ELARA'S POV
"We have six months until the world ends because of our love, and you're just NOW telling me this?"
I'm shouting at Raven, who stands completely calm in her cracked mask while I lose my mind.
"Would you have preferred to know from the beginning?" Raven asks. "When you were barely surviving each day? When you were just discovering you were pregnant? When would have been the perfect time to learn that loving your husband might destroy the kingdom?"
"ANY TIME BEFORE NOW!"
The Memory Veil shimmers with my rage. Nearby memory bubbles pop and reform, reflecting my anger back at me in a thousand glowing spheres.
"What do I do?" My voice breaks. "How do I stop loving him? How do I save everyone?"
"I don't know." Raven's honesty is almost cruel. "No one's ever survived this prophecy before."
"Before? This has happened before?"
"Twice. Both times, the Phoenix heir loved someone they shouldn't. Both times, their combined power destroyed entire kingdoms when their child was born." Raven pauses. "Both times, everyone died. Including the child."
I sink to my knees on the glass floor. "So I'm doomed. My baby is doomed. Everyone is doomed."
"Maybe." Raven kneels beside me. "Or maybe you're strong enough to change fate. Maybe love can be enough if it's the right kind of love."
"What does that even mean?"
"I don't know." She stands and walks away. "But you have six months to figure it out."
I'm alone again with impossible knowledge.
Footsteps approach. Vincent.
He sits beside me but doesn't touch me. Smart man.
"Raven told you," he says. Not a question.
"You knew." Not a question either. "You've known this whole time."
"Yes."
"And you didn't think I deserved to know that our child might end the world?"
"I thought—" His voice catches. "I thought if I kept my distance, if I never let myself fully love you, maybe the prophecy wouldn't activate. Maybe I could protect you and still save everyone."
"How'd that work out?"
"Terribly." He laughs bitterly. "Because I fell in love with you anyway. The moment I pulled you from those flames in Cindergrace, covered in ash and fighting to stay alive—I fell. And every day since, I've fallen harder."
My chest hurts. "Vincent, I can't—"
"I know. You need space. Time. Answers." He stands to leave. "But first, you deserve the whole truth. About the night we don't remember. About what really happened."
I look up at him. "You said we spent the night together. That's the truth."
"That's part of it." Vincent's face is pained. "But there's more. Sit with me. Please. Let me explain everything before you decide whether to hate me."
Against my better judgment, I stay seated. He sits back down, careful to keep distance between us.
"The night before Cindergrace burned," Vincent begins, "I was hunting for Phoenix rumors. I'd tracked reports of unusual fire activity to your village. I was planning to investigate the next morning."
"But you stopped at the tavern first."
"I was exhausted. Hungry. I needed rest before scouting." He stares at his hands. "Then I saw you. Sitting alone in a corner booth, crying into apple cider. You looked so lost."
Fragments of memory surface. The tavern. The corner booth. Feeling hopeless because of nightmares I couldn't explain.
"I should have walked away," Vincent continues. "But something pulled me to you. So I sat down. Asked if you were okay."
"I remember that." The memory is fuzzy but there. "You had kind eyes. You didn't laugh at me for crying."
"You told me about nightmares. Fire and screaming. Faces you couldn't quite remember. Feeling like you'd lost something important but didn't know what."
"And you understood." More pieces clicking together. "You said you had the same dreams."
"Because I did. Nightmares about the coup. About your mother dying in my arms. About failing everyone." Vincent's voice drops. "We recognized each other's pain without knowing why."
The memory grows clearer. Talking for hours. Feeling less alone. His hand reaching across the table to hold mine.
"We talked until the tavern closed," Vincent says. "Then you didn't want to go back to your empty house. And I didn't want to be alone either. So we walked. Talked more. Ended up at a small inn."
My face burns. "And then..."
"And then we spent the night together." Vincent won't look at me. "But it wasn't just that, Elara. We performed a blood binding ritual."
I freeze. "What?"
"You suggested it. You were half-drunk, emotional, desperate to feel connected to something. You said you were tired of being alone. That you wanted to belong to someone who understood." His hands clench. "And I was selfish enough to agree."
"A blood binding is marriage," I breathe. "You married me while I was drunk?"
