Chapter 26 — Brothers Beneath a Dying Star

He broke my nose.

I broke his wrist.

Neither of us apologised until Seris, years later, heard the story and called us idiots.

The last time we fought, neither of us was trying to win.

We were trying to prove the other had become someone we no longer knew.

Cassian stood between me and Seris.

Red glass covered the floor around his boots.

Blood covered his hands.

Epitaph burned crimson in mine.

“Move.”

He didn’t.

“Zyrion, listen.”

“I listened for years.”

“You listened to lies.”

“Yours.”

His face tightened.

“Yes.”

Behind him, Seris lay unmoving beside the shattered platform.

Alive.

I saw her chest rise.

That was enough.

Cassian raised both empty hands.

“I’ll tell you everything.”

“You had time.”

“I know.”

“Stop saying that.”

“I don’t have anything else.”

I stepped forward.

He stepped back.

Closer to Seris.

“Get away from her.”

“I’m keeping you from doing something you’ll regret.”

I laughed.

The sound bounced around the ruined observatory.

“There it is.”

“What?”

“Everyone knows what’s best for me.”

“That isn’t what I meant.”

“The Council said the same thing.”

“I’m not the Council.”

“Then stop sounding like them.”

Cassian’s eyes dropped to Epitaph.

Three sigils glowed red.

He knew the blade almost as well as I did.

We’d trained together for years.

He knew my stance.

My reach.

The slight turn of my shoulder before I lunged.

And I knew his.

Cassian moved left.

I already knew he would.

I cut across his path.

He twisted under Epitaph and struck my wrist with his forearm.

Exactly like he used to.

Cassian grinning through a bloody lip.

Me furious because he’d knocked my sword away three times.

“Watch the shoulder,” he’d said.

“What?”

“Yours. It tells me what you’re doing.”

Back in the observatory, I reversed the blade halfway through the strike.

Cassian’s eyes widened.

Too late.

The flat of Epitaph hit his ribs.

He flew into a broken pillar.

Stone cracked.

He dropped to one knee.

I didn’t wait.

He rolled as Epitaph struck the floor.

Crimson light split the stone.

“Zyrion!”

“Fight.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Then move.”

“No.”

I swung again.

Cassian drew his sword.

Finally.

Steel met Epitaph.

The impact shook the room.

He was still good.

Better than good.

Cassian had never needed overwhelming power.

He understood people.

Angles.

Timing.

Mistakes.

Especially mine.

He redirected my second strike and kicked my bad leg.

Pain shot up my side.

I stumbled.

He could’ve cut me.

He didn’t.

“Stop holding back.”

“I’m not going to kill you.”

“Comforting.”

I opened one wing and struck him with it.

Black and white feathers exploded through the air.

Cassian hit the wall.

His sword dropped.

I crossed the room.

He grabbed a piece of broken red glass and threw it.

I tilted my head.

It missed.

Then I realised it wasn’t aimed at me.

The shard struck a hanging chain above.

An old brass lens crashed between us.

Cassian ran.

Not away.

Around.

Toward Seris.

I cut through the lens.

“STOP GOING NEAR HER!”

My voice cracked with something I didn’t recognise.

Cassian froze.

So did I.

My Soul Crown pulsed above me.

The fracture widened another hair.

A black feather landed between us.

Cassian looked at it.

Then at me.

“This is what I was afraid of.”

“You were afraid of me?”

“Yes.”

Cassian swallowed.

“I was afraid of what would happen if nobody could stop you.”

“So you helped them chain me.”

“I thought it was a restraint.”

“You signed it.”

“Yes.”

“You gave them our routes.”

“Yes.”

“My habits.”

“Yes.”

“My weaknesses.”

His voice dropped.

“Yes.”

“Seris.”

Cassian closed his eyes.

“Yes.”

“You told them how to use her against me.”

“I told them she mattered. I never knew they’d attack her.”

“But they did.”

“Yes.”

“And you stayed.”

“I thought I could control the damage.”

I laughed bitterly.

“That sounds familiar.”

“I know.”

“STOP SAYING THAT!”

I attacked.

This time Cassian barely blocked.

Epitaph cut through his sword near the guard.

He stared at the broken weapon.

I punched him across the face.

He hit the floor.

I grabbed his coat and dragged him up.

“Why?”

Blood ran from his mouth.

“Because you were dying.”

“What?”

“You were killing yourself for everyone!”

He shoved me away.

