Page 100 of Unravelled
Mira’s hand hovered over the page, fingertips brushing the page like she might absorb more if she just stayed a little longer. The ache in her chest wasn’t sadness. Not exactly. It was recognition. A resonance that ran deeper than memory.
She saw herself, in the hush of Lyren’s steps, in the weight of his quiet. She wasn’t drowning, but she understood the feeling of being carried by currents she hadn’t chosen. She had given up parts of herself to silence and duty. To bonds that had frayed, to false truths.
That was what the Navigators’ stories had always been. Not perfect histories. Not bright fables with happy endings. But mirrors. Ways to see themselves in the shadows of the past. Mira traced the final line again with her thumb.
Footsteps. Sharp. Hurried. They echoed against the stone like strikes of iron. Mira stilled. She was tucked into the shadowed alcove between two shelves, hidden by centuries of dusty pages and stained glass light. But the voices carried. Brahn and Torvyn.
“You think keeping me in the dark makes you right?” Torvyn’s voice came sharp and sudden.
Mira pressed herself deeper into the chair’s worn curve, heart thudding loud in her chest.
“You are reckless. You move without my orders, make choices that put all of us at risk.”Brahn spoke quietly, but the anger in his voice was unmistakable.
His boots struck the floor hard, measured. Cold. “Your little stunt last night was the last straw, Torvyn. I needed everything in place. And now?”
Mira’s stomach twisted. That tone, Brahn didn’t sound like a man worried for allies or the kingdom. He sounded like someone who had been denied a prize. Someone used to control, furious at its loss.
“In place? You mean beaten down and ripe for the taking?” Torvyn barked a bitter laugh. “I’ve helped you, Brahn.”
And suddenly Mira wasn’t in the library at all. She was back in Danlea’s vision. The throne room in ruin. The banners of Bharalyn torn and curling like embers. Brahn at the center, crowned in silver and blue, seated on a throne. Like it had beenwaiting. Like he had always known. The smile that did not reach his eyes. The way his fingers tapped, slow and patient. As if every moment had unfolded according to plan.
“We're bonded, which makes your recklessness mine to deal with” Brahn muttered.
The door creaked. She heard Brahn’s steps retreating, clipped and smooth. Torvyn followed, slower. The door thudded shut and the lock clicked into place. Only then did Mira breathe.
She looked down at the book still resting in her lap. Lyren’s sacrifice. Brahn was moving pieces into place and Torvyn was caught in the current. She needed to warn Ren. Mira rose from the alcove, setting the book aside. She stepped into the afternoon light and slipped from the library.
???
The corridors stretched endlessly before Mira, each step weighed down by the burden of what she had overheard. She quickened her pace, her pulse a steady drumbeat in her ears as she approached Ren’s quarters.
The door was shut, the room beyond eerily silent. She knocked once. No answer. A second time. Nothing. The emptiness on the other side sent unease crawling up her spine. The stillness felt wrong, thick with tension, with waiting. The observatory. If the council was still in session, he would be there.
She had barely made it halfway when the first warning bell shattered the afternoon. A deep, resonant chime rolled through the halls, reverberating through stone. Then another. And another. Mira had never heard the bell before, but she knew, deep down, what it warned. The palace stood on the brink of an attack.
Mira turned a corner, barely processing what she saw before she collided. A pair of steady hands caught her just in time. When she looked up, Ren’s gaze met hers, dark and urgent. Outside the open corridor windows, the sun had begun its descent, streaked with the first embers of sunlit amber, swallowed by rolling clouds.
“Mira?” His brows furrowed in surprise. “I was looking for you,” she breathed, catching her balance.
“I heard the bell, ”
He cut in, “There’s no time,” his voice firm but not unkind. “Kharadors have crossed the border”
The words struck like a blade to the chest. Her fingers curled into fists, nails biting into her palms as she swallowed the tremor rising in her throat. Ren’s eyes flickeddown the corridor, scanning. Then, in a heartbeat, he turned back to her and pulled her close.
His hands cupped her face first, reverent, his thumbs brushing along her cheekbones like he was trying to memorize her. His lips met hers in a kiss that held all the things neither of them had the luxury of saying: love, longing, the quiet desperation of two souls caught in the storm.Mira’s fingers curled into the fabric of his coat, gripping tight and anchoring herself. Her hands trembled slightly. Ren moved his hand from her face to her back and pulled her in.
He held her like he’d done it a hundred times in dreams. It was as if his body had been molded to meet hers. She felt the rise and fall of his chest against hers, the shallow breaths uneven and syncing to her own. His heartbeat thundered beneath her hand, pressed flat against his ribs, fast and unhidden.
Despite the cold seeping through the archways, his warmth enveloped her. There was no barrier at that moment. Not war. Not history. Not the silence they had once let stretch too far. Just them, reaching, orbiting, pulled in by something inevitable.
Too soon, he pulled away. His forehead brushed hers for the briefest second, grounding them both for one heartbeat more.
“You’re the best aim we’ve got. Meet me at the palace steps as soon as you can.”
She nodded once, sure and silent, and then she ran. Mira wanted to stop him. To tell him about the vision, but the warning bells rang through the corridors, low and relentless, urgency carving out every second.
When Mira pushed open the door to her quarters, she found Tharion already inside. He turned as she entered, a bundle in his hands, her leather armor from Brahn and her crossbow.