"Yes. And then..." He swallows hard. "Then I panicked. The next morning, I realized what we'd done. I realized the binding gave me access to your Phoenix magic—which meant the rumors about fire activity in Cindergrace were because of YOU. Which meant you were the child I'd saved seven years ago."
The world tilts. "You realized I was her? That morning?"
"Yes. And I was terrified. If the binding revealed your magic to me, what if it revealed you to my mother? What if our connection made you easier to track?" Vincent's voice shakes. "So I did something unforgivable."
"What did you do?"
"I found a memory mage. Paid everything I had. Made them erase our memories of that night—yours and mine. We'd both forget we married. Forget we slept together. Forget we even met." He finally looks at me, eyes full of tears. "I thought I was protecting you. But I was just a coward who stole your choice."
Rage floods through me so hot that fire sparks across my skin.
"You ERASED my memories? On top of everything else, you took away my ability to choose?"
"I know. I know and I'm sorry and there's nothing I can say that makes it right—"
"You're damn right there isn't!" I'm on my feet, power crackling around me. "You married me without my real consent. You stole my magic through that bond. Then you erased my memory so I couldn't even know what you'd taken!"
"Elara, please—"
"And the worst part?" My voice breaks. "The worst part is I'm PREGNANT with your child and I can't even remember conceiving them! I can't remember choosing to create this life that might destroy the world!"
Memory bubbles around us start exploding from the force of my emotion. The glass floor cracks under my feet.
"I know!" Vincent shouts back. "I know I'm a monster! I know I've destroyed you twice—once when I was nine, once when I was twenty-five! I know you should hate me! I hate myself!"
"Then why?" Tears stream down my face. "Why do all this? Why manipulate me? Why marry me in secret? Why steal my magic? Just kill me if that's what you really wanted!"
"BECAUSE I LOVE YOU!" The words explode out of him. "Because from the moment I pulled you from that palace fire when I was nine years old—when you were just three and looking at me with those terrified silver eyes—I loved you! Because I've spent seventeen years trying to keep you safe even when it meant doing terrible things! Because the prophecy is right and loving you will destroy everything but I CAN'T STOP!"
The silence after his confession is deafening.
We stand there, both breathing hard, power crackling between us—his shadows and my flames creating storms in the Memory Veil.
"You loved me when I was three?" I whisper.
"Not like that. Not romantically. I was a child too." Vincent's voice is raw. "But in that moment, covered in my mother's crimes, holding a terrified little girl—something in me broke. I decided right then that I'd protect you no matter what. That you'd be the one good thing I ever did."
"So you've been obsessed with me for seventeen years."
"Yes."
"That's not love. That's guilt."
"Maybe it started as guilt." He moves closer. "But it became love. Real love. The kind that makes me want to die if it means you live. The kind that makes me become a monster to protect you. The kind that dooms the world but I don't care because at least you're in it."
I should run. I should hate him. I should want him dead.
Instead, I ask: "Why did you erase your own memories too? You could have just erased mine and kept yours. Why make yourself forget?"
Vincent's smile is bitter. "Because I knew I'd fall even harder if I remembered. I knew I'd cross lines I couldn't uncross. So I tried to protect us both by forgetting." He laughs without humor. "Obviously that didn't work."
"No. It really didn't."
More silence. The Memory Veil swirls around us, full of other people's pain and joy and lives we'll never live.
"What do we do now?" I finally ask.
"I don't know." Vincent looks as lost as I feel. "The prophecy says loving me destroys everything. The smart choice is to separate. To raise the child apart. To never speak again."
"But?"
"But we're blood-bound. Magically married. Connected forever whether we want to be or not." His gray eyes meet mine. "And even knowing all of that, I still love you. I can't stop. I won't stop. Even if it burns the world down."
I should tell him to leave. To stay away from me and our child. To let me figure this out alone.
Instead, I step closer. "The prophecy says our love will either save or destroy. Not definitely destroy. Either or."
"Yes."
"So maybe—" I swallow hard. "Maybe if we fight for it. If we make our love strong enough, pure enough, good enough—maybe we can be the salvation instead of the damnation."
Hope flickers across Vincent's face. "You really think that's possible?"
