Chapter Fifteen – The Archivist’s Eyes

(Talon’s POV)

The symbol burned into my mind before I ever saw it up close.

Four interwoven spirals, each representing one of the primal elements: fire, water, earth, air. But surrounding them — barely visible to the untrained eye — was the fifth arc.

The shadow.

The absence.

Void.

The symbol had been outlawed over a century ago. Erased from texts, banned from magical heraldry, its use punishable by exile. Or worse.

And now, it sat beneath her skin.

Lyra. Or… Lyriana, if the whispers were to be believed.

And I was the only one trying to understand it.

I should have walked away after her duel with Cassian.

He didn’t speak of it, but I saw the shake in his hand afterward, the way he avoided the training grounds, the way fire no longer leapt to his fingers without conscious effort.

He’d touched something ancient inside her — and it had rattled even him.

Riven, of course, was basking in it.

He always leaned toward destruction like a wolf toward blood.

But me?

I leaned toward knowledge.

An