Chapter 152: One Last Day

Chapter 152: One Last Day

POV: Astrid Vale

I woke to the sound of Ivy and Xander arguing about eggs, of all things, their voices carrying clearly through the apartment despite the closed door of my room.

"You’re supposed to whisk them, not attack them," Ivy said.

"I’m whisking aggressively. That’s a valid technique."

"It’s not a technique, it’s violence against breakfast."

I found Reed standing between them in the kitchen, spatula in hand, looking like a man trying and failing to maintain peace between two nations.

"Good morning," he said, not looking away from whatever crisis he was attempting to prevent.

"What’s happening?" I asked.

"Xander refuses to follow basic instructions," Ivy said.

"I’m improvising," Xander said. "There’s a difference."

"There isn’t."

Since nobody had classes today, and my medical leave still technically applied, we decided to make lunch together rather than ordering something, which in retrospect was probably a mistake given the chaos already unfolding before we’d even started cooking properly.

Reed measured everything with military precision, laying out ingredients in careful order, while Xander ignored every instruction the moment it left Reed’s mouth, adding things by instinct that consistently turned out wrong. Ivy, meanwhile, seemed determined to sabotage the entire process purely for entertainment, deliberately mismeasuring things whenever Reed’s back was turned.

I joined in properly instead of hovering on the sidelines the way I might have a few weeks earlier, chopping vegetables and stirring things that probably didn’t need stirring, simply because being included in the chaos felt better than being protected from it.

The mess escalated faster than any of us intended. A handful of flour ended up on the counter, then somehow on Xander’s shirt, and within minutes he’d retaliated by flinging a small amount directly at Ivy, who shrieked and immediately threw something back at him with considerably more force than necessary.

"This is unnecessary," Reed said, trying to maintain composure while flour dusted the counter around him.

"You’re just mad you haven’t been hit yet," Xander said, and promptly remedied that, sending a cloud of flour directly at Reed’s chest.

Reed’s expression shifted from irritation to something far more dangerous, and within seconds he’d joined the chaos entirely, and I found myself laughing so hard I could barely defend myself as flour rained down from every direction, all four of us covered head to toe by the time we finally called a truce.

"We’re never getting our security deposit back," Ivy said, surveying the wreckage of the kitchen.

"We’re princes," Xander said. "We don’t have security deposits."

"Must be nice."

Once we’d cleaned up as best we could, we settled into an old academy game the twins had apparently grown up playing, some strategy game involving cards and small carved pieces that Xander immediately began cheating at within the first few rounds.

"You moved that piece wrong," Reed said, catching him instantly.

"I did not."

"You absolutely did."

"I’m defending him," Ivy announced, purely, I suspected, because irritating Reed had become her favorite pastime.

"You don’t even know the rules," Reed said.

"Doesn’t matter. Solidarity."

Despite the chaos of cheating accusations and Ivy’s baseless alliance, I somehow won the game entirely, which prompted immediate outrage from both twins and a declaration from Ivy that I clearly had hidden talents nobody had properly appreciated.

"Beginner’s luck," Xander insisted.

"That’s my third win this week," I pointed out.

"Suspicious," Reed said, though he was smiling as he said it.

By late afternoon, Ivy had curled up on the couch, drifting toward sleep despite her earlier protests that she wasn’t tired at all, and I found myself outside on the small balcony with Reed and Xander, the evening air cooling around us as the sun began its slow descent.

We talked about ordinary things, nothing connected to Elaris or investigations or anything heavier than what club I might consider joining once I returned to classes properly.

"You should try archery," Xander said. "I’ve heard you have surprisingly good aim."

"I’ve never held a bow in my life."

"Exactly. Untapped potential."

"What about you?" I asked Reed. "Still running student council?"

"Someone has to keep this one in line," he said, nodding toward Xander.

"I don’t need keeping in line."

"You’ve been suspended twice."

"That was character-building."

I laughed, leaning back against the railing, letting the conversation drift easily between us without any weight attached to it, no danger lurking beneath the surface, no mystery demanding attention. Just three people talking about ordinary futures, classes and clubs and whether Xander could actually survive another semester without earning himself detention again.

Sitting there, watching the sky shift into evening colors, I realized something significant. I hadn’t thought about Elaris once in the past several hours. Not because I’d forgotten Liora, not because any of it had stopped mattering, but because I’d simply been living, fully present in this moment with people who loved me, without needing to carry that weight every single second.

That felt like its own kind of victory.

Eventually we headed back inside to clean the remaining mess from our earlier cooking disaster, Ivy stirring awake long enough to help before declaring herself too exhausted to continue and heading off toward her room with an exaggerated yawn.

"Goodnight, everyone," she called from down the hall.

"Goodnight," I said, still scrubbing at a particularly stubborn spot of flour on the counter.

Reed and Xander lingered as I finished, both of them teasing me gently about tomorrow, about whether I’d survive an entire day of classes without needing a nap, about whether Xander’s terrible habit of falling asleep during lectures would somehow become my problem too by proximity.

"You’ll be fine," Reed said finally, more sincere beneath the teasing.

"I know," I said, and I actually believed it.

I said goodnight and headed toward my own room, pausing at the doorway to look back at the messy kitchen one last time, flour still dusted across surfaces we clearly hadn’t cleaned thoroughly enough. Something about the disaster of it made me laugh softly to myself.

Tomorrow, Moonshade would look different, feel different, carry weight it hadn’t carried before everything happened. But tonight had reminded me exactly what I was returning to underneath all of that uncertainty. Friends who genuinely cared about me. A routine worth rebuilding. People who loved me enough to throw flour across a

n entire kitchen just to make me laugh.

That was worth walking back into whatever waited for me tomorrow.