Page 83 of Labyrinthine
We lie tangled together, sharing breaths and quiet laughter. For a while, we forget. It’s easy with him—too easy. Like nothing outside this room exists. And I let myself believe that nothing can touch us. Not now, not ever.
But the summons comes anyway.
He’s silent while I dress, pacing behind me, a tension radiating off him like storm heat. When he catches my wrist to steady me, his hand shakes. Just once. He hides it fast.
He walks beside me to the doors of my father’s chambers. A sentinel. A sword held back by sheer will.
“You don’t have to meet with your father.”
I stop.
“This is reckless,” he says, low. “Let me find a way to hold him back. To delay.”
I shake my head. “Maybe. But I’ll never be free if I keep hiding behind someone else’s strength.”
His mouth opens. Closes. Then he nods, barely. “Then don’t flinch, Azhara. Not once. He’ll see blood in the water.” His eyes close for a moment too long. “You don’t have to beat him. Just don’t let him make you small.”
I pause. His words settle in my chest like flint. This time, I don’t curl in on myself.
This time, I knock.
The door opens. My father doesn’t rise. He just stares. The chill in his eyes is absolute.
“Darian passed the second trial,” he says flatly.
I close the door behind me.
The click of the latch is too loud. The silence after, worse.
Alone, the courage I carried starts to fracture. The air feels stripped of warmth—emptied of the quiet I didn’t realize I leaned on. Mallen was the stillness I trusted to catch me.
Without him, the cold bleeds in, an old fear that creeps like frostbite.
I breathe deep. Straighten my spine.
I’ve seen monsters. Seen men bleed for this kingdom.
I will not be a child cowering in her father’s shadow. Not anymore.
I lift my chin and I look him in the eye.
“He did.” I fold my hands in front of me. “They say Obcasus is difficult. Even for seasoned mages.”
It’s not just difficult. It’s notorious. My father raised me on tales of how dangerous the magic of death could be. He did it to terrify me. To put me in my place. But he taught me another lesson too—that he feared what he could not control. And even he couldn’t silence the stories that told how he struggled to master Obcasus.
The corner of his mouth twitches, not a smile. An edge. He rises slowly, fingers dragging over the polished hilt of the ruby dagger on the desk.
“He’s more dangerous than you think,” he says. “The Obcasus didn’t touch him.”
He lifts the dagger, turning it in his hands.
A flicker lights his eyes—something memory-shaped. Shame, maybe. Or fear.
“He will break you,” he says. A deliberate beat of silence passes. “Piece by piece.”
I don’t move.
He starts toward me, each step deliberate. Measured. The light glints off the blade. “You think you’re ready for him, but you’ve never had to submit. Not truly.”
