Chapter 94
Ariana moved before anyone could stop her, the word barely formed in her throat before panic took over and threw her forward. Pain ripped through her ribs the moment she lunged, sharp enough to steal her breath, but she kept going anyway, one hand stretched toward Kael as if reaching him even a second earlier might still change what was happening.
Mira reacted immediately.
She didn't shove him or drag him violently, but guided him back with a smooth, practiced movement that was somehow worse, because it made it look easy. Ariana came close enough to feel the cold shift in the air around his hand, close enough that for one wild heartbeat she thought she had made it, and then the distance between them folded wrong and he was suddenly farther away than he should have been.
"Kael!" she cried, her voice breaking under the force of it.
