Lyra was escorted to Kael's wing just before dusk—though the light never quite reached his halls.
Everything was shadow.
The architecture here was different. Ancient. Unforgiving.
Black-veined stone arched overhead like rib bones. Thin silver thread—etched with runes—ran across the floors like veins beneath glass. The walls whispered. Not with sound, but with presence. The kind that crawled along your spine, prickling nerves you didn't know you had.
The air smelled of ink, old parchment, and faintly of lavender crushed underfoot.
There were no guards inside. No escort waiting. Just silence.
She paused at a tall obsidian door with a handle shaped like a wolf's jaw, teeth bared.
It opened before she touched it.
Of course it did.
She stepped inside, her bare feet silent against polished stone.
And froze.
The room was vast, circular, and dimly lit by floating orbs of white flame. Hundreds of books lined the walls in spiraling tiers. Staircases twisted like ivy up to unseen heights. Scrolls, relics, and maps were scattered across tables of dark wood and etched iron.
A waterfall trickled quietly behind a sheer curtain of silver beads on one side—cool mist catching the firelight like scattered stars.
It wasn't a library.
It was a mind made visible.
At the center, Kael sat behind a long obsidian desk covered in parchment and runes. He was writing with a quill dipped in black ink that shimmered like oil under candlelight.
No shirt. No cloak. Just his pale skin marked with faint lines of inked runes—some old, some fresh—trailing down his arms and spine like tattoos from forgotten rituals.
His silver eyes flicked up the moment she entered.
"You're late," he said, voice like still water over glass.
"I wasn't aware this was a timed exam," she said dryly, stepping forward. "Do I lose points for attitude?"
He said nothing.
Just gestured to the chair across from him.
Lyra moved carefully, every step calculated. She dragged her fingers along the edge of the stone table as she passed—cool, smooth, and cold as Kael's expression.
"No guards. No threats. What's the catch?" she asked.
"You're not here to be threatened," Kael said, "you're here to be understood."
That stopped her.
Not broken. Not used.
Understood.
For a moment, that word disarmed her more than violence ever could.
She took the seat slowly.
Kael passed her a slate the size of a book, inscribed with an intricate rune in the center drawn in bone-white chalk.
"It's a memory spell," he said. "Place your fingers here. Think of a lie."
Lyra narrowed her eyes. "And you expect me to volunteer for mind reading?"
"It doesn't show what you think," he said. "It shows what you mean. Truth bleeds through the cracks of intention."
"And what do you get out of this?"
He leaned forward slightly.
"Insight."
She studied him, pulse ticking behind her ribs. Then, slowly, she placed two fingers on the rune.
It pulsed.
Warm at first. Then cold—like ice threading through her veins.
She thought of a safe lie: "I've never thought about killing Dorian."
The slate shimmered.
Words appeared in silver script.
"She dreams of him choking on his own ambition, and her fingers stained red with justice."
Lyra's breath caught.
Kael's mouth twitched—barely. "Interesting."
She yanked her hand back, her heart hammering against her ribcage like it wanted out.
"That's invasive."
"It's truthful," he said calmly. "You can't hide from what you are, Lyra."
"And what am I?"
He stood slowly, circling the table, his bare feet silent as he moved behind her.
"The last she-wolf," he murmured. "The untouchable. The unbroken. The one they all want to conquer, tame, own."
She turned to glare at him—but he was already behind her, leaning in close enough for her to feel his breath.
"But what I see," he whispered against her ear, "is not someone who survived. It's someone who's waiting to explode."
Her spine stiffened.
Kael moved back, calm as ever, studying her like a spell he was just beginning to decode.
"You're clever," he said. "But desperate. You think control is safety. You think seduction is power. But both are just masks. And I… collect masks."
He picked up a glass orb from the table and held it out to her.
Inside swirled dark fog and flickering silver.
"What's this?" she asked.
"A memory trap. It captures your strongest thought in a moment of decision."
"And if I break it?"
"You'll shatter a piece of yourself," he said simply.
She didn't take it.
Instead, she stood slowly, not backing away—only adjusting her footing so she was eye level with him.
"I came here to survive," she said.
"No," he replied. "You came here to start a war."
A beat of silence stretched between them.
Kael didn't blink.
"Why did you let Ronan hit you?" he asked.
Her stomach turned.
"You think I let him?" she said, coolly.
"You didn't fight back," Kael said. "Not fully. You made him feel in control. Why?"
"I was playing him."
"You were reliving something."
Her jaw tensed.
"I've read your file," he said softly. "Dorian didn't just sell you. He gave you up when you were still a girl. Told them where you'd be. Lied to your mother. And watched them hunt you."
She said nothing.
She couldn't.
Kael leaned in again, eyes sharp as daggers. "You want to destroy him. But you haven't decided if you'll destroy yourself in the process."
She swallowed hard. Heat flushed her chest. Not from arousal—but from the way he saw her. Too clearly. Too intimately.
Kael stepped back and returned to his desk like nothing had happened.
"That's enough for today," he said, already reaching for his quill.
She didn't move.
Didn't speak.
Didn't breathe.
"And Lyra?" he said without looking at her.
Her heart paused.
"You think you're controlling the game," he murmured. "But you haven't even seen the board yet."
🖤 Mini-Scene: Child of Ruin
The door to Kael's chambers closed with a soft hiss behind her.
Lyra stood in the corridor, the dim candlelight casting long shadows across the veined stone floor. Her heart was still racing—not from fear. Not even from anger.
From something colder. Sharper.
Kael had carved open a truth she didn't want to see.
That somewhere beneath her carefully crafted armor… a part of her wanted destruction. Not just for Dorian. Not just for the Alphas.
For everything.
Her knees felt weak. She pressed her back against the wall, closing her eyes.
Breathe.
"You're not a survivor. You're a weapon that survived."
His voice echoed in her skull like a curse.
She clenched her fists. Nails dug into her palms.
She couldn't fall apart. Not now. Not when they were all watching—
Except… they weren't.
Not all of them.
But someone was.
Across the corridor, hidden in the shadows near a stone arch, a figure stood silent as a statue.
Elias Rune.
Lucien's second-in-command. Always watching. Always still.
Lyra's breath hitched.
He didn't move. Didn't blink.
Just… observed.
As if recording her silence was more important than hearing her voice.
Their eyes met for only a second before he turned and vanished into the dark without a word.
Her skin prickled.
She pushed off the wall, steps shaky but purposeful, heading back to her chambers—until she heard it.
A whisper.
Faint. Distant. Not from the hallway.
From inside her own mind.
"One of them already knows. The rest will follow. Choose carefully, child of ruin."
Lyra stopped dead in her tracks.
Her blood turned to ice.
She spun—no one there.
Just empty stone and flickering candlelight.
She swallowed hard and forced herself forward, jaw clenched.
Kael had pulled her mask halfway off.
But whatever that was?
It saw her soul.