Chapter 82 Chapter Eighty-Two
The gate exploded open in a burst of light.
For a brief, disorienting moment Julian felt nothing but rushing wind and weightlessness—like the world had been ripped out from beneath him.
Then the ground returned.
Hard.
Stable.
He stumbled forward, boots crunching against something brittle beneath them as the light behind him collapsed inward. The portal snapped shut with a sharp crack that echoed through the darkness.
Silence swallowed the sound almost immediately.
Julian straightened slowly.
Night blanketed the world around them.
Two pale moons hung high above the treetops, their light filtering through towering branches that stretched overhead like the vaulted ceiling of some ancient cathedral. A thin mist drifted across the forest floor, curling between the thick roots of enormous trees whose bark shimmered faintly in the moonlight.
Jace landed beside him with a grunt, brushing dirt from his pants.
“Well,” he muttered. “That was fun.”
Julian didn’t answer.
His eyes moved slowly through the forest, instincts prickling beneath his skin.
Something was wrong.
Not with the trees.
Not with the mist.
With the silence.
Forests were never this quiet.
Jace seemed to notice it too.
He frowned, glancing around as he stepped closer to Julian.
“You hear that?” he asked.
Julian’s brow furrowed. “Hear what?”
“Exactly.”
Jace gestured vaguely toward the trees.
“No birds. No bugs. No creepy little woodland creatures glaring at us from the bushes.”
He spoke with quiet force.
“And where the hell are the guards?”
“I don’t know,” Julian replied. “But we’re not here to solve their security problems.”
His gaze shifted toward the towering palace ahead.
“We need to find my mate.”
Jace nodded once, though his eyes continued scanning the eerie stillness around them.
“Right.”
They began moving through the forest cautiously. The deeper they walked, the heavier the silence became.
After several moments, Jace spoke again.
“You know something I still can’t wrap my head around?” he said.
Julian glanced sideways.
“What?”
“The sentinels.”
Jace shook his head.
“I unloaded half a clip into one of those things.”
He huffed.
“Didn’t even slow it down.”
Then he looked at Julian.
“But that dagger you had? One stab and suddenly it hesitated long enough for us to slip past.”
His brow furrowed.
“What was so special about that blade?”
“Lazarus gave it to me,” Julian answered.
He pushed aside a low-hanging branch, his gaze fixed ahead on the faint silhouette of the palace beginning to rise through the mist.
“He called it enchanted,” Julian explained. “Said it has the ability to strip most supernatural beings of their power.”
Jace let out a low whistle.
“You’re serious?”
“Dead serious.”
“I didn’t even know something like that existed.”
Julian gave a humorless huff.
“When you’ve been alive as long as Lazarus has… who knows what he’s seen. Or what he’s collected.”
They kept walking.
The forest thinned gradually, the massive trees giving way to wider stretches of pale ground and creeping silver fog. Ahead, the dark outline of the Seelie castle became clearer with every step — towering spires clawing toward the twin moons like frozen lightning.
Julian’s strides began to shorten.
Subtle at first.
Then slower.
He exhaled harder than before, his shoulders tightening as a dull heaviness crept through his limbs.
Jace noticed immediately.
His eyes slid sideways, studying Julian with growing suspicion.
“You alright?” he asked.
“I’m fine,” Julian answered.
He pushed forward, as though movement alone could outrun whatever heaviness had begun creeping through his body.
He jerked his chin toward the dark silhouette rising ahead.
“Look.”
Jace followed his gaze.
The forest thinned abruptly.
The last of the towering trees gave way to open ground washed in cold moonlight, silver mist curling low across pale marble paths that wound toward the Seelie Court.
And that was when they saw them.
Jace stopped walking.
“…What the hell…”
Figures stood scattered across the terraces and walkways.
Dozens of them.
Maybe hundreds.
Frozen.
Not statues.
Not illusions.
People.
A Seelie guard stood at the edge of the main path, one hand raised mid-signal, his spear angled toward the sky as though he had been about to call out a warning that never came.
