Taveer moved like a storm barely contained.
In just a moment, he was across the distance between them. His red blade flashed like lightning, and Maika barely brought up her ward in time. The shield cracked, as she screamed under the force of impact, and she was thrown backward into the wall, gasping.
Nola didn't think.
She dove at him, slashing with her katana. The blade met his, steel on steel and the impact sent a shock through her arm so strong it went numb.
"Taveer!" she shouted, eyes wide, "It's me!"
He didn't blink.
Didn't speak. His stake had disappeared.
He turned and struck again.
Fast, heavy and merciless.
She ducked low and rolled to the side. His blade crashed into the stone where her head had been a heartbeat ago.
Maika scrambled to her feet, blood at the corner of her mouth. "That's not Taveer anymore."
"It is," Nola said, breathing hard. "He's still in there."
"You're gonna die trying to prove that."
Nola didn't argue.
She rushed him again.
Taveer met her swing for swing, each one sharper, tighter, stronger. It was like fighting the idea of a sword, not a person. His precision and unrelenting force were inhuman.
His movements were perfect. Too perfect. He wasn't holding back.
And he was winning.
Maika tried to flank him, dropped two freeze runes and hurled a binding spell. The ground beneath Taveer's feet erupted with ice, but he pivoted mid-motion, slicing the air in a circle around him.
The glyph shattered.
Maika cried out as the backlash struck her and sent her flying again, limbs limp, barely conscious.
"Maika!" Nola screamed.
Taveer came for her next.
She stepped into the strike, not away from it and locked blades with him again. The pressure was unbearable. Her knees buckled. She forced herself to stand.
"Taveer, please," she said, breath shaking. "You're stronger than this thing inside you. You don't want to hurt us."
His eyes, once dark and warm were now glowing red, swirling like a dying star. He leaned in closer. Said nothing.
Then shoved her back with a grunt.
Nola flew.
She hit the ground hard, rolled, came up with blood in her mouth and a fire in her chest.
She watched him walk toward her.
Maika coughed behind her.
They weren't going to win.
Not like this.
They'd always known Taveer was stronger than them. That he trained harder, studied longer, fought like it mattered more.
But knowing it and facing it while bleeding, desperate and alone was something else.
Nola's hand trembled as she raised her blade again.
He had always been the steady one. The immovable wall. The one who didn't flinch when others faltered.
She had always wondered how far he could go if pushed.
Now she knew.
And it terrified her.
"You remember me," she said. "You have to."
Taveer charged.
She parried.
The strike nearly broke her arm.
Blow after blow rained down. Her parries became flinches. Her flinches became bruises. Blood ran down her fingers, soaking into her blade hilt.
She stumbled.
Dropped to a knee.
"Taveer," she whispered. "Don't do this."
For a second, just a breath his sword hesitated midair.
His eyes twitched.
A flicker.
She reached out, desperate. "Come back to me."
Then the red returned. Stronger.
He raised the blade to kill her.
And Nola did the only thing left in her arsenal.
She surged forward.
Grabbed him by the collar.
And kissed him.
It wasn't graceful.
It wasn't perfect.
It was bloodied and broken and foolish.
But it was real.
It wasn't a spell. It wasn't a command.
It was him she wanted.
Not the weapon. Not the Willbound soldier. Just him.
He froze.
Just for a heartbeat.
Then the glow in his eyes cracked.
His body stiffened.
The sword dropped from his hand, clanging against the ground.
He staggered back two steps, his hand clutching his head.
A ragged gasp tore from his throat.
Like something was trying to crawl out of him and couldn't.
Nola didn't wait.
She lunged and struck the side of his neck with the flat of her blade, her whole body behind the blow.
Taveer dropped.
Hard.
Breathing shallow.
Unconscious.
Silence flooded the ruined hallway.
The only sound was the ringing in Nola's ears and the uneven rasp of her breath.
She dropped to her knees beside him, chest heaving, hands shaking.
She pressed her forehead to his.
"You're okay," she whispered. "You're okay."
Maika groaned somewhere behind her. "Well, damn."
Nola didn't laugh. She couldn't.
Because the blood on Taveer's lips was hers.
His breathing was uneven.
But he was alive.
He hadn't killed them.
And he was still in there.
Maika limped over, dropping beside them. Her hair was singed, her lip cut.
"I don't know what the hell that was," she said, "but I'm adding 'emotional attacks' to your spellbook."
Nola smiled weakly.
"I just… couldn't kill him."
"You kinda did, though," Maika said, glancing at the bruise forming on Taveer's neck. "With that weird kiss. He is going to kill himself when he wakes up."
She looked down at him. "He was terrifying."
Nola nodded.
"He's always held back when we sparred."
"Yeah," Maika said quietly. "And now we know how much."
They sat in silence for a while.
Broken.
But breathing.
Nola didn't let go of his hand.
She didn't want to.
It was warm.
Still warm.
"He was going to kill me," Nola whispered, like saying it now made it more real.
Maika didn't respond right away.
Then: "But he didn't."
"I don't know if that was because of me. Or if… I just got lucky."
"Who cares?" Maika said, softer now. "You brought him back."
Nola's hands clenched tighter around his.
"Next time," she said, "we might not get another chance."
Maika leaned her head back against the wall, exhaling slowly. "Then we make sure this was the last time."
The area around them was cracked and blackened. The stone under them stank of burning rift-blood. But above them, in the silence that followed the quake, the sky didn't split again.
No monsters surged through the walls.
No voices whispered in the cracks.
Only breath.
And stillness.
And the ache of what it took to survive.