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Indignation fuelled Oleander’s hands as he signed, >What about Hemlock? Why is he allowed to help?Why don’t you go help your project partner find a backbone and leave me alone?You have very little room to judge.It is damn near impossible to question the truth of anything when there’s always been someone’s hand locked around your throat, forcing your face toward the lie and calling it reality. When survival means obedience, questioning things becomes a luxury.<

Wisteria looked away, her breathing ragged. Then she looked at him for a long time, as if before today she’d never seen him as she did now. In a low, apologetic voice she said, “Don’t forget to leave Thistle Cottage before nightfall.”

Without another word, Wisteria slipped out of the house, Hemlock following close behind.

Oleander slumped into his bedroom, freshly showered and exhausted. He blew out a long melancholy breath and slipped the now powerless ring from his finger, throwing it as hard as possible against the wall opposite him.

The ever-present shadow stirred, its whispers curling around him like smoke. His defences trembled under the shadow’s relentless pressure, and for the first time in a long while, he felt the weight of his own isolation pressing in on him, inescapable.

Loneliness had slipped into his life long ago. He’d been a shadow in a crowd long before the shade had taken root inside his mind. Once, he had shared a close bond with his siblings, only for that closeness to slowly fade in recent years. He’d told himself that was fine—it likely wasn’t natural for siblings to be one’s best friends anyway. Yet making friends was harder than he'd imagined. Every time he thought he'd found someone worth calling a friend, they inevitably revealed themselves to be shallow, vapid, or some combination of the two. That or, they thought Oleander was the easiest way to gain influence with his father.

Then it was he that disappointed them.

His loneliness had abated for a while, the sunshine of Perine driving it away. Yet tonight, he found the echoes of it settling in once more; thick and suffocating, gnawing at his ribs with a hunger he couldn’t ignore. The ache of it pulsed in his gut, unbearable in its intensity. He needed to tell someone, to say the words aloud, to share the truth before it consumed him whole.

More than that—spirits help him—he wanted to be held.

It had been so long. Too long. The thought of warm arms around him felt like the most wonderful, impossible thing in the world. Maudlin, maybe, but undeniable.

Wisteria and Hemlock were always so self-sufficient. If they knew all the awful bargains he’d made merely to gain their father’s approval. They would—rightly so—never look at him the same.

Outside of his siblings, he’d never had deep friendships. Even Amiran had been more of a casual entanglement—a shared love of throwing knives and laughter, but nothing real beneath the surface. He had never realised how utterly isolated he was until now, until the absence of connection glared back at him, merciless and cold.

A strangled laugh escaped him. How rare it was to find someone who could make you feel both at ease and electrified just by being near them.

And despite himself, despite everything—he thought of Perine. He patted around on the table next to him until he felt the well-worn softness of her lavender handkerchief. He laid it gently on his pillow next to him, smoothing out the wrinkles and wondering what it would be like to have her with him every night. He’d never laid much stock in the act of hoping before, one tended to be disappointed by such ideals. Nevertheless, he felt a tender hope emerge inside his heart. That perhaps he could find a way to keep Perine in his life forever. It was a mad thing to hope for—especially now that it had been over a moonphase since he’d last seen or heard from her.

He wasn’t even sure he deserved somebody as lovely as Perine. He couldn’t shake the grime of seeing that shadow consume five demoness souls, only to then be promptly shoved inside of him.

And anyway, it was exceedingly rare for demonkind to ever leave the Circle they’d been born into, and to leave the beatific Holy Circle for the unsavoury ruthless Rune Circle would be… still, like an idiot, he hoped.

The thing was, his loneliness chafed like a blistering rash. He’d avoided thinking of it for so many years but then Perine had careened into his life and had forced all the carefully tucked away misery into the sunlight and made him wonder, rather than avoiding it, if he could instead repair those deeply broken parts of him. She made him want to fight for himself again.

Chapter

Twenty-Two

OLEANDER BRIGHTMORE

Asandpaper tongue scraped up Oleander’s cheek, jolting him from sleep. Blinking blearily, he found himself face-to-face with a dark, feline beast looming over him. The hellcat’s glowing eyes gleamed in the dim light.

Zila.

As if in a trance, Oleander pushed himself upright. Without hesitation, Zila leapt from the bed and motioned for him to follow.

He didn’t waste time. It had been weeks since he’d last seen Perine, and the creeping dread about why she’d suddenly disappeared had been nagging at him for a while now. He’d told himself it wasn’t his place to worry about her, but now that Zila was here he decided this was all the permission he needed to let the strangling fear that she was in danger propel him into panicked action.

Grabbing his jacket, he threw it over his shoulders and stumbled after Zila. Moments later, he was astride the hellcat as she bounded out of his bedroom window, plunging them both into the night.

They didn’t take the usual route through the starry Void. Instead, they wove through shadows, slipping between darkness like a blade through silk. The landscape blurred past until, at last, they raced toward the Holy Circle.

Oleander had always thought of it as an empty, joyless place. He attended the required four religious services each year, arriving late and leaving as soon as the doors swung open. Due to his breakneck skiff departures, he had never paid attention to the Holy Circle itself.

Now, with the wind whipping through his loose hair, he saw it properly for the first time.