Chapter 67 - Ember in the Blood
Chapter 67 - Ember in the Blood
Jaquelyn
She didn’t think. She moved.
The vision hadn’t faded so much as slammed shut, yanked away mid-frame — wings, fire, Topher — and now her body was a taut, focused line, cutting down the hallway at a dead sprint. Somewhere behind her, the others moved too. Not rushed. Not frantic. Purposeful. As though some unseen current had swept through them all, threading them together.
Evren. Coren. Ezekial.
Even Thorne.
She felt them fall in behind her like falling dominoes — no words, no orders. Just shared knowing.
The hallway blurred past, her pulse hammering in her ears. She didn’t feel the cold of the floors or the ache in her legs. Only the burn in her chest — fear, instinct, fury — all wrapped into one breathless, driving force.
The door came into view, and her hand was on it before her brain caught up.
She slammed it open.
“Topher, what the actual—”
The words died in her throat.
The room wasn’t chaos.
It wasn’t violence.
It was… soft.
Lacey and Topher sat side by side on the couch. Close, but not entangled. No blood smeared across the floor. No panic. Just a hush — the warm, damp quiet of something that had already happened. That had just ended. His face was slack with peace. Her neck held the faintest smear of red, but she didn’t look harmed. If anything, she looked... content.
They were staring at each other.
Like school kids.
Jaquelyn blinked.
Behind her, footsteps slowed. Ezekial appeared beside her. Coren just behind. Evren, still ragged but standing, lingered in the doorway. Thorne did not enter — but she felt him there in the hall. Watching.
She opened her mouth again, to demand, to yell, to do something—
—and Lacey turned toward her like a loaded weapon.
“What the hell, Jaquelyn?!”
Jaquelyn froze.
“I—”
“You barge in here like he’s some kind of threat? You scared him!”
Topher flinched.
Lacey was on her feet now, the protective fire in her eyes blazing. “Do you know how hard that was for him? How scared he was? How careful? And you—” she gestured, furious, “you come in like you’re ready to put him down.”
“I saw the vision,” Jaquelyn said, hands half-lifted. “We all did.”
Lacey’s eyes narrowed. “What vision?”
She turned to Topher, her expression flickering between concern and confusion. “Did you see anything?”
He blinked, then shook his head slowly. “No... I was focused on her. On not screwing it up.”
Lacey’s stare returned to Jaquelyn, sharper now. “So you assumed something went wrong — based on something he didn’t even feel?”
“So what? That gave you the right to assume the worst?”
There was silence. Not because Jaquelyn didn’t have an answer.
But because none of them did.
Lacey didn’t wait for the silence to grow.
“You all felt something, and that was enough? Enough to storm in here like he’d lost control — like I couldn’t handle myself?” Her voice trembled with fury, not fear. “Is that how little faith you have in me? In him?”
No one answered. Not Ezekial, still as a statue. Not Coren, jaw tight. Not even Jaquelyn, who looked like she’d been slapped.
“I carried him,” Lacey continued, voice low now — fierce in a different way. “I found him, remember? Back behind a curtain, starving himself because he was too afraid to ask for help. I sat down next to a kid everyone avoids and treated him like a person.” Her eyes locked onto Ezekial then, unflinching. “You saw everything else in that penthouse. Knew every move the Council made before they made it. And still — did you even notice he hadn’t fed?”
Only after that did her gaze sweep the others like a blade. Jaquelyn glanced sidelong at Ezekial, searching for some reaction — and to his credit, he at least had the grace to look uncomfortable. “Any of you?”
Jaquelyn flinched. “I should have,” she said quietly. “I was so focused on keeping everything else from falling apart, I didn’t see what was right in front of me.”
Lacey snorted, low and bitter. “So focused on everyone else — Ezekial, the Council, the shifting mess upstairs — but not enough time to check on the one who’s been quietly fading right under your nose?””
Topher made a small noise and shifted as if to speak, then reached out — not to defend himself, not to interrupt, but simply to anchor her. His fingers brushed lightly against Lacey’s wrist.
It wasn’t dramatic. It wasn’t even confident. But it was steady.
She didn’t look at him, not right away, but her shoulders eased by the smallest degree. Just enough to say she felt it.
She kept going.
“He trusted me with this — and he did it right. I’m fine. He’s fine. And you all came in here like you were ready to burn the place down just to be sure you got to be heroes first.”
She turned to Jaquelyn one last time, the heat in her eyes tempered only by exhaustion.
“Next time, knock.”
Jaquelyn didn’t argue. She didn’t back down either — but the defiance in her spine dimmed, the edge she usually carried sanded just a little by the burn of being wrong.
It wasn’t much. Just a flicker of discomfort, a quiet crack in her certainty. But it scraped at her pride, left her staring at Topher with something unfamiliar brewing under her ribs — not guilt, exactly. Not shame.
But awareness.
She hadn’t seen him. Not really. Not the way Lacey had. And for all her sharp instincts and survivor’s edge, she’d missed something important. Something human.
Her mouth opened, but no words came. What could she say? She’d stormed in like a weapon and found a boy trying his damned best not to break anything.
And for once, that boy hadn’t needed saving.
She exhaled, slow. Still too proud to apologize. But not too proud to see him.
Behind her, Evren shifted. The quiet sound of his weight moving was followed by a low chuff — not aggressive, not loud, but unmistakably animal. He sniffed in Lacey’s direction, nostrils flaring.
"Kit," he murmured under his breath, more instinct than speech.
Lacey’s head whipped toward him.
“Oh my gods,” she muttered. “Is there anyone in this building who can’t smell that I’m pregnant?”
Topher cleared his throat softly, voice low. “I… knew before I fed,” he admitted. “I could hear it — that second heartbeat.”
Lacey didn’t look surprised. Her expression softened, and she gave a small nod. “I know. You hesitated.”
He looked up, startled.
“I told you it was okay,” she added, her voice gentler now. “And you believed me.”
A pause.
Coren, who had been silent throughout, shifted his stance. His gaze swept from Lacey to Topher and back, mouth parting as if to speak — then closing again.
He blinked once, the weight of revelation landing behind his eyes.
“You’re pregnant,” he said, half to himself.
Lacey raised her brows, deadpan. “And now you know too. Welcome to the club.”
His jaw tightened, unreadable. But Jaquelyn caught the flicker in his eyes — part protective, part amazed. Torn between guarding something fragile and wanting to celebrate it outright.
Evren glanced his way with a low hum, something like agreement.
And for a heartbeat, the tension in the room eased — not gone, not forgotten, but loosened just enough to allow breath.