Chapter 225
Chapter 225
+25 BONUS
Thad chased after him, or tried to. My body hadn’t responded the way I wanted it to. Every step had felt like dragging my soul uphill, barefoot and bleeding.
By the time I caught up, he was already barking orders at the Captain of the Guard. Already demanding arrests. Already setting things in motion that couldn’t be undone.
Already sealing Logan’s fate. And Maggie’s too.
The sharpness of it all–the speed at which the truth had gutted every friendship, every false sense of safety I had clung to–left me feeling hollow. Like someone had carved me out from the inside and left only the shell of a girl I didn’t recognize.
When Derek finally turned to me, his eyes still burning with anger something shifted the second he looked at my face. I saw it— like the rage was a mask, and underneath was worry, and grief, and maybe something like heartbreak.
He didn’t speak. Just crossed the distance between us in two long strides, his hand closing around my elbow–not roughly, but firmly, like he needed to know I was real. That I was still standing.
He led me out of the building without another word. Through the wide glass doors. Into air that felt too bright, too cold. The sky had started to cloud over, and the temperature bit at my skin like teeth.
I let him guide me toward a cracked old bench at the edge of the lot half hidden under a stand of trees. The metal was cold beneath me, the paint chipped and flaking onto my fingers when I touched it.
I didn’t feel the cold. I didn’t feel anything.
The world buzzed dimly in my ears, as if I were submerged in a moment that hadn’t finished unraveling. As if time itself was trying to give me a moment to catch up.
Derek crouched in front of me, his posture protective, tense.
“Logan will pay,” he said, his voice low and steady. It felt like an anchor thrown through the fog. Something solid. Something! could hold onto.
I blinked, feeling like I was waking from a terrible dream. One where all the people I trusted wore masks, and underneath those masks were monsters with familiar hands.
“And Maggie,” he added grimly. “They’ll both be tried.”
I nodded faintly, not trusting my voice.
Because part of me–deep down–knew that Maggie had earned consequences. She had kept things from me. She had led a rogue faction that had hurt people.
She had lied when the truth might have saved us both.
But another part of me–the part that had laughed with her around a shared bottle of cheap wine, the part that had cried into her shoulder after nightmares, the part that had fought beside her through fear and fire and hunger–couldn’t help wondering if she had a point.
Maybe she’d been right.
Maybe society had failed her.
Failed all of us.
Maybe rogues who wanted peace never stood a chance. Maybe we’d built a world where people like her didn’t get options—they got exile. Chains. Judgment.
Maybe she hadn’t tried to break the world. Maybe she’d just tried to force it to see her.
And maybe just maybe–things didn’t always have to end in blood and chains.,
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Chapter 225
+25 BONUS
I didn’t know anymore.
What I did know was that I couldn’t carry all of it at once.
The betrayal. The heartbreak. The weight of everyone’s sins on my shoulders.
So I sat on that bench, hands curled in my lap, staring at nothing, and tried–desperately–to remember how to breathe.
I closed my eyes, drawing in a ragged breath.
When I opened them again, Derek was still crouched in front of me his hands gentle but firm on my knees, grounding me. Yes, Logan and Maggie would pay for what they’d done. But they weren’t the only ones who were in the wrong here. “And Cassandra?” I asked finally, my voice shaking. “Will she pay for what’s she’s done?”
Derek’s jaw tightened.
A shadow crossed his face.
“I will take care of Cassandra,” he said darkly.
There was no hesitation. No doubt.
And somehow, hearing that–knowing he would be the one to deal with her–for once let me breathe a little easier.
+25 BONUS
Chapter 226