A pair of attendants remained bent over a lantern stand, caught in the act of lighting enchanted glass globes that now burned endlessly without flicker.
Near the fountain, a scholar had collapsed against a marble bench, scrolls spilling from stiff fingers — parchment caught forever in the moment before it hit the ground.
Further ahead, two young fae stood locked in what must have been an argument, their expressions twisted in anger, mouths open mid-word.
On the far terrace, musicians sat poised with instruments lifted — hands hovering above strings that would never be plucked.
Even the water itself had been claimed.
A crystal fountain stood at the center of the courtyard, its cascading streams halted in mid-fall, droplets suspended like shattered diamonds in the air.
“What’s wrong with them?” Julian said to no one in particular.
No breath fogged from their lips.
No eyes blinked.
No chest rose or fell.
Jace moved closer to one of the frozen guards, waving a hand in front of the man’s face.
Nothing.
“…They’re alive?” he asked.
Julian didn’t answer right away.
His gaze had drifted toward the towering doors of the palace beyond the courtyard.
Something inside him twisted.
Hard.
“We need to find Kaelani,” he said, urgency flickering in his eyes.
They crossed the threshold of the Seelie castle expecting answers.
Instead—
they found more stillness.
More silence.
The vast entry hall stretched before them, its towering arches and crystal chandeliers frozen mid-glow as though time itself had simply… stopped.
Figures stood scattered throughout the chamber.
Suspended.
A pair of attendants remained locked in the act of bowing to one another. A noblewoman stood halfway down a staircase, her gown caught mid-sway. Two guards flanked the grand doors deeper within the castle, their hands frozen inches from their weapons.
Not dead.
Not alive.
Trapped somewhere in between.
Jace let out a low breath.
“You think she’s here?” he asked quietly.
Julian shook his head.
“No.”
His voice came out rougher than he intended.
“I’m not picking up her scent here.”
But his wolf bristled beneath his skin.
Unease coiled tight in his chest — instinct screaming that something here was deeply, dangerously not right.
They moved deeper into the castle.
Their steps echoed through corridors swallowed in shadow, the faint glow of enchanted sconces casting long, distorted shapes across marble floors. Every turn revealed more frozen figures… more lives caught mid-motion as if the entire court had been locked inside a single unfinished moment.
Julian kept walking.
Kept pushing forward.
But his breathing began to change.
Subtle at first.
Then heavier.
Each inhale dragged slightly, as though the air itself resisted filling his lungs. A dull ache pulsed beneath his ribs, spreading slowly outward like poison threading through his veins.
He lengthened his stride to keep pace with Jace.
Refused to slow.
Refused to show weakness.
Until—
Jace stopped walking.
Completely.
“Show me.”
Julian’s steps only slightly faltered.
“What?”
“Julian…” Jace’s voice dropped, heavy with knowing. “You know what I’m talking about.”
Julian finally came to a halt. He didn’t turn.
His back remained rigid, shoulders tight as he stared down the darkened corridor ahead.
“We don’t have time for this right now,” he said flatly.
Silence filled the space between them — a heartbeat or two slipping through the tension.
“Julian.”
Just his name.
Nothing else.
The persistence in Jace’s voice was enough.
Slowly, Julian exhaled and turned to face him and the sight made Jace’s stomach drop.
Julian’s skin had gone pale beneath the moonlit shadows pooling through the high windows. Dark circles bruised the space beneath his eyes, deeper than they had been only moments before. A thin sheen of sweat clung to his brow despite the chill hanging in the castle air.
Without a word, Julian lifted the hem of his shirt.
Revealing the mark.
Blackened veins spidered outward from the wound like creeping rot beneath his skin — twisted, corrupted lines spreading across his abdomen and inching toward his chest. The surrounding flesh looked wrong… as though something inside him was quietly unraveling.
Jace’s breath caught.
He closed his eyes for a brief moment, shaking his head as if willing the sight away.
As if hoping his vision had betrayed him.
It hadn’t.
