Chapter 13 The Last Friend
Andreas
The moment the girl vanished into the trees—her thin silhouette swallowed by darkness—I exhaled and let the illusion melt off my skin.
The frail, silver-haired crone straightened as her cracked spine unfurled, bones realigning with soft, deliberate snaps. Strength flooded my limbs. White hair lengthened into drifting wisps, and the cane dissolved into light.
A heartbeat later, I stood as myself again.
Andreas Thorne of the White Flame. Imperial Examiner. Watcher of Thresholds.
And the last friend Serafina Valen’s parents had ever trusted.
I dragged a hand down my face and let out a slow breath.
“Just in time,” I murmured to no one.
I had kept watch from the moment Serafina scurried to the brothels in search of help until the instant she boarded the carriage. To ensure interception, I sent word to the rebels that the Mistress’s carriage would pass through Ember in three days’ time.
And so I waited—here, at this hut—for her arrival.
But I had underestimated Magnus’s desire for Serafina. He did not wait. He moved swiftly.
If I hadn’t sensed the Collectors searching for her—if I hadn’t recognized the pulse of Magnus’s magic unraveling the healing the Mistress had gifted the boy—Serafina would have returned to Dust only to watch her brother die in her arms.
Just as Magnus intended.
The thought made bile burn my throat.
Magnus Ironside of the Blue Flame—Imperial Mage of the Fifth Circle. Celebrated healer. Advisor to the Emperor.
And underneath it all?
A man obsessed. Patient. Brilliant. Cruel beyond measure.
He did not buy Serafina for her purity. No Imperial needed a virgin for anything except rumors.
He bought her for her blood.
Celestial blood.
The rarest magic of all.
I clenched my fists. The cold night air stung my bare skin, but nothing could chill me like the memory of the day I discovered the truth.
They had called her parents traitors.
Said they plotted against the Empire.
Said they consorted with forbidden magics and rebels.
Lie after lie after lie.
The truth was far simpler—and infinitely darker.
Magnus needed a Celestial mage to control what slept beneath the Veiled Sanctum.
A relic too ancient to name.
Too old to destroy.
Too dangerous to wield.
A relic that rejected anyone without Celestial blood.
When Serafina’s parents refused to surrender their children—still only infants—Magnus poured venom into the Emperor’s ear. What followed shook the Empire’s square with screams as the Emperor himself branded them traitors. Their deaths were not swift nor private. They were deliberate. Public. Deafening.
A warning etched into the memory of all who witnessed it.
I still remember her mother’s final look—rage and desperation, wrapped into one terrible scream. She used the last of her magic to cast a cloaking spell on her children, hiding their bloodlines even from Imperial Seers.
The spell would hold until the girl’s eighteenth year.
And now…
Serafina’s time had come.
The violet glow of the orb on Rank Day had been proof enough of the power she carried within her, that her mother was right. I had forced it back to red, twisting fate just enough to buy her a few precious, fragile moments—but that illusion of safety would not last.
I had known this day would arrive. But knowing does not soften the ache.
For eleven long years, I had watched, waited, and prepared. Every spell, every observation, every shadowed step had been in service of this moment. And now, the weight of what was coming pressed against me like a storm ready to break.
“Celestial child,” I whispered into the shadows. “I pray you choose wisely in that shrine.”
A branch snapped behind me. I stiffened—then forced myself to relax.
Just a fox.
Good. The forest had not yet turned its eyes toward me. It would, eventually. The Sanctum always sensed those who meddled too closely.
But not tonight.
Tonight, its gaze rested elsewhere—on a girl named Serafina Valen.
I reached into my cloak and touched the small crystal orb that hummed faintly with light. An image flickered inside it—Lio Valen, sleeping fitfully on a collapsing bed, sweat soaking his blankets.
A boy who had done nothing wrong except be born a Valen.
The Warden’s guard stood near him, bored, leaning against the wall with a cup of cheap liquor.
“This is my fault,” I murmured. “If I had acted sooner… taken you somewhere else—”
But guilt was a luxury I could not afford. Serafina had to be desperate—cornered, driven to the edge where no other choice remained. I crushed the feeling before it could take root and tightened my grip on the orb, its cold weight anchoring my resolve.
Time to move.
I rubbed the pearl-like orb, and the forest dissolved around me.
Light flared. Wind spiraled. The world folded in on itself like fragile paper.
When it snapped back into place, I stood before Serafina’s shack in the Dust District—once again cloaked in the guise of the old woman.
I could never appear as myself in Dust. They already fear the Examiners enough, and Magnus—he would recognize the two as the Valen siblings he sought.
Besides, the Warden dismissed me as a poor old woman, rambling about things too absurd to be true. She let me roam freely—so long as I paid my dues.
The shack door creaked loudly as I pushed it open. The smell hit first—rot, damp wood, and sickness. My stomach twisted. Serafina had lived her whole life in this.
The guard straightened, alarm flickering across his face.
“Who the hell—?”
I raised my hand before he finished.
A soft pulse of white light burst from my fingertips. It struck the man square in the chest. His eyes rolled back, and he collapsed to the floor, unconscious before he hit the dirt.
I stepped over him.
Lio lay on the bed—no, sank into it. The mattress was eaten through by mold. The blankets were stiff with dried sweat. His lips were turning blue. His breaths came in sharp, wet rattles.
Magnus’s reversal had worked quickly. Too quickly.
He had restored the illness the Mistress had pulled out, but worse—he had accelerated it. Twisted it. Weaponized it. Using the Black Shroud.
Lio was drowning on dry land—and I was powerless to save him.
“Steady, boy,” I whispered.
He didn’t hear me.
He didn’t stir at all.
Death hovered above him, invisible but undeniable.
And still, he fought. I could feel it—his magic, weak and untrained, fluttering like a failing pulse.
“You have your mother’s stubbornness,” I murmured.
I slid my arms beneath him. He was weightless—terrifyingly so. Skin burning with fever. Heart fluttering against my chest like a trapped bird.
The moment I lifted him, the shack door rattled.
Voices outside.
Collector uniforms.
The Warden's men.
Damn. No time.
I lowered my head and let the illusion wash over both of us—covering him, hiding him in the magic’s weave.
Another press of my fingers against the orb.
Reality cracked—
—then rebuilt—
—and the two of us vanished from the shack entirely.
We landed in a clearing several districts away, hidden deep inside the southern woods, far from the Sanctum’s path and Magnus’s reach.
Lio wheezed in my arms, his small hands twitching.
“It’s all right,” I said softly, rocking him. “Your sister will save you. She has your mother’s will, your father’s courage… and something even stronger.”
Celestial light.
Light the Empire would kill to control—or destroy for fear of it.
Light that would one day awaken in full—if she survived.
If she made the right offering.
If she willingly bound herself to whatever dwelled within the Sanctum.
I stroked the boy’s red hair, my throat thick.
“She will save you,” I repeated, not sure if I was reassuring him or myself. “I have placed her feet on the path. It is all I can do. The rest… belongs to her. And to fate.”
The wind shifted, carrying a faint hum.
The Sanctum was waking.
Serafina was approaching.
And the world—our world—was about to change.