Page 264 of House Ignis

The doors to the private wing parted without question.

Princess. Heir. Flame.

Titles that meant power. Control. Reverence. Tonight, none of it mattered.

My pulse raced as I moved through the corridor, faster than dignity allowed, faster than sense.

The music faded into nothing, swallowed by stone and distance, until all that remained was the sound of my own shallow breathing and the deafening silence of the bond.

Gods… the silence.

The bond was quiet in the way a battlefield goes quiet after the screams stop.

It felt wrong inside my chest—like a limb had been torn away, leaving behind a hollow that ached every time I drew breath.

I reached for him instinctively, the way I had a hundred times a day since he’d been sent away, and found nothing.

No shadow. No silver. No dark, relentless pull keeping me in place.

Just emptiness. The absence hurt more than any magic flare ever had.

“You’re doing it again,” Aether muttered through our link, his voice rough with a restrained, feline concern.

I swallowed hard, forcing my steps to stay certain on the polished floor. “I know.”

At least Aether could still feel me. At least one bond in my life still answered when I reached for it.

I turned down the south wing, my boots whispering across the stone. Warm scents drifted from the distant kitchens—fresh bread, spice, wine—ghosts of a childhood that suddenly felt like a lifetime ago.

Once, I would have slipped inside those kitchens without hesitation, laughing and stealing pastries, pretending I was just another girl with no crown waiting to swallow her whole.

Once. Not tonight.

I kept walking, faster now, trying to outrun the ache hollowing out my ribs.

Ezra would come looking eventually; he always did when he noticed I was spiraling. Not because of some divine tether, but because he was my friend. Because he cared.

And gods… right now, I would have given anything to feel the blood bond come roaring back to life and pull me under.

I passed the library, and memories crashed into me with the weight of a physical blow. Me. Jax. Ember.

We had run these halls as if they were our playground, our laughter echoing against the marble like a promise of forever.

How strange that a place which once felt like sanctuary now felt like a gilded cage.

Asher had become my home.

With him, I was shadow and silver and fire all at once, every part of me somehow brighter.

This castle was only gold meant to contain me, a beautiful box for a bird that had forgotten how to fly. I turned into a dim corridor and pushed through the heavy doors leading into the private gardens.

Cold night air hit my face like a slap, sharp and bracing.

Stars glittered above the high, jagged walls of Solkaris, indifferent to the girl shivering below.

Two guards stood posted near the far end of the private garden, where the entrance to the hidden Ignis Library waited behind an ornate golden gate.

“This is it,” Aether whispered through the bond, his voice a low vibration in my mind.