[Magnus’s POV]
The twins are gone. I’m certain of it now.
My wolf found nothing in the eastern wing. Kira’s fever story was a test, and I walked into it. The children aren’t in the palace, and the nursery wing has been quiet for two days. Wherever she sent them, it was planned with Malik’s precision.
Kira knows. Enough to act, enough to separate her children from me.
I sit at my desk and wait for the shame to arrive. What arrives instead is relief, terrible, sickening relief. The pretending can stop, and the masks come off soon.
I could still stop. I can’t reach the twins, so I could walk away and tell Kira I’ve been recalled to Ironridge. Leave, burn the documents, and spend the rest of my life being the man I pretended to be.
“The man you pretended to be was real.”
Then I’ll be him. I haven’t performed the ritual yet, haven’t touched the children. Everything can be undone by leaving.
“Sending for the archive was the point of no return. Surveying the convergence site was another. Every step since the garden has been one, and you’ve crossed them all. Telling yourself you haven’t decided is the last mask. Aren’t you tired of wearing it?”
Damn, it’s talking about me in the past tense.
“The decision is already made. It was made when you didn’t burn the documents. Everything since has been a long walk down the other side.”
I think about Damon. This is the thought that hurts most: not Kira, whose suspicion I expected, but Damon.
He trusted me with the unguarded openness of a man who had learned to trust again after believing the capacity was dead. We argued about military history over wine — proper arguments, the kind where both people raise their voices and neither considers it a wound.
He told me about the night he broke free. He told me things he hadn’t told anyone outside his family, and I received them with the gravity they deserved because I meant every response.
And he laughed. Actually laughed: the rare, full sound of a man rediscovering that joy was still available despite everything his mother and his first mate conspired to destroy.
I earned that laughter through genuine companionship, through the particular intimacy of two men who recognized each other’s damage and chose proximity. That laughter is something I will carry like a wound for the rest of my life.
I could still hear it. I could still argue about flanking maneuvers and watch him laugh. I could keep that.
“You can’t keep it and take the power.”
Does power matter more?
“It could prevent a thousand wars. One man’s laughter, however precious, doesn’t weigh against that.”
I don’t believe that. I’m performing conviction the same way I’ve been performing warmth — rehearsing the words until they sound natural, hoping repetition transforms them into truth.
“Maybe. Or maybe you believe it enough, and that’s all the ritual requires.”
I think about Malik. The Commander never liked me, never relaxed the professional distance that kept me at arm’s length. His instincts were right from the beginning.
While everyone else was charmed, Malik watched from the edges with the quiet attention of a man who learned to read danger before he learned to trust safety.
He never talks about what he actually wants, and I respect the observation more than I can express.
“The power to change the world and the wisdom to know whether you should are never given to the same person. Remember this.”
“He never saw what you’ve seen.”
“He ruled a northern territory that accomplished nothing for three decades. He preserved knowledge and called preservation enough. You’re the first Ironridge Alpha with the opportunity to use what we’ve kept, and the courage to act on it.”
“It’s conviction, and courage follows.”
“He is dead. The dead don’t get to judge the decisions of the living.”
VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABEL
Comments
The readers' comments on the novel: Reject me twice (Kira and Theron)