Lyra's POV
The soul eater screamed.
It wasn't a sound you heard with your ears—it was something that clawed directly into your brain and squeezed. Every face in its writhing shadow-body had a mouth stretched wide in endless agony.
I couldn't move. Couldn't breathe. Terror locked my muscles solid.
"Lyra!" Kael grabbed my shoulders and shook me hard. "LOOK AT ME!"
His dark blue eyes blazed with intensity, forcing me to focus on him instead of the monster. "You have the Codex now. That means you have power. Use it!"
"I don't know how—"
"Figure it out fast, or we die!"
Professor Winters laughed, the sound wrong coming from someone who used to help me with homework. "Such spirit. But you're just children playing with forces you don't understand. Give us the Cipher girl, Voidstrider, and we'll let you live."
"Tempting offer," Kael said coldly. "Here's my counter-proposal."
He thrust both hands forward, and void magic exploded from his palms like a tidal wave of darkness. It slammed into the soul eater, tearing chunks from its body. The creature shrieked and recoiled.
But it wasn't enough. More shadows poured from the robed figures, feeding the monster, making it grow larger. It lashed out with tendrils made of screaming faces, and Kael threw up a barrier of crackling energy. The impact drove him back a step.
"Lyra," he gritted through his teeth, "any time now would be great."
The Codex can help, the voice whispered in my mind. But you must trust yourself. Trust your blood. Remember what you are.
"I'm nobody," I whispered, the same words I'd said all night. But this time, something inside me rebelled against them. "No. That's what they wanted me to believe."
Heat built in my chest, spreading through my veins like liquid fire. The marks on my wrist blazed brighter, and suddenly I could SEE—really see—the magical structure of everything around me.
The soul eater wasn't just a monster. It was a spell, woven from stolen life force and dark rituals. And every spell had a weak point.
"There!" I pointed at a spot in the creature's center where the magic threads tangled together. "That's where they're controlling it from!"
Kael didn't question me. He pivoted instantly, gathering his void magic into a spear of pure darkness, and hurled it at the exact spot I'd indicated.
The spear punched through the soul eater's core.
The creature exploded into smoke and screaming faces that dissipated into nothing.
Professor Winters stumbled backward, her eyes wide with shock. "Impossible. She just bonded with the Codex. She shouldn't be able to read magical structures yet."
"Surprise," I said, shocked by how steady my voice sounded. "Turns out I'm full of surprises."
"Get them!" Professor Winters shrieked at the other robed figures.
Kael grabbed my hand. "Hold on tight. This is going to feel weird."
"What—"
Reality twisted.
Darkness swallowed us whole. My stomach lurched as if I was falling and flying at the same time. The world turned inside out, and for one terrifying second, I felt like I was being pulled in a thousand different directions.
Then we crashed onto solid ground.
I gasped, my head spinning. We were in a different room—smaller, with rough stone walls and a single torch burning in a bracket. The air smelled damp and old.
"Where are we?" I managed to ask, fighting down nausea.
"Hidden chamber beneath the Academy's foundation." Kael released my hand and moved to seal the entrance with his magic. "One of the few places they can't easily track us. Are you hurt?"
"No. Terrified, confused, and possibly about to throw up, but not hurt."
The corner of his mouth twitched. Almost a smile. Almost. "That was void-stepping. It gets easier after the first dozen times."
"Great. Can't wait." I leaned against the wall, trying to steady my breathing. My marks still glowed faintly, pulsing with residual power. "That was Professor Winters. She taught me Ancient Languages. She was always so nice to me."
"Nice people can hide dark hearts," Kael said quietly. "I learned that the night my family died. The man who killed them was my father's best friend."
The pain in his voice was raw and real. I looked at him—really looked—and saw past the cold, scary reputation. He was just a boy who'd lost everything, trying to save what little he had left.
"Your sister," I said. "Aria. Tell me what happened to her."
Kael was quiet for a long moment. When he finally spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper.
"I was fourteen. Aria was eight. We were at our family estate when they attacked—dark mages who wanted our ancestral magic. They killed my parents first, then came for us." His hands clenched into fists. "I tried to protect her. I used every spell I knew. It wasn't enough."
