Chapter 27: Delphine

The castle led me to him.

Not directly. It never did anything that plainly. But the halls felt... angled tonight. Doors that normally opened toward the vault now opened toward the southern corridor. Staircases I had walked a dozen times tilted just slightly toward the west wing.

And the farther I walked, the heavier the air became.

Not suffocating. Guiding.

As if the castle was tired of whispering.

It wanted me to see.

I found Cassian in the old strategy hall. The room had fallen into disuse in recent decades, its long table now dusted with half-formed maps and glassless lanterns. He stood near the center, hands braced on either side of the table like he was still commanding troops. There were no soldiers. Just shadows.

And secrets.

He looked up when I entered. He didn’t look surprised.

“Miss Ashwood,” he said smoothly, as if we’d merely crossed paths in a corridor. “Couldn’t sleep?”

I walked in slowly, letting the door close behind me.

“You met with Nerisse last night.”

He didn’t answer right away.

“I meet with all Council envoys,” he said finally, voice light. “It’s protocol.”

“You met with her in secret. In the conservatory. After the castle had gone still.”

His mouth twitched, almost amused. “The castle tattling now?”

“No. Just watching. And I listen when it does.”

He leaned back slightly, crossing his arms. “You’ve grown confident.”

“I’ve grown aware.”

Silence stretched between us, sharp and tense.

I stepped closer to the table, eyes on his. “You’ve been feeding her information.”

“Not untrue information.”

“But strategically delivered.”

“I’ve been ensuring that decisions are made with perspective,” he said coolly. “You walked into a place meant to stay sealed, destabilized the existing systems, and bound yourself to a living structure without oversight. That’s not progress, Delphine. That’s volatility.”

My pulse spiked, but I didn’t let it show.

“You’re afraid of what I’ve become,” I said quietly.

“I’m afraid of what you’ll take down with you when it collapses.”

The castle pulsed once underfoot—sharp, clear.

Cassian didn’t feel it. Or pretended not to.

I let the moment settle before speaking again. “What do you get if I fall? A promotion? Favor from the Council? Or did Nerisse promise you something sweeter?”

He didn’t flinch. But he didn’t deny it either.

I stepped around the table now, closer. My fingers brushed the edge of a map bearing the vault’s symbol. “You think you’re the one pulling strings. But this place doesn’t belong to you.”

“Neither does it belong to you.”

“No,” I said. “It chooses me.”

The lanterns in the room flared—just slightly. Enough for Cassian to notice.

He straightened. “Careful, Ashwood.”

“Why?” I asked, voice calm. “You’ve already called for my leash. What’s left to lose?”

He stepped forward then, real tension bleeding into his posture.

“You don’t understand what this castle is,” he said. “What it’s capable of. You think it wants you because you’re powerful. But power is temporary. The last Ashwood thought she could shape it, too.”

“And you think I’ll end like her?”

“I think you’ll be lucky to last that long.”

I met his gaze without blinking. “Then start counting the days. Because I’m not leaving.”

The mark on my arm pulsed hot beneath my sleeve. I didn’t look at it.

Cassian stepped back—not far, but far enough.

“You’ve made your choice,” he said.

“No,” I replied. “The castle made it.”

And this time, it didn’t hide its agreement.

The shadows in the room twisted gently. A low thrum echoed through the beams above. The door closed behind me—without a single touch.

Cassian’s eyes flicked to the ceiling.

He wasn’t amused anymore.

He was afraid.

And he should be.

Because I wasn’t someone the castle tolerated.

I was someone it defended.

-

After I left Cassian in the strategy hall, the castle didn’t settle—it bristled. The walls pulsed low, like a heartbeat underfoot. The door to my chambers refused to open until I whispered my name into the lock.

It was choosing me, over and over.

And I was beginning to wonder what that choice would cost.

I had barely crossed into my room when I heard the knock—sharp, precise, and unmistakable.

Theron.

He didn’t wait for me to answer.

The door opened anyway.

He stepped inside without ceremony, his coat still on, jaw clenched tight. The moment he saw me, his eyes narrowed—not in anger, but in something deeper. That flicker of worry he only let surface when he thought I might break.

I didn’t speak first.

He closed the door quietly behind him, then turned to face me fully. “You confronted him.”

I didn’t ask how he knew. The castle was whispering to all of us now.

“He betrayed you,” I said.

