're okay. You haven't answered my texts, and after what happened at the library—"
Guilt twisted my stomach. I'd completely forgotten about James. Forgot that normal people would worry when someone vanished after a supernatural explosion destroyed the basement.
"I have to talk to him," I said. "If I don't, he'll just keep coming back. Or worse, he'll call the police."
Kael studied me for a long moment. Then he nodded slowly. "Fine. But I'm right here, and at the first sign of anything wrong—"
"You'll protect me. I know." I walked to the door, trying to calm my racing heart.
Through the peephole, I saw James standing in the hallway. Normal James with his messy brown hair and wire-rimmed glasses and nervous smile. Nothing threatening. Nothing dangerous.
So why did every instinct I had scream that something was wrong?
I opened the door, keeping the chain lock on. "Hey, James. Sorry, I've been sick. Really bad flu."
"For three days?" His eyes searched my face. "Aria, what happened at the library? There was an explosion. The whole basement is destroyed. And people are asking questions about you."
"What kind of questions?"
"The kind that involve the police and property damage." James glanced past me, trying to see into the apartment. "Can I come in? I want to help you, but I need to know what's going on."
Behind me, I felt Kael tense. Through the bond, I felt his warning: Don't let him in.
"Now's not a good time," I said. "But I appreciate you checking on me. Really. I'll call you when things settle down, okay?"
James's expression shifted. Something cold flickered in his eyes, there and gone so fast I almost missed it.
"Things aren't going to settle down, Aria." His voice changed, became harder. "Not for you. Not anymore."
My blood froze. "James?"
"That's not my name." He smiled, and it was wrong. All wrong. "But you can call me that if it makes this easier. I've been watching you for weeks, waiting for you to lead me to something interesting. And you finally did."
He raised his hand, and I saw marks on his palm—the same kind of divine seal that had trapped Kael.
"You're working for Theron," I breathed.
"I'm working for myself. But yes, the Starfire King pays well for information about Oracle Keepers." His smile widened. "Especially ones who break impossible seals and bond with war criminals."
Kael was beside me in an instant, shoving me behind him. "Leave. Now."
"I don't think so." James—or whatever he really was—held up his marked palm. The seal began to glow. "I have orders to bring the Oracle in alive. You, War Prince? You're optional."
The seal flared bright. Energy exploded from James's hand, slamming into Kael's hastily raised shield. The force sent us both flying backward. We crashed into my already-destroyed living room.
Kael was up immediately, silver fire erupting along his arms. "Aria, get to the bedroom. Lock the door."
"I'm not leaving—"
"GO!"
The command in his voice made me move. I scrambled toward my bedroom as Kael and James collided in an explosion of silver fire and golden seal-magic.
But I only made it two steps before something grabbed my ankle.
I hit the floor hard, the breath knocked out of me. I looked back and saw a shadow—one of the moving shadows from earlier—wrapped around my leg, pulling me toward the open door.
More shadows poured into the apartment like living smoke. They surrounded me, cold and suffocating, lifting me off the ground.
"KAEL!" I screamed.
He spun, saw me being dragged toward the door, and his face went white. The curse chose that moment to spike—I felt it through the bond, felt his heart stutter as fear for me overwhelmed everything else.
He collapsed to one knee, gasping.
James laughed. "The Heartbreak Curse. Beautiful, isn't it? The more he cares about you, the easier this becomes."
The shadows pulled me into the hallway. I fought, clawing at the darkness, trying to summon my Oracle power. But nothing happened. The shadows were blocking it somehow, smothering my abilities.
"Aria!" Kael tried to stand, but the curse had him in its grip. Blood trickled from his nose. "Hold on—"
"He can't save you," James said, following the shadows into the hall. "The curse won't let him. Every step he takes toward you brings him closer to death. So he has a choice: let you go and stay alive, or try to save you and die."
He smiled at Kael, who was struggling to his feet, determination and agony warring on his face.
"What's it going to be, War Prince? Your life or hers?"
Kael's eyes met mine. Through the bond, I felt his decision—felt the moment he chose me over survival, over sense, over everything.
