Page 83 of She Who Holds My Wrath

His shadows flare instantly, swirling up around him in a protective cocoon. “Behind me, now,” he orders, stepping in front of me without any hesitation.

I don’t argue. The pressure in my chest has turned into a relentless, pounding thrum. It’s not pain. It’s not fear. It’s something else entirely, something I haven’t felt since… The very thought has my stomach dropping, my throat going dry. It can’t…

The torches flicker once. Then every flame goes out, slamming us in a wave of darkness. Someone gasps on the balcony, the sound of a sword scraping from its scabbard rings through my eardrums. I feel the guards’ panic prickle along the edge of my awareness, their fear feeling like tiny sparks. Elyistria’s light flares faintly, but even that seems muted. Like something is swallowing it.

“Stay with me,” Maelkar murmurs, his body a solid, reassuring wall in front of mine.

I reach for my flame automatically, calling it to my palms. Nothing happens. It’s like throwing a match into black hole. My power surges, but the second it reaches the surface, it fizzles out.

Panic slams into me. “My magic⁠—”

“I know,” Maelkar says grimly. His shadows are behaving strangely too. They’re twitchy and erratic, frayed at the edges, as if something’s gnawing at them. “This isn’t me.”

“Is it them?” I whisper. “The Six?”

“If it is, it’s a trick I haven’t seen before.”

There’s movement in the darkness ahead. A ripple. A shape pulling itself through the void, tall and broad and so saturated with power that it makes my body vibrate from just being near it.

I grip Maelkar’s arm so hard my fingers hurt. I can’t see clearly, but the silhouette is wrong for any of the Divine Six. Too tall, too solid. There’s no ethereal bullshit from whoever it is strolling towards us.

Someone on the balcony spits a curse, and I swear I hear someone else drop to their knees with a choked sound.

“Aran,” Sariya’s voice warns sharply from somewhere behind me. “Do not move.”

Aran?

The figure steps forwards through the gloom, and the shadows peel back just enough for me to see who it is. Time slows. Every sound and movement around me fades into the background like it’s been pulled underwater. All I can see is him.

Long black hair, falling around his shoulders like ink. Tanned skin traced with faint, shifting helix-like shadows beneath the surface. A tall, brutal frame wrapped in dark armour I’d recognise anywhere. And piercing eyes. Deep, endless onyx eyes that once felt like home.

My chest locks. I stop breathing.

This isn’t possible. It isn’t. My mind scrambles, frantically clawing for something logical. For rational explanations. Illusion, glamour, an enemy wearing his face… but the bond in my chest is screaming. That pounding thrum explodes into a full roar, a tether yanking so tightly between us it hurts.

“Little flower,” he says softly.

The nickname hits me like a blade straight through the heart. My knees nearly give out, the ground tilting beneath me as a high-pitched ringing floods my ears, drowning out everything else. My vision tunnels, black creeping at the edges.

“No,” I whisper, the word breaking apart as it leaves me. I shove past Maelkar before he can stop me, before anyone can anchor me back to reality. “No. You’re not him.”

He flinches as if I’ve hit him. As if he’s actually real and alive. ”Daisy⁠—“

“Do not.” My voice shatters. “Don’t you dare say my name like that.”

My chest heaves, breath finally crashing back into my lungs in uneven bursts. My hands are shaking uncontrollably, my entire body vibrating with too much everything.

“You’re dead,” I choke out, the memory of it all slamming into me all at once. “I watched you die. I held you while your blood soaked into my hands. Your body vanished. You’re gone.”

My magic surges again, desperate and wild. I fling out my hand without thinking, reaching for the one thing I know is mine. It explodes from my palm in a blinding wave, white and furious, roaring straight towards him with enough force to level the room. The fire hits true. But it disappears. Not like water doused it, or like it burned out. It was swallowed whole. One second my fire is there, devouring the space between us. The next, there’s nothing. No scorch marks, no smoke. Just him. Standing there like my power never existed at all.

My heart flips sideways. “What are you?”

He looks wrecked. Not physically—no. His body is whole, untouched, not a single mark of the way he died. No wound. No blood. No sign of the sword that tore him from me. If anything, he looks… stronger. Darker. Power coils around him in a way that feels heavier, like something has changed. But his eyes… they’re fractured. Pained. Like he’s been dragged through something I can’t even begin to understand.

“It’s me,” he says hoarsely. “It’s Korithax.”

Maelkar steps up beside me again, shadows coiled tight. I can feel the tension in him, the barely contained violence with his instinct to protect snapping into place.