Page 109 of Autumn L.A.W

Perfect. He paced. Still, the sorceress’s words echoed.

‘Impossible to undo.’

Duke’s jaw tightened. “Yeah,” he said. “We’ll see about that.”

He pushed off the table and headed for the deeper stacks.

“Gods, Goddesses, help me fix this.”

Silence answered.

Fine. He’d do it himself.

Something about the sorceress didn’t sit right. Too smooth. Too helpful. That wasn’t closure. That was a cover.

His father had hidden things. Important things. By the time Duke took over, dementia had already erased the map.

Which meant the library still had secrets. “There’s more,” he said.

He started by pulling the book the way his mother had shown him, revealing the forbidden ones.

If the answer wasn’t here, he’d find it somewhere else. Because “impossible” was just a word people used when they ran out of better ideas.

And Duke wasn’t even close. Victoria wasn’t staying like this.

Duke tore through the shelves like a man who had officially run out of patience.

Books slid out, stacked, abandoned. Scrolls unfurled and were dismissed just as quickly. The library didn’t mind the chaos. It seemed to lean into it, shifting subtly, as if it approved of his desperation.

Good. Someone does.

He’d always been curious. Relentless, even. It was how he’d survived inheriting a magical library with more secrets than a politician’s hard drive. But this? This wasn’t curiosity anymore. This was personal.

Victoria’s face kept cutting through his focus—cool, controlled, unflappable. Except now he knew what was coming for her. Loss. And the worst part? He couldn’t fix it. Yet.

His jaw tightened as he yanked another book free. “Not good enough,” he muttered. Because by now, it wasn’t just about restoring balance to the coven. It was about her. Somewhere between strategy meetings and near-death experiences, he’d crossed a line he hadn’t meant to cross.

He was in love with her. Not her body. Not the version of her the world recognized. Her.

Which made this whole situation especially cruel, because while her body didn’t matter to him, it mattered to her. And that was a stumbling block he couldn’t control.

He exhaled sharply and shoved that thought aside before it could slow him down.

The League would get involved. Of that, he had no doubt. If the sorceress didn’t cooperate, they’d make her. The witches weren’t exactly known for gentle persuasion on a good day—and now that Rayna’s pets had returned their weapons? ‘Subtle’ was off the table.

Still, he hesitated. There was a difference between extracting answers and crossing a line you couldn’t uncross. He didn’t know which side of that line they were standing on anymore.

A prickle ran up the back of his neck. Duke stilled. The library had gone quiet. Listening quiet.

He turned slowly. Nothing. No movement. No shadow out of place. Just rows of books pretending they weren’t full of dangerous ideas.

“Fantastic,” he muttered. “Now I’m imagining an audience.”

The feeling lingered. As if something had leaned in and then thought better of it. He didn’t like it.

He turned back to the shelves, searching faster now. Time was not on his side.

Victoria’s condition didn’t just affect her—it threw off the entire coven. They fought as a unit, moved like one mind split across multiple bodies. Every spell, every battle, every chaotic, barely-controlled magical disaster—they relied on that connection.