Page 72 of Darkness and Deceit
He hasn’t stirred since those few dazed moments with Lilith days ago.
I’ve been here every moment I could spare since. So has Vaughn. Between patrols, cleanup, and whatever vague orders the Keepers decide to give us, we’ve kept watch.
We haven’t said it out loud, but we’re both thinking it. If that fire keeps eating at him, twisting what’s left… we won’t let him face that alone.
Vaughn is passed out on a cot in the corner, boots kicked off and one arm slung over his eyes. He hasn’t moved in hours. He won’t talk about it, and I won’t push. But the silence where Kai should be? It’s loud. It sits between us like a wound we’re both pretending we don’t see.
I sit beside Kai’s bed opposite of a sleeping Lilith, staring at the rise and fall of his chest. Each breath is shallow but steady. That has to count for something, right?
Kai’s skin is pale—almost grey in the half-light—but the burn tracing down his side looks… darker. Contained, somehow. No longer unraveling him from the inside out. I don’t know if it’s Lilith’s bond holding him together, or if he’s just too stubborn to give in.
Either way, I’m grateful.
A gasp breaks the silence as Lilith wakes up and bolts upright. She’s slumped on the chair across from me, half-wrapped in one of the blankets the healers left behind. When she looks at me, I notice how red her eyes are, rimmed with exhaustion.
“He hasn’t moved,” I say quietly, before she can ask.
She nods, lips pressed tight. “I figured. The bond’s quiet.”
“He’s still in there.”
Lilith touches Kai’s arm lightly, brushing a hand down to his wrist like she’s checking for a sign he can feel it. When nothing happens, she closes her eyes for a breath.
Her braid is a tangled mess, and I don’t think she’s changed clothes since the night they brought Kai in.
Before I can say anything, she speaks. “We have to be ready for whatever happens next.”
“What do you need from me?” I ask, sensing there’s more to her statement.
She glances away briefly before her eyes find mine. “I need you to train me properly. I need to be ready. I–I refuse to be left behind again.”
I study her face. There’s steel in her eyes now. Whatever fear she walked into this academy with has sharpened into resolve. She was never fragile. Just unsharpened steel waitingfor pressure, for fire, for something to forge her into what she was always meant to be.
Whatever hesitation she carried in has burned away, remade into something steadier. And gods help me, I don’t know if I feel more proud or more terrified of what I’d do to protect that fire now that it’s lit.
“All right. But Lilith,” I say, pausing briefly. “You’re already one of the most naturally talented fighters I’ve ever met. Especially for a first year. You just need some refining and to find harmony with your shadows.”
She snorts softly. “Harmony? I don’t even know what that would feel like.”
“Then that’s the first lesson,” I reply. “But first, you need to shower. Get some real sleep. Something.”
She glances at Kai, chest still rising and falling slow and uneven beneath the bandages. “I… don’t want to leave him. I told him I’d stay.”
“You have stayed.” I lean forward. “But you’re running on fumes, and he wouldn’t want that for you. He’d understand. Hell, he’d probably scold you for not taking care of yourself sooner.”
Her expression twists, part laugh, part guilt. “Yeah, I probably smell awful.”
“You do,” comes a groggy voice, scratchy with sleep as Vaughn stirs on the extra cot. His hair is a mess, his shirt wrinkled, but he manages a weak smirk. “Go clean up, Fox. I’ll keep Kai company. I’ll send my wolf if anything changes.”
Lilith hesitates, biting her lip. The war inside her is obvious.
“You won’t miss anything,” I say quietly. “You’ve done everything you can. Let us be here for him too.”
She finally nods, eyes shining but clear. “Okay. Just for a minute.”
“Take longer,” Vaughn mutters. “Seriously. You look like death.”
“So do you asshole,” she shoots back, the first real smile I’ve seen gracing her lips in days.