"Both," he snarled.
Silver fire exploded from him with such force that it shattered every window in the building. The shadows holding me shrieked and dissolved. I fell, hitting the floor hard.
But Kael fell too. The curse's retaliation was immediate and vicious. He collapsed, his whole body convulsing, blood streaming from his nose and eyes.
"KAEL!" I crawled toward him, but James stepped between us.
"Impressive. Stupid, but impressive." James looked down at Kael's struggling form. "The curse should kill him in the next few minutes. But you know what? I think I'll help it along."
He raised his hand, the seal glowing brighter. Golden energy gathered in his palm, deadly and focused on Kael's heart.
"NO!" I screamed.
And something inside me broke open.
Power flooded through me—Oracle power, pure and wild and stronger than anything I'd felt before. It poured out of me in a wave of silver light that sent James flying down the hallway.
The light surrounded Kael, sinking into his skin, fighting the curse. I didn't know what I was doing. Didn't know if it would work. I just knew I couldn't let him die.
Not for me. Not like Sera had.
The curse fought back. I felt it through the bond—ancient, cruel magic trying to tear Kael apart from the inside. But my Oracle power pushed harder, creating a shield around his heart, buying him time.
Kael's eyes opened. "Aria... what are you doing?"
"Saving you," I gasped. The effort was draining me fast. "Like you saved me."
"You'll kill yourself—"
"Then we die together."
James laughed from where he'd landed. "How touching. But you're only delaying the inevitable. The curse is too strong. Your power is too new. And backup is already on the way."
As if summoned by his words, I heard footsteps. Lots of them. Coming up the stairs. Coming down the hall from both directions.
We were surrounded.
I looked at Kael. He was barely conscious, the curse still tearing through him despite my shield. I was exhausted, my Oracle power guttering like a dying candle. And enemies were closing in from all sides.
We were trapped. Helpless. Finished.
Then the building exploded.
Not the whole building—just the walls around us. They blew outward in a shower of brick and plaster, revealing the night sky.
And standing in the opening, wreathed in violet flames and starlight armor, was Lyssa.
"Well," she said, looking at our situation with amused eyes. "You two really know how to make an entrance. Or an exit, in this case." She held out her hand. "Come on, then. Unless you'd rather stay and fight thirty of Theron's best agents?"
I looked at the hand. At Lyssa, who'd appeared in the Fractured City with warnings and offers. Who claimed to have served under Kael. Who might be leading us into another trap.
Behind her, through the broken wall, I saw shapes moving in the darkness. Thirty agents. Maybe more.
In front of us, James was getting to his feet, his seal glowing brighter.
And beside me, Kael was dying.
"Your choice, Oracle," Lyssa said. "Trust me or die here. You have about five seconds."
Through the bond, I felt Kael trying to tell me something. A warning? Permission? I couldn't tell. The curse was eating away at our connection.
Four seconds.
James raised his hand. The seal blazed.
Three seconds.
The footsteps grew louder. Voices shouting orders. Magic crackling in the air.
Two seconds.
Kael's hand found mine. Squeezed once. Weakly.
One second.
I grabbed Lyssa's hand.
Violet fire exploded around us as she pulled us through the broken wall and into the night. I heard James screaming in rage, heard the agents shouting, felt the building collapse behind us.
Then we were flying—actually flying—through the air as Lyssa's magic carried us away.
"Where are you taking us?" I shouted over the wind.
Lyssa looked back, her violet eyes gleaming. "The one place Theron can't reach you. The one place where Oracle Keepers were born."
"Where?"
Her smile was sharp and knowing.
"The Temple of the Moon Goddess. Where everything began. And where, if you're very lucky, you might find a way to break the curse before it kills you both."
She paused, then added: "Of course, entering the temple requires a test. One that kills most people who try it. But hey—" She laughed. "What's one more impossible task when you're already bonded to a dying War Prince?"
We soared over the city, leaving destruction and enemies behind.
And I realized we weren't escaping our problems.
We were flying straight toward something infinitely more dangerous.