"Kael—"
"The attackers had me pinned. They were going to drain my magic and kill me. Aria was hiding behind a bookshelf, and I kept screaming at her to run, to get help, to save herself." His voice cracked. "But she didn't run. She used forbidden magic she'd read about in our father's books. Soul-shattering magic. She destroyed the attackers, saved my life, and broke herself into pieces across dimensions."
Tears burned in my eyes. "She was eight years old."
"Eight years old and braver than I'll ever be." Kael turned away, but not before I saw the moisture in his eyes. "The last thing she said was 'don't be sad, big brother. Heroes sacrifice themselves for the people they love.' Then she was just... gone. Scattered. Lost."
Without thinking, I crossed the room and wrapped my arms around him from behind. He went rigid with surprise.
"I'll help you find her," I said fiercely. "I promise. However long it takes."
"You don't have to—"
"Yes, I do. Because someone should have helped you back then, and no one did. And because..." I hesitated, then pushed forward. "Because I know what it's like when the people you trust destroy you. When you're left alone with no one believing in you. I won't let you stay alone anymore."
Kael slowly turned around. His eyes searched my face like he was trying to figure out if I was real. When he spoke, his voice was rough. "Why would you promise that? You just met me. For all you know, I could be using you."
"Are you?"
"Yes. But not just for Aria." He lifted his hand, gently touching one of the glowing marks on my wrist. "I've watched you for three years, Lyra. Watched you work twice as hard as everyone else. Watched you stay kind even when others looked down on you. Watched you help students who struggled, even though you struggled too. You're brilliant and stubborn and you never give up. That's why I knew you might be the Cipher."
My heart hammered in my chest. "You've been watching me for three years and I never noticed?"
"I'm good at shadows." He stepped closer. "But you noticed me. Last year, in the library, you looked up from your books and our eyes met for exactly three seconds. You smiled. Then you went back to studying. It was the first time anyone had smiled at me in five years."
I barely remembered that moment, but he'd kept it like a treasure.
"Kael—"
A loud BOOM shook the chamber. Dust rained from the ceiling.
Kael's head snapped toward the sealed entrance. "They found us already. Impossible. I used military-grade concealment spells."
Not impossible, the Codex said urgently. Someone on their side knows this chamber. Someone who's been here before.
Another boom. Cracks appeared in the stone walls.
"We need to move," Kael said, but his voice held uncertainty I hadn't heard before. "But there's only one other way out, and it leads to—"
The wall exploded inward.
Professor Winters stepped through, flanked by six robed figures. But she wasn't looking at us. She was looking past us, at something behind me.
I turned slowly, following her gaze.
In the far corner of the chamber, hidden in shadows, was a doorway I hadn't noticed. An ancient doorway covered in the same symbols that now marked my skin.
"Oh, Lyra," Professor Winters said, her voice dripping with false sweetness. "You led us right to it. The Second Seal. The Academy's original seal, hidden beneath the foundation. We've been searching for it for ten years."
Ice flooded my veins. "No. I didn't—I wouldn't—"
"You didn't know," Kael said grimly. "But the Codex did. It brought you here because the seal is in danger."
Professor Winters smiled. "How clever. The Codex brought its new Keeper directly to what we needed. It's almost like fate wants us to win."
She raised her hands, and the other robed figures began chanting. Dark energy gathered around them, building into something massive.
They're going to break the seal, the Codex warned. If it falls, the dimension behind it will collapse into ours. Thousands will die in the first hour. Millions by dawn.
"Can we stop them?" I asked desperately.
Yes. But you must bond deeper with me. Accept your full power. It will hurt—
"I don't care about pain!" I shouted. "Tell me what to do!"
Place your hand on the seal. Let me show you what you truly are.
I ran toward the ancient doorway. Kael tried to grab me, but I was faster. My palm slammed against the cold stone.
The world exploded into light and pain and POWER.
My body lifted off the ground. My marks spread across every inch of my skin, burning like brands. Energy poured through me—ancient, vast, terrifying. I could feel the seal beneath my hand, feel its magic recognizing my blood, welcoming me home.
And then I felt something else. Something wrong.
The seal was already cracked. Someone had been working on it for months, carefully, slowly, weakening it from the inside.
But that wasn't the worst part.
The worst part was that I recognized the magical signature of whoever had been breaking it.
Because I'd felt that exact magic signature every day for three years.
It was Nova's magic.
My roommate. My only friend. The one person who'd stood by me after Cassia's betrayal.
Nova was one of them.