Page 8 of The Threads Between

“Not because she was brave or strong or special.” Tears tracked down her face, silent and unstoppable. “Because stopping would’ve meant everything we’d already lost meant nothing.”

She swallowed hard.

“You remind me of her.” She tightened her grip on my hand—briefly, fiercely, then released it. “You’re going to hurt. It’s going to cost you. But you’ll do it anyway. Because you are built for this, Lily Whitmore.”

“I don’t feel like a fighter,” I admitted, voice thin. “I feel like I’m drowning.”

Syra let out a broken, almost-laugh. “That’s what fighting feels like.”

We sat there on the cold floor. The lamps hissed. The shadows held still. And for the first time since the Weavers of Oxford unraveled, I didn't feel quite so alone.

Eventually, Syra wiped her face with her sleeve. The vulnerability closed like a door and when she stood, the sharp edges were back in place.

“So,” she said, her voice almost steady, “are you done feeling sorry for yourself?”

I let out a wet laugh. “Probably not. But I can pretend for a while.”

“Good enough.” She offered me her hand. “Because we’re trying again. And this time, I’m making it harder.”

I stared at her. “You’re serious.”

“Completely.” She pulled me to my feet. “You want to save him? Then stop trying to make it flawless.”

She created a new thread between us—tangled, shredded, impossible.

“Again,” she said.

This time, when I reached for it, I didn't try to erase what had been done. I didn't try to make it pristine. I just tried to make it hold.

Restoration magic poured out of me, messy and raw, filling fractures instead of smoothing them.

The thread held.

Not seamless. Scarred, glowing at every break. But alive.

“There,” Syra said quietly. “That’s what I’ve been waiting for.”

My legs gave out. I sank to my knees, shaking, blood wet on my upper lip. But for the first time in a week, hope flickered—small and fragile, but there. The ghost-thread hummed in my chest. Two weeks until the opera house.

“Again?” Syra asked, already creating another impossible thread.

I wiped the blood from my mouth and stood.

“Again.”

CHAPTER 4

LILY

They arrived on a Thursday, when the rain had finally stopped and weak sunlight bled through Clerkenwell’s perpetual grey. I was at my window when the hired coach pulled up outside Mrs. Hartwick’s lodgings.

Garrick emerged first, tall and insufferably energetic despite the days of travel. Then came Mira, our healer. Her dark hair was pulled back in a braid, and she descended the coach steps with the careful, measured movements of someone holding exhaustion at arm's length through sheer will. Three weeks in a coach with Garrick would do that to anyone.

Garrick offered his hand to help her descend the last step, that hopeful grin already in place.

She ignored it pointedly, stepping down on her own.

His grin only widened, like her refusal was part of some private game between them. He turned to offer the same hand to the elderly woman emerging behind them, this time with the kind of respectful patience you'd show your grandmother.