The air was thick with smoke and the scent of blood, heavy enough to choke her as she clung to the shadows. She'd grown up within these walls, the stone corridors of her family's stronghold, where she'd always been the quiet one, the unassuming Luminary, watching her kin wield their power over the wolves below with an iron fist. Tonight, the fortress shook under the force of rebellion.
A war-cry echoed nearby, and she shivered, feeling the ground tremble as wolves overthrew the guards in waves, the very magic that had once bound them broken. The legends always said that the Luminaries were untouchable, but here they were—falling, one by one, as the stronghold became a grave.
She ducked into an alcove, her back pressed against the cold stone, heart racing as her mind fought to make sense of the chaos. The Luminaries' rule was absolute; they controlled everything and everyone with invisible threads of power. They were feared, revered—and yet, she knew what had been done in her family's name. The iron discipline, the cold cruelty that had been deemed necessary, even just.
But now, face to face with what that cruelty had cost, she felt a hollowness settle in her chest.
A shadow appeared at the end of the hall. She stiffened, recognizing him immediately. He was the one from the old stories, the one who had somehow resisted the Luminaries' control, a man of a bloodline immune to her family's magic. His eyes, dark as midnight, swept the corridor before falling on her. In that moment, every instinct told her to run, but her body wouldn't move, caught between dread and a strange sense of fate.
He stopped before her, and his gaze bored into her, assessing, calculating. "So," he said finally, voice cold. "This is where they hid the last of you."
She swallowed, lifting her chin. "I… I didn't ask for any of this."
"Didn't you?" His words were sharp, cutting through the chaos. "How convenient. That's what they all say when they're caught."
The accusation stung, but she kept her gaze steady. "Not everyone deserves to die."
His lips curled in a bitter smile. "Spoken like a true Luminary. Even now, you cling to the lies they fed you."
The weight of his anger was palpable, filling the air around them. She could feel his fury like a storm, a hatred so raw it burned her. And yet, as he glared at her, she saw a flicker of hesitation, a crack in the armor he wore so tightly. She didn't know that, in her softness, she held a power she didn't understand—a quiet magic, subtle but unyielding, that drew him in against his will.
He closed the distance between them, his hand gripping her arm firmly. "The others will die," he murmured, his tone edged with finality. "But you, you're coming with me. You're too dangerous to be left alive, but maybe you're just valuable enough to be kept breathing."
Her heart hammered, the weight of his words settling over her as he pulled her forward, binding her fate to his, a captive of the very rebellion that had destroyed her family.