"I don't know. But I'm tired of running. Tired of being afraid." I touch my stomach. "This baby deserves parents who fight for them. For each other. For the world."
"Even if we fail? Even if the prophecy comes true and everything burns?"
"Then at least we burn together." The words feel right even though they're terrifying. "At least we tried."
Vincent closes the distance between us. His hand cups my face gently. "You're either the bravest person I've ever met or the most foolish."
"Probably both."
He laughs—real laughter that sounds like relief and fear and hope all mixed together.
Then he kisses me.
It's different from any kiss we might have shared before. This one is honest. Full of all our broken pieces and terrible choices and impossible love. His shadows wrap around us gently. My flames warm but don't burn.
For just a moment, we're not enemies or prophecies or doomed lovers.
We're just two people who found each other in the darkness.
When we finally break apart, we're both crying.
"I forgive you," I whisper. "For the memory erasure. For everything. I don't forget. But I forgive."
"I don't deserve—"
"None of us deserve anything. We just get to choose what we do with what we're given." I lace my fingers through his. "So I choose this. I choose you. I choose to fight for our family."
Vincent pulls me close, burying his face in my hair. "Then we'll fight. Together. Against the prophecy, the Queen, fate itself."
"Together," I agree.
We stand there holding each other while the Memory Veil swirls around us, and for the first time in days, I feel like maybe we have a chance.
Then Raven's voice cuts through the moment: "Hate to interrupt the romantic reconciliation, but we have a serious problem."
We pull apart. Raven stands nearby, her cracked mask somehow conveying urgency.
"What problem?" Vincent asks.
"Isabella just finished telling us everything about the palace defenses." Raven's voice is grim. "And there's something you need to know. Something that changes everything."
"What?" I demand.
"The Queen isn't just keeping Lily prisoner for leverage." Raven looks at me. "She's using her for experiments. Trying to replicate Phoenix magic artificially. And according to Isabella, she's finally succeeded."
My blood runs cold. "What does that mean?"
"It means," Raven says slowly, "the Queen has created her own Phoenix soldiers. Twelve of them. Each one as powerful as you, but completely loyal to her. And she's planning to use them to burn every rebel stronghold in the kingdom simultaneously."
"When?" Vincent's voice is sharp.
"Three days." Raven's mask tilts. "In three days, the Queen launches her attack. And unless we stop her, everyone we know—every rebel, every sympathizer, every person who's ever helped the Phoenix cause—will burn alive."
The moment of peace shatters.
"Three days," I breathe. "That's not enough time to prepare."
"No," Raven agrees. "It's not. Which means we have exactly one choice."
"What choice?" Vincent asks, though I can see he already knows.
"We attack first." Raven's voice is steel. "Tomorrow night. We assault the palace, rescue Lily, destroy the Phoenix soldiers before they're deployed, and kill the Queen."
"That's suicide," I say. "We're not ready. We don't have enough fighters. We'll be slaughtered."
"Yes," Raven agrees. "Probably. But if we don't try, everyone dies anyway. At least this way, we die fighting."
She walks away, leaving Vincent and me alone with impossible math.
Attack tomorrow and probably die.
Or wait three days and definitely watch everyone we love burn.
"We have to do it," Vincent says quietly. "Attack tomorrow. It's the only choice."
"I know." I touch my stomach. "I just wish..."
"What?"
"I wish we had more time. With each other. With this baby. With everything."
Vincent's hand covers mine on my stomach. "Then let's make a promise. If we somehow survive tomorrow—if we beat the Queen and break the prophecy and save everyone—we'll take our child and disappear. Find a quiet place where no one knows we're Phoenix or Ironhart. Just be a family."
"You'd give up everything? Your title, your power, your whole life?"
"For you? For them?" He looks at me with such love it hurts. "In a heartbeat."
I want to believe we'll get that chance. I want to believe we'll survive and escape and be happy.
But looking at Vincent's face, I see the same knowledge reflected back:
Tomorrow, we probably die.
And even if we don't, the prophecy is still counting down.
Six months until the baby comes.
Six months until our love either saves or destroys the world.
But first, we have to survive tomorrow.
And that might be the hardest battle of all.