Page 132 of She Who Holds My Wrath

Lucifer, leaning near the doorway, snorts. “Can confirm. Horrific at protecting himself.”

“But,” Ezra continues, pushing on despite Lucifer’s taunting. “I can help elsewhere. Healing. Support. Logistics. Something.”

Sariya tilts her head. “He has human endurance limits. That could be… useful in medial triage.”

Ezra blinks. “That’s the nicest insult I’ve ever received. I think.”

I stare at him for a long moment. The thought of him being involved in any of this is terrifying. But I guess it’s too late for that anyway. He became involved the day everything happened in the throne room. But if he’s inside the castle, helping the wounded… he’s out of their sight. Right?

“Actually,” I say slowly, “that’s a very good idea.”

Ezra’s eyes light up, and I can’t help but smile at him.

I turn to Aran. “Assign him to a senior healer. Someone patient.”

Lucifer grins. “Oh, this I want to watch.”

Ezra groans. “Please tell me they’re not scary.”

I laugh softly. “Ez, you’re in Hell. Everyone here is scary.”

Aran tilts his head, silently telling Ezra to follow him, and the council breaks apart. Plans are already moving, orders being murmured. Leaders drift towards the door, preparing to return to their realms and ready their people for what comes next.

My eyes follow Ezra as he walks towards the healers’ corridor, his shoulders a little straighter despite the nervous twitch to his fingers. I watch them all file out, one by one. And despite knowing this has been coming for a long time, everything suddenly seems to hit me all at once.

They came for my people. They came for my husband. They came for my fucking family. And now, they’re doing everything they can to make it that much more personal.

If I have to train twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week until they break through those godsdamned wards, I will. They will not come out of this alive, even if I have to die in the process.

Chapter 43

DAISY

“Oh, sweet girl you are doing so well.”

My eyes snap open. Darkness presses in from every direction, impenetrable and endless, like I’ve surfaced at the bottom of the ocean. My heart slams against my ribs as I twist, searching for walls, for ground, for anything familiar. But there’s nothing here. No sky, no ceiling, no horizon.

Nothing except one lone mirror in the centre of the space.

It floats there, suspended in the void, the only solid thing in existence. I step towards it slowly, my pulse roaring in my ears. The floor beneath my bare feet ripples with every movement, as if I’m walking across still water rather than solid ground. Each step sends soft waves outwards, vanishing into the dark.

The mirror glows faintly, a soft silver shimmer that lets out a vibration that hums low in my chest. It isn’t glass—not really. It feels more like a window. A doorway. A wound in the dark.

“Hello?” I call, my voice barely above a whisper. The sound echoes strangely, stretched and distorted, as if the space itself is listening and swallowing my voice.

“There you are,” a soft feminine voice replies.

It doesn’t come from behind me. It comes from inside the mirror. My breath catches as I step closer.

Except, it is not a mirror. I am not staring at my reflection. Not Daisy, not Dasmyrin, nor any fractured version of myself I’ve ever known.

Standing before me is an ethereal woman, tall and lean, her presence commanding without effort. Long hair cascades down her back, shimmering like falling starlight, each strand catching the faint glow of the mirror-like portal. Her skin is impossibly pale, almost luminous, as though light lives beneath it.

Her eyes—violet and bright enough that they almost burn. They are not cold, yet not warm either. Not welcoming, but not cruel. Something about them tugs at the edge of my memory. A strange, impossible familiarity. Not enough to place, but enough to unsettle. As if I’ve seen them somewhere else, hidden behind another name.

She’s so beautiful, it steals the breath from my lungs. So elegant, so utterly other that my instincts falter. I don’t know whether to kneel, or to run, or to stand perfectly still. Power radiates from her in quiet waves, pressing against my skin, my bones, my soul.

She does not belong to this world. Or any world I’ve ever seen.