“I know,” he replied. “But this place is already holding together by a thread. You could have let me handle it.”

“I didn’t need you to.”

His posture tensed. “That’s not the point.”

“Yes, it is.”

I stepped forward, not flinching beneath the weight of his frustration. “You want to protect me. I understand that. But I’m not a piece on your board, Theron. I’m not something you can shield from behind iron doors and stoic silence.”

“I never said you were.”

“You didn’t have to.”

He looked at me for a long time then, like he was trying to decide which version of me he was speaking to. The apprentice who arrived in the snow with her notes and her shaky control. Or the woman standing before him now—marked, chosen, changed.

“What did you say to him?” he asked finally.

“The truth,” I replied. “That I’m not leaving. That the castle chose me. That if he thinks I’m a danger, he’d better decide quickly whether he’s brave enough to try to do something about it.”

Theron exhaled, a slow drag of breath that sounded like it had been caught in his chest for hours. “He won’t let this go.”

“I’m counting on it.”

His brow lifted. “You want him to escalate?”

“I want him to show Nerisse exactly what she’s working with. Because if they come for me, they’ll have to face more than just a frightened girl and a prince with fading power.”

He stepped closer now, his voice low. “You’re not frightened.”

“Not anymore.”

Something passed between us then. Not magic. Not threat.

Recognition.

He reached for my wrist—not to hold it, but to pull back the sleeve. His fingers ghosted over the glowing mark. The pulse beneath it was steady.

“You’re changing,” he said, more quietly than before.

“So are you,” I replied.

He didn’t argue.

Because we both knew it was true.

“You can’t fight them alone,” Theron said.

“I don’t intend to,” I told him. “But I need you to stop standing in front of me like a shield. I need you beside me.”

That stopped him.

The edges of his expression cracked, just barely, like he hadn’t expected me to name it out loud. That for all his centuries of practiced stillness, he still didn’t know how to be needed this way.

He stepped closer, the air shifting between us. The castle pulsed faintly underfoot.

“I’ve only ever known how to protect what I care about by keeping it at arm’s length,” he said, voice low and hoarse. “But you... you don’t stay where I place you.”

“Good.”

We were close now. Close enough to feel the warmth of his breath. Close enough that the fabric of my sleeve brushed the lapel of his coat. My mark flared faintly beneath the edge of my skin, the heat of it drawn toward him like a tide.

He reached for me—slowly, reverently—and his fingers brushed my cheek, like he was afraid I might vanish. Like touching me too quickly might break whatever spell had brought us to this moment.

“I’ve tried to be patient,” he said, barely above a whisper. “Tried to wait for the right moment. But the more this place takes from you, the more I want to give you something real to hold onto.”

My breath caught.

He wasn’t just afraid of losing me.

He was afraid of never having me to begin with.

“What do you need from me, Delphine?”

I didn’t hesitate. “Trust.”

He exhaled like it hurt. “You have it.”

The tension that had coiled between us for weeks snapped like a drawn bow finally released.

His lips met mine without hesitation this time—no lingering brush, no testing the edge. Just fire and depth and months of unspoken things poured into a single kiss.

It was hungry. And aching. And honest.

I melted into him, my hands finding the curve of his jaw, the heat of his chest. He kissed like a man starved of softness—like he didn’t just want me, but needed to feel that I was real beneath his hands. My back hit the wall, but I didn’t stop him. I pulled him closer, fingers curling in the fabric of his coat.

The castle pulsed gently around us—not demanding, not watching.

Allowing.

His mouth moved to the edge of my jaw, the hollow of my throat, slow and reverent. I arched into him, breath catching. His hands slipped to my waist, then higher, cautious and careful, like he was asking with every touch if I wanted this to go further.

I did.

But I also needed the words.

I caught his face in my hands and made him look at me.

“I’m not yours to protect,” I whispered. “I’m yours to stand with.”

His forehead pressed against mine, eyes dark and bright all at once.

“Then let me stand with you,” he said. “Here. Tonight. No lies. No walls.”

I pulled him down into another kiss.

Softer this time. But no less certain.

And in that moment—castle pulsing gently around us, magic laced between our fingers, two enemies watching from the wings—I didn’t care about the vault, or the Council, or the cost of becoming what this place needed.

Because I wasn’t alone in it anymore.

I had him.

And he finally knew it.

Because I’d earned it.