Page 122 of Labyrinthine
But I knew. I knew they were true the moment I heard them.
Four words. That was all it took to unmake me.
I’d told myself Mallen was dead. I’d built my escape on it. Needed to believe it. I hadn’t checked his pulse. I hadn’t dared. If I had?—
I might have hesitated. I might have stayed.
But he lived. He lived, and he was coming.
The mirror doesn’t show panic. It shows something worse.
It shows longing.
I don’t look like someone who’s afraid. Like someone desperate to be chosen. And I don’t know what that makes me.
A liar?
Or just a girl who made one choice—and now wants to make another.
The door creaks open behind me. I don’t have to look to know it’s Darian. He leans in the doorway, his weight casual, his presence deliberate. Still handsome. Still a face and body gifted by the gods.
“Azhara,” he says.
My name sounds different tonight. Less sure. Less rehearsed.
I don’t answer. I rise and move past him without a word, the edge of my shoulder grazing his. The corridor is darker now. The house hushes around us. Every footstep echoes.
I find a sitting room at the end of the hall. Dust drapes the furniture. A cold hearth yawns at the center. I kneel and light the fire myself, coaxing the flames until they lick up and catch. The heat stings my fingers and then begins to spread.
Darian follows, but doesn’t speak. Doesn’t ask if he can come in. He doesn’t need to. Men like him never do.
He stands by the mantel, too close to the fire, like it might soften whatever edge he’s trying to hide.
“You’ve been quiet,” he says. “Since we rode over the ridge.”
“I didn’t have anything to say.”
“You usually do.”
I shrug. The silence stretches.
“You were right not to check,” he says. “At the maze. If you had—he would’ve used it. Turned it against you. That’s what he does.”
My spine stiffens. “I made a mistake.”
He studies me carefully. “No, you made a decision.”
“I told myself I had to. That I was saving myself. That leaving him behind was the right thing.”
“And now?”
“Now I know he lived. And I ran when I shouldn’t have.”
He tilts his head. “I fought for you. Bled for you. Won the Reaping for you. I’ve planned this for years. Bribed guards. Found courtiers who weren’t as loyal as they should have been. My fleet waits for us to join them on the next tide. All to take you with me and keep you safe. From Mallen. From your father.”
“From the magic?”
Darian stills.
