Chapter Thirty-Three: The Inheritance of Fire

They say fire purifies.

But no one talks about what it leaves behind—the smoke, the ash, the hollowed-out bones of who you were before the burning.

We returned from Prague scorched.

The private jet hummed through the clouds, but inside, we were all silent.

Lucien sat beside me, his hand on mine, fingers unmoving but iron-strong. Clara dozed fitfully across from us, her head pressed to a pillow like it was the only softness she trusted.

Andrei sat near the back, cleaning his gun with a reverence that told me he was thinking about what came next.

I wasn’t sure if we’d won anything.

Just destroyed a piece of the darkness.

But the roots ran deeper than fire could reach.

Back in Manhattan, the city no longer looked like home.

It felt like a chessboard—and every move we made only revealed how many pieces Reagan and Eryx had hidden.

Mira met us at the hangar. Her expression was grim.

“They leaked it,” she said without preamble.

Lucien stiffened. “What?”

She handed me a phone.

BREAKING NEWS: Lucien Blackwood Linked to Genetic Breeding Program – Human Rights Lawsuit Pending

I scrolled through the article, bile rising in my throat.

They’d spun it perfectly—images from Prague, anonymous testimonies, fragments of files now reworded to make Lucien look like the villain.

“They’re pinning it all on him,” Mira said. “While Reagan’s name stays out of it.”

Of course they were.

Dead men can’t be sued.

But Lucien could be.

And now I could see it—the trap.

Eryx didn’t just want to dismantle Lucien’s empire.

He wanted to make him into the monster they’d designed in the lab.

At the estate, Clara stood in front of the mirror in silence.

She’d barely said a word since Prague.

I stepped behind her, meeting her eyes in the reflection.

“You don’t have to carry this alone.”

“I’m not like you,” she whispered. “You were strong enough to survive outside. I only know how to survive in cages.”

I touched her shoulder. “You’re learning. And survival is still strength.”

She looked down. “They made me to be used.”

“No,” I said firmly. “They failed. Because you’re here. With me. Free.”

She turned to face me, voice trembling. “Then why does it still hurt?”

Because some chains leave bruises on the soul.

That night, Lucien and I stood on the rooftop.

The city stretched beneath us like a sleeping beast.

“Ivy,” he said, voice rough, “if I walk into that courtroom, they’ll crucify me.”

I leaned on the railing, the wind stinging my face. “And if you don’t, Eryx wins.”

He looked at me.

“I’m not afraid to burn,” he said. “But I need to know—if I go down, what happens to you?”

I turned to him, stepping close. “You don’t get to protect me from the fire anymore, Lucien. We burn together. Or not at all.”

He crushed me to his chest, holding me like a man holding onto the only thing he had left.

Mira’s plan was dangerous.

“We let them bring Lucien in. And then we flip the narrative. Clara testifies. We release the unaltered files. Everything.”

Lucien scoffed. “You think the court cares about truth?”

“No,” Mira said. “But the world cares about stories. If we control the story, we control the war.”

It was reckless.

It was insane.

And it was our only shot.

Two days later, Lucien was arrested.

They made a show of it.

Handcuffs. Cameras. Flashbulbs.

I stood on the courthouse steps, watching him disappear behind cold metal doors.

My hands were shaking.

But not from fear.

From resolve.

They wanted to destroy him?

They’d have to go through me first.

The trial was chaos.

Lucien’s name was dragged through the mud.

They paraded photos, voice clips, decontextualized records from the Prague facility.

None of it was real.

All of it looked damning.

Until Clara walked in.

She wore black.

She looked like a ghost.

But her voice—

Was steel.

“I am Clara,” she said clearly. “I am the result of Project Seraphim. I was born in a lab. I was used. Hurt. Branded.”

She paused, and the whole room held its breath.

“But Lucien Blackwood saved me.”

Gasps echoed.

She turned toward the jury. “He burned down the facility that made me. He destroyed the records. He risked everything—for me.”

The prosecutor tried to object.

But Clara stared him down.

“If you want a monster,” she said, “then you’re looking in the wrong direction. The monsters wore white coats. They had funding. They had Reagan’s name on their paycheck.”

Silence.

Then murmurs.

Then a crack in the mask.

We had them.

Lucien was cleared of all charges.

But not without cost.

His companies took hits.

Investors fled.

Some allies distanced themselves.

But in that ruin, something new bloomed.

Something real.

We stood in the burned-out chapel of the old Blackwood estate in Vermont.

Lucien turned to me.

“I never believed in redemption,” he said.

I took his hand. “You don’t need redemption. You need freedom.”

He pulled me closer.

“I never believed in love either.”

I smirked. “You’re terrible at belief.”

He kissed me like a man who wanted to forget the world.

And for a moment, we did.

Later that night, I stood at the old altar.

Alone.

The stars above were sharp and bright.

Clara approached from the shadows.

“They’ll come again,” she said.

“I know.”

“And they’ll have new weapons.”

“So will we.”

She smiled faintly. “You don’t feel like a sister. You feel like a storm.”

I smiled back.

“That’s what they made me.”

Then she tilted her head.

“What will you do now?”

And I answered with the one truth left to me.

“I will build a world where girls like us never have to bleed for a man’s crown again.”