Chapter 24 — Old Stars, Fractured Faith

That felt almost insulting.

Seris arrived first.

Cassian came ten minutes later.

Alone.

Good.

She stood beside the broken observation platform with his letters tucked inside her coat.

"You came."

"You told me to."

"That never stopped you ignoring good advice before."

Seris didn't offer him a seat.

"Start talking."

"How much did you read?"

"Everything I could find."

His shoulders lowered.

"Then you know most of it."

"No."

She pulled the first letter free.

"I know what you wrote. I want to know why."

"I was trying to keep him alive."

"Try again."

"I'm serious."

"So am I."

"Do you remember Lareth?"

"Of course."

"He ignored a direct order and nearly died."

"He saved a village."

"Both can be true."

"How many times do you need to watch someone nearly kill himself before helping stops looking noble?"

"You think giving Ortheon his movements was helping?"

"At first? Yes."

"That's convenient."

"It's the truth."

"Zyrion didn't sleep. He barely ate. Every stranger who cried in front of him became his responsibility. If someone said there was danger three provinces away, he'd already be fastening Epitaph before they finished the sentence."

"I noticed."

"Then you know."

"I know he needed us."

"He needed someone who could stop him."

There.

"Stop him from what?"

"From becoming exactly what everyone was afraid he'd become."

"You thought he was a monster."

"No."

"You just said—"

"I thought he could become one."

"That's worse."

"How?"

"Because you punished him for something he hadn't done yet."

"He scared me."

"At Deren Hollow, I watched him try to stand when he couldn't feel one side of his body."

"At the festival, he tore an entire plaza apart because someone put a chain around you."

"Nobody died."

"That time."

"You saw the faces afterward."

"So did he."

"And then Bellmere happened."

"He spared those hunters. They came back. Children died."

"That wasn't his choice."

"He thinks it was."

"I know."

"And after that?"

"Maelor didn't even get to draw his sword."

"Darius got one warning."

"Darius attacked me."

"With binding wire."

"And Zyrion killed him."

"Immediately."

"I love him, Seris."

"Don't use that to excuse this."

"I'm not."

"I'm telling you why I was afraid."

"I've watched him spend his entire life running toward fires because he thinks being able to help means he's guilty if he doesn't."

"And now every fire teaches him something worse."

"You should've told us."

"I know."

"You should've told him."

"I know."

"You should've trusted him enough to let him choose."

"And if his choice got him killed?"

"Then it was his."

"That's the part none of you understand."

"None of us?"

"You. Ortheon. Half the Council. Even Zyrion lately."

She tapped his chest directly over the hidden mark.

"You all keep deciding love means making choices for someone before they can make the wrong one."

"I was trying to stop a disaster."

"You were afraid."

"Yes!"

"Yes. I was afraid."

"The first route was supposed to be protection."

Seris didn't interrupt.

"The Council said they'd clear roads ahead of him. Control crowds. Stop emergencies reaching him before local forces had a chance."

Another breath.

"Then they asked about his schedule."

Cassian's eyes dropped.

"Then his habits."

"Then me," Seris said.

He nodded.

"I told them you mattered."

"You told them he'd lose control if I was threatened."

"I didn't know they'd arrange the festival attack."

"But they did."

"Yes."

"And when you realised?"

"I confronted Ortheon."

"What did you do after that?"

Cassian couldn't answer.

Seris already knew.

"You stayed."

"I thought leaving would make things worse."

"For who?"

"For everyone."

There it was again.

Everyone.

Civilisation.

Safety.

Words large enough to hide individual people underneath.

Cassian pulled something from inside his coat.

A folded copy of the binding agreement.

His signature waited at the bottom.

"I signed this after Deren Hollow."

Seris's expression hardened.

"Why?"

"Because I thought it was an emergency restraint."

"You thought putting chains around his Soul Crown was restraint?"

"It required my approval."

"That's meant to comfort me?"

"It meant they couldn't use it unless I agreed."

She held up the crystal tablet she'd taken from the safehouse.

"And now?"

His face went pale.

"Now they don't need your agreement."

"No."

"They need you."

"Yes."

Seris hated how tired he sounded.

"Did you know they bound you permanently?"

"Not when I signed."

"When did you learn?"

"After the House of Still Waters."

Her anger returned.

"After?"

"The ritual activated through me."

