Chapter 60 Fifty-nine

Chapter 60 Fifty-nine
CHAPTER 59 

FIRST BETRAYALl

The academy had never sounded so alive.
Whispers crawled through corridors, the air charged like a storm about to break. Every face Iria passed seemed to carry a secret. Every glance lingered a second too long.

By the time she reached the east wing, her wristband had already flashed another alert:
Access Log Detected. Unauthorized Entry, Vault 7.
Her vault.

Her throat tightened. She pressed her thumb to the band, but the log refused to clear.
Someone had gone through her data — the sealed archive that only she, Brian, and the Professors were supposed to access.

The air in the study hall was heavy with the hum of data-screens. Students bent over their devices, pretending focus. But when Iria stepped in, the silence folded differently, like the room itself was holding its breath.

Clara sat at the far table, sunlight catching in her hair. She looked soft, harmless, a warmth Iria had once trusted without question.
Now, watching her laugh lightly at something Ben said, Iria’s stomach turned.

Ben’s grin was easy, but too easy. His eyes slid to Iria, then away, guilt flickering like static.

She didn’t confront them right there.
Instead, she turned away, walked out, and let the silence trail behind her like smoke.

Later that night, the storm finally broke.
Rain slashed across the academy’s glass dome, lightning flashing over the training courtyard. Iria’s boots splashed through puddles as she made her way toward the restricted wing.

She didn’t knock.
The security door hissed open after scanning her blood ID, and the chill that met her felt personal.

Inside, three holograms hovered mid-conference: Brian, Grey, and Professor Halden. Clara’s name tag flickered on one corner of the feed.

They were looking at her energy readings.
Her pulse signatures.
Her dreams.

Brian’s voice, calm, logical, filtered through:

> “She’s connected to every surge since the Blood Moon event. We need containment, not confrontation.”

Grey’s tone cracked through the feed:

> “Contain her? She’s not an object, Brian.”

Halden’s voice, sharp:

> “If she triggers another resonance, the city grid won’t recover. This is not emotional. It’s survival.”

Then Clara’s voice, faint but clear,

> “I’ve sent the coordinates. You’ll find her near the east dorm by dawn.”

The recording looped, the timestamp marking it three nights ago.
Her pulse thudded once, hard, then again, faster.

When the door opened behind her, she already knew who it was.

“Clara.”

The girl froze, rain dripping from her sleeves. “Iria.…”

> “Don’t,” Iria said quietly. “Don’t lie.”

Clara’s lips parted, searching for words, for forgiveness, for anything that could make the air less suffocating. But Iria’s gaze stopped her.

“I thought I was protecting you,” Clara whispered. “Kael said…..”

The name hit like glass shattering.

> “Kael.”

The sound of it in her own voice tasted like blood.

She took a slow step forward. “You’ve been feeding him information?”

“Iria, please. I didn’t know, he said he could stop the surge, that you’d die if…”

> “If what?”

Clara’s eyes filled. “If I didn’t help him track you.”

Something in Iria went very still.
It wasn’t rage, not yet. It was silence so deep it vibrated.

“You gave him me.” Her words came out soft, measured, and terrifyingly calm. “You gave them all of me,  the brothers, the professors, the enemy.”

“I…..”

> “You turned me into a case study.”

The air thickened, static crawling across the walls. Screens flickered; the lights dimmed. The scent of ozone filled the room.

Clara stumbled back, her hair plastered to her face. “Iria, please, I didn’t mean….”

> “You did,” Iria said. “You just didn’t think it would matter.”

For a moment, neither moved. The storm outside roared, thunder rumbling like the heartbeat of the Blood Moon itself.

Then Iria turned away, the hum beneath her skin rising to a low, steady glow.

“You should leave, Clara. While you still can.”

The door hissed open.
Clara hesitated, tears streaking her cheeks, and whispered, “You don’t understand, Iria. He’s not done with you.”

Iria didn’t answer.

When the door sealed behind Clara, the silence that followed felt final.

The next morning, word spread through the academy like smoke:
The professors had issued a lockdown.
Ben hadn’t been seen since dawn.
Grey had been spotted leaving the west gates in a storm cloak.
Brian had called for an emergency council.

And Iria, 
She sat in her room, the hum in her chest steady now, almost calm.

The Blood Moon’s power pulsed faintly beneath her skin.
It no longer felt foreign.

> “First betrayal,” she murmured.
“Now we see who still stands when the light breaks.”

She looked toward the horizon where the dome met the clouds.
The next storm would not be weather.
It would be her.