Chapter 126: Part of the Solution - Callista's POV

The silence that followed was deafening. Ronan’s pallor didn’t recover. He looked at me with an expression that moved through several things before settling on something neutral. At least he tried it, but I knew he was uncomfortable.

“I said I think I know,” he said carefully, choosing his words. “That isn’t the same as lying.”

“You said you found a way to keep them from dying,” I replied, keeping my voice even. “Those exact words. Not I think I have. Not I believe I'm close. You said finally, which implies certainty and relief, not ongoing uncertainty." I held his gaze for a moment, watching his eyes. "So, which is it?"

Riven was very still beside me. I could feel through the bond that he was letting me have this. He wasn’t stepping back fully, and I knew he had plenty more to say, but he also understood I had clocked something and was giving me space to figure out what it was.

Ronan looked at his son briefly, then back at me.

"It's more complicated than a simple yes or no," he admitted with a huff.

"Then uncomplicate it," I said firmly.

He exhaled and moved away from the fireplace for the first time since we came into the room. I watched him go to the chair near the window, the worn one that clearly had been sat in through many long nights. He sat down with a hard thud.

I stayed where I was, the old leather book still in my hands, my senses picking up on something.

"There are two paths," Ronan said finally. "I have found both of them. One keeps the demon contained and suppressed enough that it can’t complete its purpose. Riven lives. He functions. The demon is there but managed." He paused. "The other path removes it entirely."

"Then that's the one we want," Riven said, stepping forward.

"Yes," Ronan agreed. "It is, but it carries a condition that I have been trying to find a way around for the better part of two years." His eyes moved to the book in my hands. "The complete removal requires something that I can’t provide. Something that has to come from within the bond itself."

I looked down at the book.

"That's why you wanted to train me," I drawled. "It was never just about my seer abilities being useful. You needed me specifically."

"Yes," he said, and the word came out quietly.

Riven turned his head and looked at me, and I felt it move through the bond. He didn't feel anger or even betrayal. This was so much more complicated. He recognized that he was a piece in this game and honestly, we were both at a loss for what to do.

"So she was always part of the plan," he said, his voice very quiet.

"She was always part of the solution," Ronan added carefully. "There is a difference."

"Is there?" Riven asked, his voice hesitant.

Ronan held his son's gaze. "I did not manufacture the bond between you. I did not choose her for you or arrange for you to find each other. Fate did that. What I knew was that a true mate bond—fully realized, fully sealed—carried a power that the original summoning had not accounted for." His jaw shifted. "Because when it was performed, the person who did it had no mate. Had never had one. He didn't understand what it meant."

"The bond is the variable he missed," I said, the breath coming out in a rush.

"Yes."

I looked down at the book again. My seer sense was pressing harder now. It wasn’t a full vision, but the edges of one, the way the sky looked before a storm arrived.

"There's something in here," I said, my voice trailing off. "I can feel it. Something that wants to be read."

"Don't open it yet," Ronan said, and there was a sharpness to it that made me look up. He was watching the book in my hands with an expression I hadn't seen on him before. Something that looked, very simply, like fear. "Not in this room. Not with both of you present."

"Why?” Riven asked, his voice soft.

"Because the last time I opened it with another person in the room who carried the demon's influence, the record responded." His voice was flat and careful. "It isn't just a document, but a living record. It was made that way deliberately, so that the summoning could be adjusted and maintained without requiring the original practitioner to be present."

The room became very quiet.

"Someone can still access it," I said, my gaze landing on the book. “Someone accessed this book, and that was why Raze lost his mind.”

"Yes."

“Does this person know—”

Ronan looked at me steadily, the words dying in my throat. "He knew the moment you touched it. My brother has a bit of a gift and can work with magic.”

I looked down at the book in my hands and felt the seer sense move through me again, except this time it wasn't reaching toward something. It was recoiling from something. A subtle wrongness that hadn't been there ten seconds ago, like a temperature drop so gradual you only noticed it when you were already cold.

I looked at Riven.

He felt it too. I could see it in the slight tension that moved through his jaw, the way his eyes had gone distant for just a moment before coming back. The demon was awake, though he wasn’t pushing or pressing at the surface yet.

“I need to find out what is in this book.”

“The sooner the better,” Ronan agreed. "There's a room in the lower level of the mansion. The original builders put wards into the foundation that predate anything the current security system uses. They were designed to contain exactly this kind of thing." He was already moving toward the door. "The record will be readable in there without the risk of it responding outward."

"You've been planning for this," Riven said, following.

"I've been planning ‌many things," Ronan said firmly. "Most of them didn't go as intended. This one I'd like to get right."

We moved out of the sitting room and into the corridor, and I carried the book carefully with both hands. Beside me, Riven's hand found my elbow.

The demon was still awake in him. I could feel it through the bond, quiet and oriented and far too aware of what I was holding. A brush of coolness around my heart almost made me jump.

I kept my eyes forward and followed Ronan toward whatever waited below and I thought about what he had said.

She was always part of the solution.