INEXPLICABLE _(ⁿᵒ ᵒⁿᵉ ʰᵃˢ ᵗᵒ ᵏⁿᵒʷ, ᵃ ʰⁱᵈᵈᵉⁿ ᵖˡᵃᶜᵉ ᵒᶠ ˢᵉᶜʳᵉᵗˢ ᵃⁿᵈ ᵈᵉˢⁱʳᵉ)

Chapter 60 (Epilogue-1)

The dean's voice blurred into a muffled hum, like sound traveling through water. Her words, her calm tone, the clicking of a pen it all folded in on itself, dull and distant. What cut sharper was the pounding in my head, a rhythm that didn't belong to me, that felt like it came from somewhere outside, too loud, too violent. My chest rose and fell in shallow, uneven bursts, my throat tight as if a hand were wrapped around it. I blinked hard, but the edges of the room smeared, the outlines of the dean's desk and chair bleeding together. My knees buckled as a wave of dizziness tore through me, heavy and relentless. I stumbled back, one hand clutching at the air as though I could catch hold of something solid, something real. Then the muffled sounds began voices, far away, faint, shapeless. Not the dean's. Not anything clear. Just a steady murmur, slipping past me like echoes I couldn't quite grasp.

My pulse raced faster, my breathing staggered, every nerve in my body screaming Magnus's name, clinging to his scent, his touch, his ghost. I tried to hold onto that image him smiling, him trembling in my arms but even that began to blur at the edges, dissolving into darkness. "No... no, no, no..." I whispered, though the sound barely made it past my lips. My tongue felt heavy, my mouth dry, my words lost in the haze. The floor swayed beneath me, tilting, dragging me down with it. My grip on the edge of the desk slipped, my knuckles scraping wood as I fell. The muffled voices grew louder for a heartbeat, then dimmed again, like someone turning the volume up and down in my skull. And just before the darkness swallowed me whole, one name rose louder than all the rest in my mind clear, desperate, undeniable.

Magnus.

"No..." The word scraped out of my throat like broken glass. My knees threatened to give, but I locked them, every muscle trembling with effort. The room tilted, spun, but I forced my eyes open wider, blinking against the blur. If I closed them, I knew I'd lose him. I bit the inside of my cheek until I tasted iron, using the sting, the burn, the tang of blood to anchor me here. To keep me from slipping under. Think, Alec. Think of him.

Magnus's laugh low, unguarded, the one he only ever gave me when we were tangled up in the quiet of our dorm nights. The warmth of his palm pressed flat against my chest as though he was measuring my heartbeat with his own. The scent of sandalwood and cloves clinging to his maroon robe when I pulled him into me that first night in beach cabin, both of us too young and too reckless and too sure we had forever. I could hear him, even now. 'Alexander', whispered with that impossible mix of affection and command, the way only he could say my name. "Stay," I muttered under my breath, whether to him or to myself, I didn't know. "Don't leave me. Please don't leave me." The muffled voices around me swelled again someone calling my name this time, sharp, urgent but I forced them out. They weren't who I needed. It was Magnus's face I dragged back into focus, his eyes those beautiful, endless, almond-shaped eyes that undid me every time. If I could just hold onto that image, if I could just keep him here in my mind, then maybe I wouldn't break.

My body buckled forward, my hands gripping the desk so hard my knuckles turned white. Sweat slid down my temple, my chest heaving in ragged gasps. My head screamed to give in, to let the dark take me, but my heart clawed and fought back, clinging to him. "I won't..." I rasped. "I won't lose you. Not again." And so I stood there, trembling, half-conscious, half-broken held together by nothing but the memory of Magnus's touch and the stubborn refusal to let go. My grip on the desk slipped. I didn't even realise my fingers had gone numb until they failed me, until the wood slid out from under my palms like water through a sieve. My knees buckled, and I staggered back, catching myself only halfway against the wall. "Magnus..." His name was all I had left, a lifeline I kept whispering, like if I said it enough times, he'd come back, walk through the door, tell me this was some terrible mistake.

But the silence that followed was deafening. The voices outside blurred into one another Cody, Caterina, maybe Izzy?....I couldn't tell anymore. My ears were ringing, my vision flickering, like a candle guttering against a storm. I pressed my forehead against the wall, the cool paint burning against my fevered skin. My chest ached, every breath sharp, shallow. I tried to force air into my lungs, tried to force Magnus's face to stay sharp in my mind. His smile. His eyes. His hands holding me in that dorm bed when I thought the world was too heavy. But even those images began to blur. "No...no, stay," I begged the memory, begged my own body. "Don't take him from me...not again." My body didn't listen. The strength bled out of me all at once, leaving me hollow, weightless. My legs gave way, the wall sliding out from under me, and I hit the ground hard on my knees before collapsing fully, cheek pressed to the cold floor. My lips still shaped his name even as the darkness clawed its way up my spine, swallowing everything.