“You wouldn’t sleep. Wouldn’t eat. Wouldn’t say no. Every village became your responsibility. Every stranger became someone you had to bleed for.”

“That gave you the right?”

“No!”

“Then why?”

“Because I was scared!”

Silence.

Cassian’s chest heaved.

“I watched you run into Lareth when everyone told you not to.”

“You came with me.”

“I always came with you!”

His voice broke.

“That was the problem.”

He looked at me with tears mixing into the blood on his face.

“Every stupid rescue. Every impossible fight. Every time you decided your life was worth less than whoever happened to be screaming loudest, I followed.”

“Do you know how many times I thought I’d watch you die?”

“Then you should’ve trusted me.”

“I did!”

“No. You trusted a leash.”

“I trusted the possibility that one day you might need someone to stop you!”

I pointed toward Seris.

“And look how well that worked.”

He wiped blood from his mouth.

“The festival wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“But it did.”

“The peace gathering wasn’t supposed to become a coronation.”

“But it did.”

“I never meant for any of this.”

“But you did it.”

Each answer pushed him backward.

Each one pushed me forward.

Cassian’s heel struck the edge of the platform.

No more room.

I raised Epitaph.

He didn’t reach for another weapon.

“Do you remember when we were twelve?” he asked.

I stopped.

“Don’t.”

“You couldn’t beat me.”

“Cassian.”

“You kept attacking straight on.”

“Shut up.”

“So I told you to watch your opponent instead of your sword.”

Dusty training yard.

Two wooden blades.

Cassian laughing.

Me promising I’d beat him tomorrow.

He smiled now.

Broken.

“You finally learned.”

I swung.

Cassian ducked and drove his shoulder into my chest.

We crashed through a cracked divider.

Red glass rained around us.

He hit me twice.

I blocked the third.

We moved like we had a thousand times before.

Step.

Turn.

Counter.

Every childhood lesson returned with teeth.

I knew when he’d feint.

He knew when I’d chase.

He knew I hated retreating.

I knew he always protected his right side after an old shoulder injury.

So I attacked left.

He expected that.

I changed direction.

Epitaph cut across his thigh.

Cassian collapsed.

I kicked his broken sword away.

He rolled.

Too slow.

My boot hit his chest.

He landed flat on his back.

Epitaph stopped against his throat.

Both of us froze.

Cassian breathed hard beneath me.

His face was bruised.

His clothes torn.

Blood spread beneath his leg.

Still, he looked at me the way he always had.

Not at the Star-Chosen.

Me.

“Do it, then.”

My grip tightened.

“Don’t.”

He laughed weakly.

“You always hated being told what to do.”

“Shut up.”

“You think killing me fixes this?”

“No.”

“Then why?”

“Because you betrayed me.”

“Yes.”

No excuse.

No qualification.

Just truth.

“I betrayed you.”

My hand trembled.

Cassian saw it.

“I wanted my own name.”

I stared down.

“I hated living in your shadow.”

There it was.

“But I never hated you.”

“Does that matter?”

“To me.”

“Not to Seris.”

His eyes shifted toward her.

Pain crossed his face.

“I’d give anything to undo it.”

“You can’t.”

“I know.”

This time, I let him say it.

Wind moved through the shattered dome.

A few red fragments slid across the floor.

Cassian looked at my wings.

More black than before.

Then at the fracture in my halo.

His expression turned unbearably sad.

“I thought I was stopping this.”

“Stopping what?”

“You.”

Something hot surged through me.

Cassian stared straight into my eyes.

“You’ve become exactly what they feared.”

Silence.

For a heartbeat, Epitaph felt impossibly heavy.

Then Bellmere flashed through my mind.

The children.

Maelor.

Solenne.

The chains.

Seris bleeding.

Cassian’s letters.

Every warning.

Every lie.

Maybe he was right.

That was why I hated him for saying it.

My thumb moved across Epitaph’s guard.

The eighth sigil dimmed.

A final groove appeared beneath it.

One I had never touched.

The warning carved inside the reliquary returned to me.

A blade that severs everything cannot distinguish justice from grief.

Seris’s voice followed.

You still remember what you promised?

Of course.

Never in anger.

Never for revenge.

Never because someone hurt me.

Cassian saw my hand move.

His face changed.

“Zyrion.”

I pressed my thumb into the final mark.

The ninth sigil opened.

Crimson light flooded the blade.

The room went silent enough that I heard Cassian breathe my name.

“Ninth Sigil.”

Epitaph began to change.

And the promise I’d carried for years finally broke before the blade ever fell.