Cassian's voice dropped.

"I felt it."

He touched his chest.

"Every chain around Zyrion pulled through my body too."

Seris remembered him standing beside Ortheon.

Unrestrained.

"Why were you next to him?"

Cassian closed his eyes.

"I went for the anchor control."

"You expect me to believe that?"

"No."

That stopped her.

He looked at her.

"I don't expect you to believe anything."

"Then give me something I can."

Cassian swallowed.

"Zyrion was never supposed to know."

Seris stared.

"What?"

"The ambush."

He forced the words out.

"Ortheon told me they were going to present the Crown again under neutral supervision. I knew there'd be restraint wards. I didn't know they intended to activate the full coronation."

"But you knew there would be a trap."

"I knew they'd stop him if he became violent."

"He walked in because you told him the meeting was genuine."

"I know."

"You looked me in the face."

"I know."

"You heard me make him promise to run."

Cassian's composure finally broke.

"I KNOW!"

His voice echoed from the ruined dome.

Seris didn't move.

Cassian covered his face.

"When the chains came up, I realised what I'd done."

His hands dropped.

"I tried to reach the control. Ortheon stopped me. Zyrion looked at me and..."

He couldn't finish.

Seris could.

"He thought you were trapped too."

Cassian nodded.

Tears ran down his face.

"He apologised to me afterward."

Seris closed her eyes.

"For doubting you."

"Yes."

"And you let him."

"I couldn't tell him."

"You wouldn't."

"He would've cut the bond."

"Maybe."

"He'd have killed me trying to free me!"

"And that was his choice to make with the truth."

Cassian laughed bitterly.

"You're starting to sound like him."

"No."

Seris stepped close enough that he had to look at her.

"I'm starting to sound like someone who still believes he deserves choices."

Cassian's face crumpled.

For a while, neither spoke.

Then Seris asked the question she'd been avoiding.

"Did you ever hate him?"

Cassian looked genuinely shocked.

"No."

"Never?"

"I hated being invisible beside him."

Honest.

Ugly.

Human.

Cassian looked toward the broken sky.

"I hated hearing his name after my victories. I hated how people looked through me to reach him."

His jaw tightened.

"And when I saw that statue in Veyr's Rest..."

He stopped.

Seris remembered his face.

"You liked it."

"For one second."

"That's enough."

"I know."

"No, Cassian."

Her voice softened.

"That's normal."

He looked at her.

"You wanted to matter."

She held up his letters.

"This wasn't."

He nodded slowly.

"I know."

Seris stared at the man she'd once stolen pastries with.

The man who'd saved my life more times than she could count.

The man who'd also handed our enemies the map to everything I loved.

"You didn't expose a monster."

Cassian froze.

"You manufactured one."

His face went blank.

Seris kept going.

"Every time you told the Council how to contain him, they gave him another reason to fear chains."

"Seris—"

"Every time they used someone he cared about, he learned caring was dangerous."

"Stop."

"Every time they lied, hunted us, rewrote what happened—"

"I said stop."

"You were so scared he'd become a threat that you helped build the world teaching him to become one."

Cassian looked like she'd struck him.

Good.

She hated herself for thinking that.

Then a bird screamed overhead.

Both looked up.

Black feathers cut through the rain.

A courier bird dropped through the broken dome and landed on the old platform.

Cassian stared.

"No."

Seris reached it first.

A message was tied beneath its wing.

Not Council black.

Neutral scout grey.

She opened it.

Three words.

CAELARIS APPROACHING. ALONE.

Her blood went cold.

Cassian looked toward the southern trail.

"How far?"

Seris checked the mark.

"Minutes."

Cassian's face changed.

Fear.

Not for himself.

For me.

"He followed you."

"I made sure he didn't."

"Zyrion always finds people when he thinks they're in danger."

Seris grabbed the letters.

"We tell him."

Cassian caught her wrist.

"Wait."

She looked down at his hand.

He released her immediately.

"If he sees those before I explain—"

"You just explained."

"To you."

"Then explain faster."

A distant sound rolled across the hill.

Not thunder.

Wings.

Cassian went pale.

Seris looked toward the ruined entrance.

For twenty-three chapters, I'd been walking toward the truth.

At last, it was only minutes away.

And none of them yet understood that the truth wasn't going to save us.

It was going to put Epitaph in my hand.