Jace’s eyes snapped open again, anger flashing through the shock.
“Why the hell didn’t you say something?” he demanded, voice tight. “Why didn’t you tell me before I drank the potion?”
Julian lowered his shirt slowly, the fabric falling back over the spreading decay.
“Because you wouldn’t have taken it,” he said.
“You’re damn right I wouldn’t have.”
Julian’s jaw clenched.
“And I wouldn’t have either,” he shot back. “We would’ve stood there arguing like idiots until that rot finished the job and killed us both.”
The words came out fierce. Final.
Julian dragged in a slow breath, the effort visible in the rise and fall of his chest.
“Look…” he said, quieter now. “I don’t know how much time I have left.”
Jace’s expression hardened, but he didn’t interrupt.
“I just need to find her,” Julian expressed. “I need to see Kaelani… just once more.”
His voice faltered.
“To tell her—”
The words died in his throat.
For a moment neither of them spoke.
Jace muttered a curse under his breath, shaking his head as he scrubbed a hand over his face.
“Damn it, Julian.”
The anger was still there.
But something else had settled over it now. Something heavier.
He gave a single nod toward the dark corridor ahead.
“Then let’s go.”
They moved forward together.
The castle corridors stretched long and quiet before them, shadows pooling in the corners like something alive.
Then they saw them.
Massive doors — towering nearly to the vaulted ceiling, carved from pale stone veined with faint threads of gold that no longer seemed to glow.
It was the entrance to the throne room.
They didn’t hesitate.
The massive doors groaned open beneath Julian’s push, the sound echoing through the frozen silence like a warning no one was left conscious to hear.
Both men stepped inside, their eyes immediately landing on her.
Lyressa sat upon her throne at the far end of the hall — regal even in stillness, platinum hair spilling like liquid starlight over her shoulders. One hand rested upon the arm of the throne. The other lay limp in her lap.
Her expression was stricken with grief.
As though the world had ended around her… and she had been forced to watch it happen.
“What the hell is going on here…” Julian murmured.
They approached slowly.
Every movement sounded heavy. Intrusive. Inappropriate in the suffocating silence.
Julian shrugged the straps of his backpack from his shoulders as they reached the dais.
He reached inside and pulled out something wrapped tightly in dark cloth — layer upon layer bound around it, as though whatever lay beneath was too important… or too fragile… to leave exposed.
Jace frowned.
“What is that?”
Julian finished unwrapping the final layer.
Light caught the object in his hands.
A disc of strange crystalline glass framed in ancient silver metal — etched with symbols that seemed to shift if stared at too long.
A looking glass.
Better known as The Veil of Truth.
“Another gift from Lazarus,” Julian finally said.
His voice was quiet. Focused.
“He told me it emits a light of truth… reveals someone’s true nature.”
Jace stared at the object.
Skeptical. Uneasy.
“He said…” Julian’s gaze darkened slightly as memory pulled at him.
“I’ve seen kings hide behind beauty… and monsters hide behind crowns. This shows what they truly are.”
Julian looked back toward the frozen queen.
“I told him that something felt off about the Fae lord,” he continued. “If I’m right… this will prove it.”
He began to raise the Looking Glass toward Lyressa.
Jace’s brow furrowed deeper.
“Why are you using it on her?”
Julian hesitated.
The question hung like a stone between them.
“I don’t know,” he admitted.
His words came more subdued.
“I just have this feeling…”
He stared at the queen.
“Like she wants me to see her.”
Slowly… deliberately… Julian lifted the glass and aimed it at the frozen Seelie Queen.
For one suspended heartbeat—
Nothing happened.
But then—
Light exploded outward.
Blinding.
Pure.
Golden radiance burst from her body like the rising sun itself, pouring across the throne room in living brilliance. It climbed the towering pillars and shattered the long shadows clinging to the empty chamber, reflecting violently in Julian and Jace’s eyes as they staggered back.
The queen burned with impossible light.
Not corrupted.
Not monstrous.
Something else entirely.
Something celestial.
And neither of them could look away.