Chapter 74
*Jiselle*
I didn’t sleep.
Not after the night I had. Not after the fight with Nate that somehow turned out fine in the end. And especially not after the ash message burned across the mirror.
Nate didn’t see it. I ensured he didn’t. After he finished dressing my wounds, I went into the bathroom and broke the mirror myself. I shattered it with the back of my hand, sending the reflection–and the threat–with it. When he rushed in, terrified and worried, I lied, telling him it was an accident. I got a few new splinters, which he was not happy about, but he didn’t give me another lecture, either. Thank the moon goddess.
It wasn’t that I wanted to keep things from him. But he already ate away every personal space I had. I knew he had my best interests at heart, but I still needed to breathe. To think. To be afraid in silence.
When the sun rose, I was relieved to see the spill of gold across the floor. A reminder that I was still alive. Barely. Shaken. Hunted. But alive.
My body ached like it had been dropped from a rooftop, and the bandage Nate wrapped around my ribs was already stained at the edges, but I moved. Slowly, stiffly, I pushed myself up from the bed and reached for the hoodie I’d left crumpled near the edge. Nate was still asleep–one arm thrown over his pillow, brow furrowed like even his dreams weren’t peaceful anymore. I watched him for a moment. Just a moment. Then I turned away and dressed in silence.
The note came just after I finished tightening my boots.
It wasn’t slipped under the door. It wasn’t delivered by owl or scroll. It appeared–burned into the top of Nate’s desk. The faintest trace of smoke still curled off the edges of the parchment.
“Report to the Headmaster’s chamber. Now. -Bastain”
No signature. No seal. Just the scrawl of his voice pressed into my skull like an imprint.
I left quietly.
The academy halls were already waking, students moving toward breakfast or training. I kept my head down and walked quickly, each step more tense than the last. The Headmaster’s chamber wasn’t in any main wing. It was an upper tower- one that most first years never saw. Only faculty and council emissaries were summoned there. And apparently… people like me.
By the time I reached the door, my palms were slick with sweat.
I didn’t even knock. The heavy wooden door swung open the moment I lifted my hand.
Bastain stood inside, arms folded tightly across his chest, his jaw clenched like he hadn’t slept in days.
Carrow was beside him, eyes darker than I’d ever seen them.
“Jiselle,” a voice said smoothly. “Come in.”
I froze.
Headmistress Solara.
I had only seen her once before–at the entrance ceremony. She had spoken briefly. A single speech. Then disappeared into legend. Rumors swirled about her being powerful, half–lunar blood. That she’d once challenged a full–blooded Alpha and won. That she had more say than even the council. And now… here she was. Standing in the middle of a room that reeked of old wood, burning incense, and battle magic.
Her silver hair was braided down her back like a crown of moonlight. Her eyes–sharp and unreadable–settled on me. “Sit” she said
1 obeyed
Bastain didn’t move. Neither did Carrow. And I realized, with a strange jolt, that they were waiting for her to speak. “There’s been a development,” Solara said evenly. “A council faction has moved forward with something unsanctioned.” I tensed. “What do you mean?”
She turned slightly and lifted a scroll from the d
And there it was
A list
Ten names.
Ten students
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th a flick of her wrist
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Chapter 74
At the top–my name.
I stared at it. “What is this?”
“The council calls it a ‘precautionary register,” Bastain said bitterly. “They’re pretending it’s a surveillance log. What it really is… is a list of targets.”
Carrow’s voice was cold. “All ten are marked. Or suspected to be. And if you’re on that list, you’re at risk of being ‘removed‘ before Solstice.”
Removed.
What a neat, terrible word.
I tried to breathe–but the air felt heavier now. Like the scroll was radiating heat.
“I understand why I’m on it,” I said slowly. “But… Nate’s name is there too.”
Bastain nodded.
I felt something inside me fracture.
“He’s survived two Solstices,” I said, voice rising. “Why would they list him now?”
“You know why,” Carrow said quietly.
I did.
Because of me.
Because he’d mated with me. Protected me. Because he’d bled for me and stood in front of council fire and didn’t flinch. He was guilty by association. Marked by proximity.
And I had put him there.
I swallowed the guilt like broken glass.
“Are they planning to act?” I asked.
“They already have,” Solara said. “You There will be more.”
I clutched my sides, suddenly dizzy.
attacker in the dueling yard? That wasn’t rogue initiative. That was the first attempt.
“So what now?” I asked. “What do you want from me?”
Solara tilted her head. “Protection. Of a kind. Two watchers. Handpicked students. Older. Loyal only to me.”
“No,” I said immediately. “No strangers.”
Carrow sighed. “Jiselle-”
“I said no. I’ll just tell Nate and we’ll-”
“You can’t,” Carrow said, cutting me off. ‘The targets can’t know or they die immediately.”
I gaped at them. “What?”
Solara didn’t seem surprised. In fact, she smiled. “I expected that.”
I held the list with trembling fingers.
“No one has ever been able to stop it, and it updates much like how a computer would. Once a target is eliminated, it highlights the next target. But if you survive until Solstice, when the sun reaches its maximum declination, the magic in the scroll becomes redundant, and it stops picking the names off. They just have to accept that they were meant to live in the first place. So my advice, stay alive until then.”
This was sick. Just… sick.
Who makes a list of people to kill?
The scroll was warm in my hand. Alive.
“Why are you giving me this, then, if I can’t warn them?”
Solara stepped forward, her voice lower now. “You can survive the awakening. But you will not survive it alone. Choose wisely who you trust. Because they will bleed for you long before the council does.”
“Just not Nate?”
“He will need protection, too”
“But you only care if I live, don’t you? it was evident in her eyes. Bastain said it. I was ‘special.‘ She didn’t want me dead. “So how am I not dead then? Since I’m on the list and I know about it.”
She smiled like I was a child she was explaining something to
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“You already know you’re special, don’t you?”
It wasn’t an answer, but I realized it was as good as one that I could get. I was dismissed.
I left the chamber in silence.
I didn’t cry.
Not even when Bastain called my name softly as I left.
I just walked. The list clutched to my chest like a lifeline.
I didn’t stop until I was back in Nate’s room, door locked, curtains pulled.
I spread the roster out on the floor.
Names.
And one name in particular–faint, half–erased–circled in red ink.
Someone at the academy.
I was still staring at it when the door opened.
Nate stood in the threshold, his hair mussed, his eyes bloodshot. He looked at me, then at the way I shoved the scroll in my bag.
“What is that?” he asked.
“Nothing,” I said quickly, zipping it up.
He paused.
He didn’t believe me.
But he didn’t ask again.
Instead, he crossed the room, sat beside me on the floor, and pulled me gently into his side.
And for the first time in days, I let myself lean into him.
Just a little.
