Sarafina POV
Cassian's voice still lingered in the air after the door sealed itself again.
Soft.
Frayed.
More broken than I'd ever heard it.
"I'm here."
I pressed my palm to the cold stone, wishing I could touch him through it.
Wishing I had answers.
Wishing any of this made sense.
But the more I remembered… the more the world stopped feeling like mine.
Thalen watched me with those unreadable eyes of his, arms folded behind his back.
"You should rest," he murmured.
I shook my head. "Rest won't stop whatever's happening to me."
"No," he agreed quietly. "But it may give you clarity."
I was about to argue when something glimmered in his hand—
a crystal sliver, small as a teardrop, glowing faintly with soft white light.
My pulse stumbled.
"What is that?" I whispered.
Thalen approached slowly, as though the object might bolt if startled.
"Your mother left you many things," he said. "Most cannot be given yet. But this… this is yours by right."
He extended the shard.
I didn't touch it.
It pulsed once—slow, like a heartbeat.
"Why does it look like it's breathing?" I murmured.
"Because it is reacting to you."
That didn't make me feel better.
I hesitated. My fingers tingled just from being near it.
"Thalen… what if I'm not ready?"
He almost smiled. "Then it will not answer."
But his eyes said the opposite.
Something told me this thing had been waiting for me long before I realized I was someone worth waiting for.
My hand moved on its own.
The crystal shimmered.
I swallowed hard and closed my fingers around it.
The moment skin met light—
The world exploded.
White heat seared up my arm—not fire.
Not magic.
Memory.
A scream ripped out of my throat.
Thalen shouted something—too distant, too muffled, like sound had been sucked out of the air.
The shard's glow surged, burrowing under my skin, spiraling up my wrist, carving heat straight into my palm.
I dropped to my knees.
The crystal dissolved— not fell, not shattered
Dissolved into pure light that burned into the center of my hand.
Shapes carved themselves into my skin— a star.
A crown.
A circle of runes I didn't recognize but somehow understood.
Pain tore through me until I couldn't breathe, couldn't think, couldn't scream anymore….
Then it stopped.
Just… stopped.
I collapsed forward on trembling hands, gasping, vision blotched with white sparks.
Thalen was suddenly beside me—not touching, but close.
"Let me see," he murmured.
I lifted my hand.
He inhaled sharply.
The mark glowed faintly, the edges still pulsing with the memory of pain.
A star-shaped burn.
Permanent.
Alive.
I choked a breath. "What did it do to me?"
Thalen exhaled slowly.
Reverently.
Fearfully.
"It did what only it can do," he said. "It recognized you."
My voice cracked.
"Recognized me as what?"
Thalen looked at me—really looked at me— as though the girl on her knees was no longer the one who had woken in this room.
"As the Starlight Heir," he whispered.
My chest clenched.
I shook my head violently.
"No. No, I'm not—"
"Yes, Sarafina. You are."
The room swayed.
"I don't want this," I whispered. "I don't want to be anyone's heir. I don't want to be part of any prophecy. I just want to go home."
Thalen's gaze softened.
"And I want to give you that," he murmured. "But the world will not allow it. Not anymore."
I staggered to my feet, clutching the glowing mark.
"This thing—this shard—it hurts. Why would my mother want this?"
"Because you will need it," Thalen said quietly. "It is the First Key."
"To what?"
He hesitated.
"To everything."
My breath caught.
Before I could speak again, a soft metallic click echoed from behind us.
A door.
Not the warded entrance.
A smaller, hidden one.
Thalen stiffened.
Someone was inside with us.
Someone who hadn't been there a moment ago.
Before I could even turn—
A voice drifted through the dim air, calm as silk and unbearably familiar.
"Well," the stranger said softly.
"That escalated quickly."
My blood ran cold.
I knew that voice.
I turned.
And froze.
Someone I had never seen—and yet felt I should have known—stepped from the darkness… smiling.