Chapter 176
Jiselle
The first thing I noticed was the silence.
Not absence of sound–but a different kind of quiet. One that lived inside me.
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For so long, my body had hummed with fire. My veins had carried heat, my thoughts laced with the thrum of power waiting to ignite. But now… it was still. Not empty. Just changed. Like a song had ended and something new waited to begin.
My lashes fluttered open. Light filtered through high infirmary windows, pale and diffused. I didn’t recognize the room immediately. The Academy had changed. I could feel it in the walls–in the way the magic bent differently now. Softer. Calmer. Wounded.
My head turned slowly.
Nate sat in the chair beside my bed, slouched with exhaustion, one hand wrapped tightly around mine. His other rested against his chest, fingers twitching faintly like he was dreaming. Even asleep, his brow furrowed. He looked pale. Urishaven. Beautiful.
I didn’t wake him. Not yet.
I just watched him breathe.
Watched the rise and fall of his chest, the way his thumb unconsciously stroked the back of my hand every so often. He’d stayed. Of course he had. Even when I’d walked into fire, into the Gate, into Kael–he’d come for me.
He’d always come for me.
The memory flickered. Not of the battle. Not of the breaking. But of his arms catching me as the Gate collapsed. Of him holding me against his heart while I glowed from the inside out, while my body teetered on the edge of something divine and unrelenting.
I shifted slightly, enough to tighten my grip around his.
His eyes opened instantly.
It took a beat before they focused. And when they did–when they landed on me, alive, awake–he exhaled a sound like a man surfacing from deep water. His fingers tightened, and he leaned forward, brushing his forehead against mine.
“You’re here,” he whispered, voice thick.
“I think so,” I murmured.
He kissed the inside of my wrist. Then again, higher, just below the pulse. His hands shook. His breath did too. And when he pulled back far enough to really look at me, I saw the tears he hadn’t let fall until now.
“How long?” I asked softly.
“Four days.”
I blinked. “And you’ve been here-”
“Every second,” he said, cutting off the question “You stopped glowing on the second night. Your heartbeat took longer. Eva said… said you’d find your way back if you could.”
I swallowed, the weight of those hours crashing into me. “It was close,” I admitted. My voice cracked. “I don’t remember the end. Only that it felt like letting go. Like I was floating too far to come back.”
He nodded, jaw tight. His thumb brushed my knuckles again, and he looked down at our joined hands. “I kept talking to you. Even when you didn’t
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Chapter 176
move. I told you everything. That I wasn’t ready. That I never would be–not for a world without you.”
My chest ached. Not from pain. From love. From what it meant to be held through something like that.
He didn’t press me for more. He didn’t ask what I saw or what I gave up. Instead, we let the quiet settle again. This time, it was not a silence born of loss. It was gentler. A hush between heartbeats.
And when it broke, it wasn’t with fear or memory–it was with truth.
“I don’t feel like myself,” I said finally, staring at the ceiling. “Not the version I was before the Gate. Not the one I was in it. It’s like… something new is settling inside me. Something I haven’t met yet.”
Nate’s hand moved, brushing down my arm and resting over my heart. “Then we meet it together,” he said quietly. “Whatever it is. Whoever you become -I’ll be there.”
The words settled deep. I closed my eyes, letting that promise sink into the soft ache blooming in my chest.
A knock interrupted us. The door creaked open, and Eva stepped in, her boots quiet against the tile. She looked different too–older, maybe. Like the war had threaded itself through her spine and left her standing taller in its wake.
She smiled faintly. “About time you woke up.”
I tried to smile, but it felt fragile.
Eva came closer, placing a warm hand on my shoulder. Her eyes held that distant sheen–the one that came when visions crept too close to the surface.
“I saw your fall,” she said. “It was fire and silence. I thought that was the end. But… I didn’t see your rising.”
A chill brushed over my skin.
Eva’s grip tightened gently. “That means your story isn’t finished yet.”
And with that, she was gone, fading into the corridor like a shadow of something not yet written.
Nate and I sat together in the stillness that followed, his fingers tracing idle circles on my palm. Eventually, the door opened again. This time it was
Bastain.
He walked slowly, favoring one side, a thick bandage wrapped around his ribs. But his eyes were clear, focused. He studied me the way a scholar studied prophecy–cautious and reverent.
“You unbound it,” he said without greeting. “The Gate. The threads that tied it to the leyline are gone.”
I nodded. “I saw them. I ended them.”
“Permanently.”
He nodded back. “But the leyline… it carries the scars. The balance will take years to restore. Some of us may never touch magic the same way again.”
I absorbed that in silence.
Then, softly, “Was it worth it?”
Bastain met my gaze. “I believe in freedom. Even when it costs. Especially then.”
He left without ceremony, like he had simply delivered a final lecture, and the test was now ours to take.
That night, Nate helped me walk. My legs were stiff, unused, but I refused to stay in bed one second longer. The halls were cracked but standing. The lights flickered in places, and ash still dusted the window ledges. But it was ours. And it lived.
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We said little as we walked.
There was no need.
When we reached the ruined courtyard, I slowed.
The fountain was shattered. The benches overturned. One tree still stood, blackened but upright.
Nate leaned against a crumbling pillar beside me. “What now?”
I stared at the soil. At the tiny green sprout pushing through ash.
“Now,” I said, “we don’t run. We plant something.”
He looked at me for a long moment, then smiled.
It wasn’t the kind of kiss that followed tragedy. It wasn’t rushed or fevered or wild.
It was slow.
Lingering.
Hopeful.
His hands framed my face like I was something sacred, and when he pulled me into him, the rest of the world fell quiet again. Not from loss. But from
reverence.
We stayed like that until the stars appeared–new ones, brighter than the sky remembered.
Morning came too soon.
A nurse bustled in before sunrise, clipboard in hand. She hummed under her breath, flipping pages while another nurse checked my pulse, my temperature, my eyes. Nate sat nearby, half–asleep, still refusing to leave.
“You’re healing well,” the older nurse said. “But we couldn’t understand why your recovery took longer than expected…”
She turned, frowning slightly.
Another nurse stepped forward, holding a thinner chart.
She looked at me. Then at Nate.
A beat of silence passed.
Then-
“Miss Johal,” she said softly. “You’re pregnant.”
End
AD
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Sara Lili is a daring romance writer who turns icy landscapes into scenes of fiery passion. She loves crafting hot love stories while embracing the chill of Iceland’s breathtaking cold.
