Page 164 of Severed Heir

My throat locked. My voice broke. “Naraic… Naraic—I need you!”

Kian’s eyes widened. “Why… why do you need their enigmas?”

Callum’s grin sharpened. “Sevy here has a forbidden quell. That dragon? It’s resurrected. We can’t trust it. We need to kill it.”

“Then kill me,” Kian snarled. “But if you kill that dragon, you kill two Serpents. You remember Theodore and Veravine. Night will fall.”

Callum laughed. “Your brother broke the bond. Convenient, right? Archer won’t be harmed.”

Tears blurred my vision. “I hate you,” I said. “I’mnotsorry the king chose you that day. You deserved it.”

Callum’s voice dropped, cold and casual. “If the heir dies, Kian, you get your chance. What’s she worth to you?”

Kian didn’t blink. “Kill me first.”

Callum raised the dagger again, the blade catching in the torchlight. Then he froze as a dragon’s screech tore through the sky above.

Naraic. He’d portaled. He heard me.

I shoved myself upright, breath ragged. “Let him go! I did what you asked!”

Callum’s sneer deepened. “Congratulations, Lynch. You passed.” He dropped the dagger to the floor. “The front lines await. But first, clean up tonight’s mess. I know a few guards eager for dungeons.”

Kian stumbled, swiping blood from the light cut on his neck. “Sevy. I’m sorry. I should’ve known it was a trap.”

I said in single breath, “If I die, take your shot at the Academy. It’s yours.”

“No,” he said fiercely. “It’syours.You earned it.”

Callum grunted, temper fraying. “How sweet. But I lied. Kian will age out before he ever gets a chance. Sorry to break your little shadow heart.”

Kian hadn’t fought back. He’d chosen loyalty to Archer, to me. None of this was his fault. And in that moment, I knew I’d have to break my own moralsto protect his.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Callum dragged me from the dungeon by a frost-laced chain. Rok emerged from the haze ahead, his expression unreadable. Without a word, he knelt and pried open my clenched fist.

“I need some of your shadows for this one, Severyn.”

I barely had time to process his words before he siphoned them with a raise of his hand.

The pain struck like a fissure splitting open inside me, and darkness spilled from my breath, my skin, until my knees buckled. Above the institute, pearl wings cut through the sky. Naraic was searching for me. But before he could reach me, Rok raised a hand, and a shadow tether coiled around Naraic’s neck, yanking him from the air.My shadows. Rok was using my own shadows to chain him.

“Naraic,” I breathed, straining toward him.“Break the bond. Please. They’ll kill me. They know about my power.”

His lavender eyes met mine, wide with strain as his wings curled and heaved against the chains.“No,”he barked down our bond.

Rok’s turned to me. “How does your resurrection quell work, Severyn?”

I said nothing.

He unsheathed a dagger, spinning it lazily between his fingers as he paced down the line of guards. “Does someone have to die for it to activate?”

“I don’t have a forbidden quell,” I said.

Callum scoffed, cutting me off. “Enough lies. Our guards got to your little Serpent in prison, just before he severed his bond. But it was enough. They found out the truth. You have a necromancy quell. And severing his bond only made you look more guilty.”

“No,” I said firmly.

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