Chapter 22: Delphine

The message came at noon.

Not by courier, not by bird, but by magic.

One of the central towers rang with a sharp tone—too clear and cold to be anything natural. When I reached the hall just outside the observatory, Valesa was already there, her expression unreadable as she stood before a hovering silver seal, suspended midair like a flattened coin. Its center pulsed with a glyph I recognized from the High Council’s archives: a formal summons.

Theron stood beside her, jaw tight.

Neither of them looked surprised.

Only I seemed to feel the world shift beneath my feet.

“What is it?” I asked, even though I already knew.

Valesa gave me a small nod. “The Council is sending an envoy. They’ll arrive in two days.”

“Why?”

Theron answered without looking at me. “They know the castle is changing. They’ve either seen it in the records... or they’ve felt the shift in the leyline network.”

“Because of me.”

He didn’t confirm it.

He didn’t need to.

I stepped closer to the floating seal. Magic shimmered along its edges, faintly pressing against the edge of my thoughts. A whisper of what the message contained.

The Council wasn’t just coming to inspect the work.

They were coming to assess me.

I folded my arms. “They’re expecting me to be dangerous.”

“They always were,” Valesa said, her voice careful. “But now they’re coming to decide whether you’re useful or expendable.”

The words were clinical.

But the fear behind them was real.

I turned toward Theron. “Are you going to let them touch me?”

His head lifted then, slowly.

“No,” he said, voice steady. “They’ll have to go through me first.”

“And if they try?”

The faintest shadow crossed his face. “Then I won’t be the one to stop them.”

I understood what he meant. He wasn’t threatening the Council.

He was warning me that the castle—our castle, now—might not tolerate their presence.

I looked at the sigil still marked on my arm. It had grown warmer over the last day, glowing faintly even through fabric. I hadn’t told Theron, but sometimes I could feel the castle’s pulse when I closed my eyes. Not like a sound. Like a second awareness—one that sharpened when he was near.

“They’ll know about the mark,” I said. “They’ll see it and assume I’ve already surrendered to the magic.”

Valesa stepped forward. “Then don’t give them that advantage.”

“I don’t know if I can hide it,” I admitted. “It’s not just ink. It’s... in me.”

Theron’s hand found mine—unseen by anyone else, but steady and grounding.

“You don’t have to hide what you are,” he said. “Just don’t let them decide what it means.”

I held onto that.

Because for the first time in my life, I wasn’t afraid of my magic.

But I was starting to understand why everyone else was.

-

The castle was quiet by nightfall.

Not the usual kind of quiet that came with fading lanterns and soft spells humming in the walls—but a deeper hush, like the entire structure had settled into the pause between one breath and the next.

The Council was coming.

And Castle Thorne had gone still.

I found Theron on the upper terrace just after dusk, alone with the sky. The stars above were sharp and cold, hanging in a velvet black that made the stone around us feel like it had been carved out of eternity. A steady breeze moved through the arches, rustling my cloak as I stepped into the open air.

He didn’t turn when he heard me.

But he didn’t have to.

His magic reached for mine before our eyes met, that familiar thread snapping taut—like a string pulled between two anchors that had been drawing closer without meaning to.

He leaned against the balustrade, one arm resting on the weathered stone, a glass of bloodwine in his other hand. He looked less like a ruler and more like a man unraveling—slowly, quietly, beautifully.

I stepped up beside him, close enough to feel the heat radiating from his body.

“They’ll come expecting control,” I said, staring at the mist rolling over the garden rooftops. “And I don’t think I can give it to them.”

He sipped from his glass. “Then don’t.”

“I’m not what they sent me here to be.”

“No,” he said. “You’re more than they deserve.”

I turned to look at him fully. His profile was all sharp edges and quiet shadows—cheekbones catching the starlight, lashes casting crescent moons on his skin. But his expression was unreadable. Distant. Braced.

“I used to think love was supposed to be soft,” I said, watching him instead of the stars. “Gentle. Easy.”

He turned his head slowly, eyes meeting mine.

“It can be,” he said. “But not for people like us.”

I reached for the glass, and he let me take it. I drank, letting the wine settle on my tongue—dark, dry, layered. Full of old memory and something slightly bitter, like ruined fruit or half-said truths. It tasted like him.

I set it down on the railing between us.

“You’re different tonight,” I said.

“So are you.”

There was something restrained in his voice. Not distant—careful. Like he was weighing every word before he let it leave his mouth, and every moment he spent beside me threatened to tip the scales.

“I think I was waiting for you to push me away again,” I admitted, eyes dropping to the space between our hands. “But here you are.”

“I’m tired of pretending you don’t matter,” he said. “And I’m tired of watching this place try to take you from me.”

He didn’t touch me right away. He just looked at me. Really looked.

And I realized—this was the first time he’d seen me without defenses. Not mid-spell. Not mid-argument. Just me. Unarmored. Chosen.

He reached for me slowly, his fingers brushing a strand of hair back from my cheek. His touch was careful, reverent.

My breath caught.

He cupped the side of my neck gently, thumb tracing the edge of my jaw. I leaned into it, closing my eyes for a moment. The warmth of his hand. The steadiness of it. Like I could ground myself there and not fall.

“I’m not afraid of the Council,” I whispered.

“I know.”

“I’m afraid of what I might do if they try to take this from me.”

His grip tightened ever so slightly—not possessive, but resolute.

“They won’t,” he said.

I opened my eyes. “You don’t know that.”

“No,” he said. “But I know what I’m willing to do to keep them from trying.”

He stepped closer, our bodies almost brushing. I could feel the tension coiled between us like a drawn bow—so many days of near-misses and held breath ready to snap.

“And what if the castle wants me for something I don’t understand?” I asked, voice barely audible now.

“Then we’ll face it together,” he said. “No more silence. No more lies.”

I reached up, fingers curling into the fabric at his shoulder.

He kissed me.

This time, it wasn’t soft.

It wasn’t hesitant.

His mouth claimed mine with the kind of hunger that had been building since the moment we first argued, first traded barbs, first looked at each other and didn’t look away. The kiss was heat and longing and desperation, but it was more than that—it was recognition.

Like our magic had known all along.

I melted into him, arms slipping around his waist as his hand tangled in my hair, tilting my head back for more. He kissed like he’d waited a hundred years for permission. Like the moment he stopped, the world might collapse in on itself.

When we finally parted, it was only by a breath.

His lips brushed against mine as he spoke.

“I’m with you,” he said. “No matter what they see when they walk through that gate.”

I held him there, forehead to forehead, while the castle hummed quietly beneath our feet.

It wasn’t a warning.

It was a vow.