Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 61 - Chapitre 69

LUCIEN’S POV I step into the tower chamber at sunset. The sky beyond the tall window burns orange and gold, bleeding into deep violet over the forest. The light cuts across the stone floor and paints her in shadow and flame. Saphra sits on the edge of the bed, arms wrapped around her knees, chin resting lightly against them. Her hair falls forward like a curtain. She looks smaller here, contained within stone walls that are meant to protect her. The door shuts softly behind me. For a moment, neither of us speaks. I can hear everything, the steady rhythm of her heartbeat, the faint rasp still lingering in her throat from the rope, the whisper of fabric when she shifts slightly. I carry a tray in one hand containing fresh bread, roasted meat, fruit, a small pitcher of water and in the other, a vial of healing tonic and salve for her throat. I cross the room slowly and set everything on the small wooden table beside the bed. She watches every movement wary. “Do you need anythi

SAPHRA'S POV I decide before he arrives, If I let another sunset pass with stories about frost and stars, I will lose my nerve. Some questions rot if they’re not cut open. Tonight, I will cut. The sky is bleeding into dusk when the lock turns. My pulse stutters despite my resolve. Lucien steps inside as he always does, measured and controlled, the door closing softly behind him. He smells faintly of cold air and steel. Council and patrol and responsibility clinging to him like a second cloak. He nods once. “Saphra.” “Lucien.” The ritual greeting. The careful distance. He takes his chair by the window. I remain standing. Not tonight. He notices immediately. His gaze sharpens slightly. “Is something wrong?” “Yes.” The word lands between us like a stone dropped in still water. He doesn’t move. “Tell me.” My throat tightens, but I force the words through anyway. “The massacre.” Silence..... not the fragile, almost comfortable silence we’ve grown used to. The forest bel

SAPHRA'S POVI wake before the sun and stare at the stone ceiling above my bed, tracing the faint cracks that split through grey like veins. My heart beats too fast for someone lying still. Lucien is far away from here. The bond hums faintly at the back of my mind. He is somewhere else in the fortress.The memory of the vision presses in.Darkness swallowing light. Her voice inside my skull, steady and terrible."When he frees you, you will come find me."She expects me and I promised.I sit up slowly, pressing my feet to the cold floor. My palms are damp.I do not break promises even to ghosts in visions.I stay sharp, monitoring the guard shifts. A sharp clang echoes down the corridor.Guards shift change.My head snaps toward the door.It is always precise, always timed, not a second late.One guard leaves and then the next arrives within the same breath.But today—Something is wrong.The footsteps are slightly off rhythm. A delay.Just seconds.But seconds are enough.My pulse e

SAPHRA'S POV The branch snaps again. I crouch at the narrow entrance of the stone shelter, every muscle strung tight, my senses stretched thin into the forest. The air smells of damp earth and distant blood. Behind me, Eira’s breathing shudders. I need to find herbs to heal her. Her voice slides into my mind like cool water over overheated skin. I whirl around. Eira’s eyes are closed. Her lips barely move. You must move quickly, she says inside my head. The sound is faint, strained, but unmistakable. The silver spreads. And I will not waste breath. Her mind brushes mine again, giving me directions. "North of the shelter. Ten paces past the split oak. There is yarrow growing near the rocks. You will see white flowers." I blink and I sprint from the shelter. The forest greets me with heavy silence, as if it’s watching. Waiting. I move fast but low, scanning for movement, for scent, for the shift of fur in shadow but there is no pack hunters crashing through un

SAPHRA'S POV Eira sleeps in the stone shelter when I finally force myself to go. Her breathing is steady, her fever gone, the herbal paste drying against wounds that no longer pulse black with silver. She insisted I return before dawn. Insisted Lucien would tear the territory apart if I did not. So I leave. I heard toward the palace that has never felt less like a prison and more like the centre of something rotting. The bond hums low and restless as I approach the fortress walls. Lucien’s presence is closer now,no longer frantic, but sharp. Controlled fury instead of blind panic. He knows. He absolutely knows. I circle wide to avoid the main paths and patrol routes. The eastern wall looms in the dim grey of pre-dawn. Joren’s passage is hidden and I slip through the narrow gap and pull the stone back into place behind me. Darkness swallows me whole. The air inside the tunnel is damp and cold, thick with the scent of old earth and stone. I move by memory, fingers grazing the